Eodus 16:4 Then the LORD said to Moses, “I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day. In this way I will test them and see whether they will follow my instructions.”

God already knows our tendency to disobey Him, but He allows circumstances to help us understand it as well. When we think we can follow God on our own, we get into terrible traps. It is when we follow Him in humility, depending on His guidance and His grace, that we indeed walk as He intends, in the victory that He has planned for us. God knew ahead of time that the Israelites would have to wander in the wilderness for 40 years, but He also knew that telling them that, and why they would have to do that, from the outset would produce such a reaction that they wouldn’t set out in the first place. God understands our weakness and foolishness and loves us anyway. It is when we recognize and acknowledge that weakness and foolishness that we are enabled to walk in the fellowship with God for which we were created.

I have certainly experienced this big time. I was already a married Army veteran with a child when the Lord tapped me on the shoulder and showed me a mirror, and I understood the depth of foolish pride that I had been walking in. That experience was pivotal in my life, and I am deeply thankful for it. I hadn’t been fooling God in the least, but I had managed to fool myself into thinking I was a fine Christian, when my heart was very far from God. However, when I turned around, He was right there. It is painful to me now to see people who are doing as I did prior to that experience, and I see quite a few, but I know that God’s grace is as great toward them as it was toward me, and I pray that they would come to their senses sooner rather than later, for their own benefit and the benefit of everyone around them.

Father, thank You again for the magnificence of Your grace toward me. May I be a fully open channel of that grace toward those around me, teaching, admonishing, supporting and encouraging as You intend, so that the Body of Christ may be built up for Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!