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Key Bible Verse: "But you are my witnesses, O Israel!" says the Lord (Isaiah 43:10). Bonus Reading: Isaiah 43:5-13

Hilary of Tours urged us to avoid the blasphemous anxiety of doing God's work for Him. We're all invited to work in God's kingdom, but only God can really do what He has in mind. The Lord expressed this [Isaiah 43:10] through His prophet. It's the job of a witness to watch for God's salvation, not to make it happen. Only those convinced they have a Savior can avoid the temptation of becoming one themselves.

Much of the time we wonder where our lives are heading. Sometimes we grow so anxious over the confusion that we decide to take over and complete things according to our ideas of what God should be doing. That's usually when the disasters start. We must develop a regular habit of giving ourselves, our families, jobs, and churches back to the Savior. We can do that only if we hold our expectations about the future pretty loosely.

God has a way of always getting what He wants. He's at work—even if we can't see it, and the stuff we do see looks anything but divine. Yet if we're faithful, in time, usually with hindsight, we discover God's plans are much more thrilling than the smaller ideas we had in mind.

—M. Craig Barnes in An Extravagant Mercy

My Response: What is it that I need to give back to the Savior?

Thought to Apply: What we need very badly these days is a company of Christians who are prepared to trust God as completely now as they know they must do at the last day. —A.W. TOZER (Illinois pastor, writer)

Adapted from An Extravagant Mercy (Servant, 2003) by permission.

Copyright © 2005 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine.Click here for reprint information on Men of Integrity.

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Prayer for the Week

Forgive me for calling you Lord and then trying to run things as if You weren't in charge.

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