How to Respond When God Turns Your World Upside Down
Life is full of uncertainty. We know that there are any number of things that can happen in an instant to change our circumstances, and our perception of those things can be good or bad, based on what we know in the present.
But there’s just one little problem:
Our knowledge and understanding are so limited, and much of the time, we are content to settle for so much less than God has in mind for us because we can’t see what’s on the other side.
But God can. He sees the entire picture—the end from the beginning. Nothing is a surprise to Him.
So let me ask you a few questions:
What if God turned your world upside down?
What if He asked you to quit your job or move to another city or country?
What if His desire for you is to adopt rather than have biological children?
Do you trust Him with your dreams, your family, your future?
Our family has experienced many changes over the years including job loss and relocating 4 times during the 22 years that my husband, Tony, has worked for his company.
I have a confession to make. I used to worry about so many things. It’s something I am still working on, but I have learned some important facts over the years:
Nothing that happens in our lives is a surprise to God, and He always goes ahead to prepare the way and to provide what we need.
Relocating to West Des Moines, Iowa, for Tony’s job (part of a corporate merger) was not even close to being on my radar. I was in the process of completing my college degree at Kansas State University, something I had waited a long time to do. I had even applied for and been awarded a grant which would have paid for my tuition. My plans were in place.
But God…
God had other plans, and even though it was apparent that He was blessing our move and we were supposed to be there, I was still trying to adjust to a new city and really missing home.
Needing to buy food and supplies, we drove to a Hy-Vee that was near our house. As we were making our way down the aisles, I was thinking how much bigger it was than our grocery store back home and how it just didn’t feel the same. Those thoughts seem silly as I reflect on them, now, but I was dealing with so many different emotions at the time.
As we pushed our cart toward one of the registers and proceeded to put our items onto the conveyor belt, the young man who was sacking groceries asked me, “Would you like drive up?”
I said, “I don’t know what that is. We just moved here.”
Continuing the conversation, he asked where we had moved from. When I said, “Manhattan, Kansas,” he proceeded to tell me that members of his family owned a small restaurant near Manhattan and that he was preparing to move there in a couple of weeks.
While it may not seem like much, in that moment, home didn’t seem so far away. God had managed to bring the familiar to me. Seriously, what were the odds that we would choose to purchase groceries at that particular store, at that particular time, in order to meet that particular person?
God knows where you are and what you need, and He has the power to get you where you need to be and to connect you with the right people.
Perhaps you have a dream that God has placed in your heart, and you wonder how you are ever going to achieve it with a house full of children and limited resources. Maybe you are facing job uncertainty or a company transfer. While the human thing to do would be to worry about these things, if you know Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, you can trust His plans for your life.
You are not on your own here—really.
If God has called you to something, He has already gone ahead to prepare the way.
So what should our response be when the unexpected happens?
We only have two choices: We can choose to trust Him, or we can choose to live with worry and fear.
I can tell you that it is so much better to live in the freedom that comes with the decision to trust and surrender our lives to Him. Remember, He knows what’s in our future.
“For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope” (Jeremiah 29:11 NLT).
If we see Him as He is—a loving God who cares deeply about us (his children)—we must also accept that He is in control and that His plans are good when viewed from an eternal perspective.
The truth is that we won’t always understand why some things happen on this earth.
So we cling to Him, in obedient surrender, and hold to the truth “that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love [him] and are called according to his purpose for them” (Romans 8:28 NLT).
The God who made the universe loves you. There’s nothing that He cannot do. Trust Him to provide everything you need along the way.
(Updated content from a blog post titled Seasons of Change, originally published October 24, 2012.)
