November 19, 2025

GOD’S WORD FOR TODAY:

“For He chose us in Him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in His sight. In love He predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ, in accordance with His pleasure and will….”

(Ephesians 1.4-5)

TODAY’S REFLECTION ON GOD’S WORD:

Where would we be if not for God’s “pleasure and will”? What if others are right that humans exist as a product of chance? Wouldn’t that mean that this world is our home and there is no other existence apart from it? Wouldn’t that mean that all we do on earth has no consequence anywhere else? Wouldn’t it mean that such promotion of self would be the highest level of achievement we could reach? Wouldn’t that mean that our thanksgiving is limited to our accomplishments and random chance and acts of kindness? My head starts spinning just thinking of a world and a life without God. It seems that futility would finally cast a lasting shadow over us all. Imagine that there is a point where nothing we can do or say can change that most certain future which some preachers declare, “From dust we came and to dust we shall return.” (Ecclesiastes 3.20) In those teachings many attribute to Solomon, we hear of the futility experienced in life resulting from a lack of believing in God. If our only view of God was nature, then there is great wonder to behold. Any future life comes as the byproduct of the present life such as “from little acorns, mighty oaks grow.” It is a cycle of life solely dependent on the environment which ebbs and flows from season to season. To see only life and death and life and death in generation after generation whose eternal legacies then become grave markers and tombstones, would not inspire any pleasure and good will. We would be limited to a “thanksgiving” for the past. Each day is built on that past. But what of tomorrow. Only by the measure of our good pleasure and will (or is it works), dare we move forward knowing the day will come when nothing we can say or do will change that most certain future of returning to dust.

Thank God that is not all there is to life. Without God there is no lasting hope for tomorrow. Without God, everything we know and do will cease to matter or exist. The mountains of the past will loom over what little future will eventually exist. We see it happening already as trouble piles up and hope itself becomes a shadow in the fading light of today. Without God there is a mad scramble to get to the top of the heap in order to see the light of day. There the light of day will pass and tomorrow ceases to exist…without God. Mighty ones of God, we dare not lose sight of that promised tomorrow where the light of day never fades. In The Revelation given to John, the light of day is finally known as the eternal glory of God who completely dwells in the midst of us. We see it daily in smaller doses sufficient to keep us alive and hopeful. It is God’s “pleasure and will” to build us up so that when the day comes to be fully known as we will know fully, we will not be overwhelmed. A huge part of the “building up” comes in sharing the faith with others. By using our gifts, talents, abilities and faith in God, we help others to hold on to the promise of tomorrow and not merely hope there will be a tomorrow. The promise of God can never be broken. It was established as an enduring reality for our lives before we were ever born or conceived of. Moving in this Thanksgiving season, we need to turn our eyes away from the things which pass away and focus on what is eternal and enduring. It is not all the things for which we give thanks because we have them and others lament because they do not. Our true thanksgiving comes in knowing that because of God there is a tomorrow that will never pass away and we are destined to be a part of it…if we only believe.

TODAY’S PRAYER IN RESPONSE TO GOD’S WORD:

Father, in these days we are finding the need to believe even more than ever before. We all have known trouble, some in greater ways than others, but You are offering us the assurance that we will not be consumed by it forever. Regardless of the “time” we are in and the “time” we have been given, we ask for Your Holy Spirit which Jesus asked You to share with us, to lead and guide and direct us in the paths we should go. Teach us what we still need to learn. Empower us to put that learning into action. Bless our actions not as a works righteousness but as righteous works of faith, hope and love in Jesus’ name. AMEN.