No One Can Stop You

No One Can Stop You

Job replied to the LORD: “I know that you can do anything, and no one can stop you. You ask, ‘Who is this that questions my wisdom with such ignorance?’ It is I. And I was talking about things I did not understand, things far too wonderful for me.” –Job 42:1-3

A diving accident in 1967 left Joni Eareckson Tada a quadriplegic and introduced her to life in a wheelchair. “I had reasoned it was pure dumb luck that I went to the beach that day,” she writes. “And it was my misfortune that I swam out to the raft. It was the law of averages that the tide just happened to be low.” That’s what she thought until she considered Job’s story and saw that God is clearly in charge. “Satan conspires to use everything from the Sabeans to the Chaldeans, from freak storms to fire from the skies . . . but God is the one who ultimately grants the devil permission to harm Job.”

Joni figured that if Satan and God were involved in her accident at all, then the devil must have twisted God’s arm for permission and God hesitantly agreed. “Then I reasoned that once God granted permission, he nervously had to run behind the devil with a repair kit, patching up what Satan had ruined, mumbling to himself, ‘Oh great, now how am I going to work?’ Worse yet, I thought that when I became disabled I had missed God’s best for me, and the Lord was then forced to go with some divine Plan B.”

Do you think that Satan’s clever schemes, someone’s careless act of violence, or a crushing setback have thrown God’s plan for your life off course, caught God off guard? Do you think you are forever relegated to living life in the disappointment of Plan B? Here is the truth: God’s plan for your life is unfolding, and nothing and nobody can hinder it—not Satan, not your spouse or your ex-spouse, not your sickness. Whatever is happening in your life, you can welcome it as God’s sovereign Plan A. God carries out his own good purposes without mistakes or regrets, and his plan is never thwarted.

Job waved a white flag of surrender, taking back his brash words and harsh questions about God’s purposes for the pain in his life. Do you need to pull out your white flag and surrender to God’s Plan A?

Lord, you can do anything and no one can stop you. I don’t want to stop you from doing what you will for my life. I surrender to anything and everything that is your divine and surely wonderful Plan A for my life.

DIGGING DEEPER