What is BEST for You?

Having just celebrated another birthday, I reflect back on the long journey in my life. Many of the happenings have made little sense in my earthly temporal understanding until I looked back with an eternal perspective (sometimes years later). Jeremiah 29:11 has certainly given me additional insight into God’s personal attention for each of His children; He declares to us, “For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future”.

In those plans I, along with most of you, mentally believe that a loving Father wants the best for His kids. Where we struggle is in God’s definition of BEST that appears to have some negative temporal components.

God has each of us in a disciple training program where the “desires of our hearts” become what God in His love defines as “best”, many times not what we ask for.

God is a good, kind, and loving Father. Psalm 34:8 says, “Taste and see that the Lord is good”. God wants to give us His best. Believe it and expect it. Too often we think God is mad at us or we’re not worthy of God’s best. God’s best is not about how good or worthy you are, but it is based on your faith in Jesus and what He did for you.

God has great plans for our lives– the best plans. Simply believe God wants the best for us. Unfortunately, most Christians get focused on their plans and end up missing what God has for them. We spend a lot of effort and time trying to make our plans come to pass. We pray and try to convince God to bless our plans. However, Proverbs 19:21 tells us, “There are many plans in a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s plan that will stand.”

The key to knowing God’s best is to discover His plan for your life. His plans are already blessed. His plan for you is His best. He will direct your steps and lead you toward His best when you trust Him. Proverbs 3:5-6 says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.” He’s not trying to hide it or keep His plan or best from you. Trust Him and He will direct you in His best.

God’s best many times involves trials, discipline, and suffering. James 1:2-4 instructs us, “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” Hebrews 12:10 says, “He disciplines us for our good, that we may share in His holiness” - the ultimate essential of character.

Trials and discipline provide suffering that teaches us that God’s best in the Christian life is not the absence of pain. 2 Corinthians 1:5 “For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ”.

The Christian life is all about an eternal perspective. Whatever happens or doesn’t happen in our short temporal earthly life is not the objective and the goal. 2 Corinthians 4:17-18 “For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.”

God’s very best is Jesus who came into this world to show us God’s grace. Jesus who suffered so terribly to take the punishment that you and I so richly deserve so that we can have a real, intimate, powerful, and eternity long relationship with God. God’s best in the Christian life is transforming us into Christlikeness to have an eternal intimate relationship with Him.

That’s the whole purpose of everything Jesus did for you and for me--to open the door to that tender intimate relationship with Him eternally. God’s cry from the beginning of the Bible to the end is His desire to be our God and for us to be His people. Colossians 3:1–3 says, “Since then you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on the things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.”

Our loving Heavenly Father wants to eternally dwell in our midst and for us to be with Him and to behold His glory and to enjoy His presence and to worship Him in a way that is completely divine. Praise Him for His best in our lives!