Article Library

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By Pastor Chuck Swindoll

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Claim the Promise of Romans 8:28

“This promise is to be claimed, not ignored. It’s an unconditional promise. Doesn’t say we hope, we guess, we feel, we’ve been told, we pray. It says we know. There’s confidence in the word. There’s an absolute assurance in this word. The term conveys unshakable confidence. We know this. And please note our confidence is not in our situation or in our working things out or in some kind of blind fate. It is in God himself. This verse is all about God. It isn’t so much about us.”

God Sees the Ultimate Plan

“So this brings up a couple of wrestlings with His providence that come to my mind. One is we tend to focus on the immediate, God always on the ultimate. It’s in the here and now we lose the joy. We lose the victory. God sees the overall, ultimate unfolding of His plan. We tend to focus on the immediate, He on the ultimate.”

God’s Knowledge is Unlimited

“Another reason for the wrestling, we forget that our knowledge is limited, and God’s is unlimited. We think we’ve thought it through. We think we’ve considered all of the angles. Neither is true. Isaiah 55:8–9: ‘My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways. For as the heavens are high above the earth, So are My ways above your ways and My thoughts above your thoughts.’ What a magnificent God we serve. What a majestic, awesome heavenly Father who sees it all finished and here we are in this ever-present now.”

It’s God’s Project, Not Ours

“All this came clear to Jeremiah in the potter’s house. The brute fact of the clay, lumpish and inert, shaped for a purpose by the hands of the potter, and then as it took shape, the realization of the uniquely designed individuality and wide-ranging usefulness it would acquire as a finished pot, painted and baked and glazed. You’re a lump of clay. You think you know the shape it will take. You have no clue. All the while, He is reshaping the clay through losses and disappointments and brokenness and failure, and pressure and the unexpected which God causes. This project is God’s. It isn’t mine.”

For Our Good, Never Evil

“Finally, the purpose is good, not evil. You can always count on this. Your heavenly Father will never cause or allow anything to cross your path that will be to your detriment or for an evil purpose ever, ever, ever. You will reach a block wall, you’ll come to a dead end, and you will think at this moment, I cannot go on. And your majestic heavenly Father will realize this is a point now where I must reshape the clay because this is for your good.”

Additional Resources

First, sign up for our Chuck’s Insights on Ministry email where we bring you his best thoughts on preaching, leadership, and ministry each week. By signing up, you’ll instantly receive a one-page checklist with 20 preaching insights from Chuck. See this page’s sidebar.

Second, check out our new Preach The Word articles and video series on YouTube where we’re teaching Chuck’s best insights on this important calling.

Third, listen to Chuck’s messages to those in ministry through our Seminary Chapels page. For decades, he offered students at Dallas Theological Seminary his best thoughts on church leadership and ministry. Now, we have put them at your fingertips. Also, you can find them through this YouTube playlist we created for you.

Fourth, if you don’t own a copy of Chuck’s book on preaching, Saying It Well, we highly recommend you add it to your library. It’s his preaching memoir that is also like a practical preaching manual. You won’t be able to put it down.

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