Life’s Detours

We all experience life’s detours—those unexpected twists and turns which disappoint and frustrate us because they’ve disrupted our well-laid plans. When the next one comes our way, let’s be careful how we respond. If the disappointment turns into anger and bitterness, then we know we’ve clearly lost sight of one of the central tenets of biblical Christianity—namely, that God is sovereign.

Of course this is not some kind of fatalism that gives us license to rejoice in our failures or the sins that others commit against us. God’s sovereignty doesn’t preclude the fact that sin is sin and worthy of our regret and repentance. But it should keep us from wallowing in our hurt and becoming disgruntled when circumstances beyond our control take us down an unforeseen path that lands us in a place we didn’t want to go.

In part because none of it was “unforeseen” to the God who loves us, and more importantly, because the “twists and turns”, we are told, are all a part of his wise plan to accomplish with our lives something better than our well-laid plans ever could (Genesis 50:20; Romans 8:28; Psalm 119:71; Proverbs 19:21; Acts 2:23-24; etc.). So let’s trust in our sovereign God and get over our disappointment quickly. He is working out a plan that will glorify himself, and will be good for us in the long run.