The future belongs to God. What does that mean? It means God controls the future, not man. Man may plan out a future for himself or others, but that doesn’t mean it will happen. Not when the same man has planned the future only to walk out of his building and get fatally hit by a bus, instance. Not when the owner of a ball club plans for the club to bring home a world series only to find that his star player has been injured and is out for the rest of the season. The best that man can do is to guess what the future may be.
It would seem to make sense in our mortal minds that God controls the future, though the world doesn’t turn based on what we think. And a true believer in the Almighty believes on the basis of what the Bible tells us. In Jeremiah 29:11 it says “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” If God can create the universe, He can create the future.
And He is eternal. Deuteronomy 33:27 says, “The eternal God is your dwelling place, and underneath are the everlasting arms…”
The vows we make toward our future may only have teeth if we temper our vows toward what God provides for us. Without God’s playing a part, the vows we make are not absolute. We may vow to defeat our enemies, but such vows are worthless if the enemy is beyond our reach. But we could perceive that, for example, Joshua at some point made a vow to defeat the Amorites, and that vow was not beyond his reach, especially since in Joshua 10:12, after having spoken to God, Joshua says to the sun to “stand still at Gibeon” so with the assistance of the sun he can defeat the Amorites with God performing the actual miracle of the sun.
The Bible advises us to include God in our vows. James 4:13–15 says, “Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit’—yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, IF THE LORD WILLS, we will live and do this or that." That makes it plain that the future is in God’s Hands. A few ‘God Willings’ may take you a long way…God willing.
It would seem to make sense in our mortal minds that God controls the future, though the world doesn’t turn based on what we think. And a true believer in the Almighty believes on the basis of what the Bible tells us. In Jeremiah 29:11 it says “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” If God can create the universe, He can create the future.
And He is eternal. Deuteronomy 33:27 says, “The eternal God is your dwelling place, and underneath are the everlasting arms…”
The vows we make toward our future may only have teeth if we temper our vows toward what God provides for us. Without God’s playing a part, the vows we make are not absolute. We may vow to defeat our enemies, but such vows are worthless if the enemy is beyond our reach. But we could perceive that, for example, Joshua at some point made a vow to defeat the Amorites, and that vow was not beyond his reach, especially since in Joshua 10:12, after having spoken to God, Joshua says to the sun to “stand still at Gibeon” so with the assistance of the sun he can defeat the Amorites with God performing the actual miracle of the sun.
The Bible advises us to include God in our vows. James 4:13–15 says, “Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit’—yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, IF THE LORD WILLS, we will live and do this or that." That makes it plain that the future is in God’s Hands. A few ‘God Willings’ may take you a long way…God willing.
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