Let's begin with a couple of personal questions. What are the worries that haunt your private thoughts? What's the burden you can't share with anyone? And here's another one. What's the predicament that leaves you speechless?
Today on Insight for Living. Chuck Swindahl offers this stunning truth from Romans chapter 8. While we live blindfolded to the future, God sees it all with perfect clarity. He's not discovering, learning, or scrambling to adapt his plan. Instead, he's masterfully preparing us for what lies ahead.
From Chuck's teaching series on the book of Romans, here's today's message called Providence made practical. For those of us who believe in the goodness and the greatness of God, His providence over all things in our lives. offers comfort and encouragement. Even when we're at our wit's end. And we have no idea even what to pray for, Again, God's providence offers comfort.
to our confused hearts.
Now the question is how? Our lives are in the hands of a sovereign God. Never forget that. He attends to every detail.
Furthermore, he's never caught off guard. by what you and I would call tragedies.
Furthermore, he causes all things to work together For good. And for his glory. God's providence has practical implications. For our everyday lives, as we learn to rest in His sovereignty rather than resist it. And haven't we all done that?
The Apostle Paul penned some of the most comforting truths in all of his writings. in the final verses of Romans chapter eight. In fact, they're the favorite verses of many Christians. Let me read you his words from verses 26 through 30. of Romans 8.
In the same way, the Spirit also helps our weakness. for we do not know how to pray as we should. But the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings. too deep for words. And he who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is.
because he intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God. to those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew, he also predestined to become conformed to the image of the world. of his son.
So that he would be the firstborn of the world. among many brethren. And these whom he predestined he He also called. and these whom he called He also justified and these whom he justified. He also glorified.
You're listening to Insight for Living. To dig deeper into the book of Romans on your own, be sure to purchase our Searching the Scriptures Bible Study Workbook by going to insight.org/slash offer. Chuck called today's message Providence Made Practical. I have no idea what you are facing today. Chances are good down in the depths of your soul, where you entertain your innermost thoughts.
The one sitting next to you. does not know of that struggle. Quite likely, those who are members of your own family. are not aware of Those wrestlings in the deep recesses of your life. You would expect me to say this, and I See it.
In spite of that, honestly, God is the only one who knows. You And the living God who made you The one who brought you to where you are at this moment. In reality, only the two of you know. It's true for me as well. You have no idea.
What I am facing. Personally. in the deep recesses of my life. There are things known only between God and me. And because that's true, often the wrestlings accompanying.
Those things cannot be put into words. In many ways, we are not free to share them. Knowing that They cannot be entered into fully by anyone else. Oh, perhaps with a little compassion here or understanding there, but not deeply, not fully. The great truth in the scriptures is that God.
knows everything. Theologians call this divine omniscience. Omniscience. God is not discovering, God is not learning. God is not watching and then adapting.
His plan to fit What might Help make us comfortable. God's plan is set. His knowledge is thorough. Because both are true, we can rest only when we rest in that plan. A.W.
Tozer, in a fine work titled The Knowledge of the Holy. writes this of divine omniscience. God perfectly knows Himself, and being the source and author of all things, it follows that He knows all that can be known. And this he knows instantly. And with a fullness of perfection that includes every possible.
item of knowledge concerning everything that exists. Or could have existed anywhere in the universe at any time. In the past. or that may exist in the centuries or ages yet unborn, He continues. Because God knows all things perfectly, He knows no thing better than any other thing.
But all things equally well. He never discovers anything. He is never surprised. Never amazed. He never wonders about anything, nor does he seek information or ask questions.
He continues: How unutterably sweet is the knowledge that our Heavenly Father knows us. Completely. No tailbearer can inform on us. No enemy can make an accusation stick. No forgotten skeleton can come tumbling out of some hidden closet to abash us.
Or expose our past. No unsuspected weakness in our characters can come to light to turn God away from us. Since he knows us utterly before we knew him and called us to himself in the full knowledge of everything that was against us. How good is that? He knows it all.
And what makes it even better is the one who knows us that well loves us with a love that cannot be put into human words. Surrounded by and enveloped in a compassion that cannot be described. Keep that in mind. as you track with me through the rest of this message. Because you will be tempted to doubt it.
Since God knows all of these things, and since God is good to the core, and never can be anything but good. And since God is full of mercy and compassion, his plan that is underway is wrapped in all of those eternal attributes. All of those.
Now then. Suddenly we move from the vertical to the horizontal. And I ask you right now to think. Think about one thing in your life that is beyond you. One struggle.
One addiction you can't break. One test. You dread. One fact That causes you to struggle and wrestle. keeps you awake at night.
One thing that haunts you. Like a ghost. Put that one thing from your mind through a. Pen or pencil. Alongside verse 28 of Romans chapter 8.
Will you do that? Pull out a pen.
Now, before you write it out, we're a nosy bunch here, so before you write it out, Just put initials there, okay? UNEMP might be unemployment. But use something else because somebody will notice you wrote that. You might put the initials of a person that is so difficult. No matter how hard you try, you can't seem to penetrate that relationship and resolve that conflict.
Put the initials of that person there. You choose the one thing in your mind right now that you can't find escape from. or an answer to You write it down.
Now then, having done so, below it, write today's date. I want you someday in the future to come back to this alongside Romans 8:28. And from the perspective of the passing of time, just that simple perspective. you will have gained a number of things right now that you lack. But for now, It is beyond you.
It is in the category of what you might call an impossibility. I understand that. I am In this city where I live, the Fixer. I fix people. I worked for years to fix my wife.
And realized that's not too successful, so I went to work on fixing my children. And then, as they married, I thought, now it's my task to fix. They're spouses. That certainly didn't work and then I began on grandkids. And that isn't working either.
Now, I am fixing congregational members, I am fixing board members, I am fixing staff members, I am. With tongue in cheek, having a little fun with you, I can fix nobody. I can't even fix me. I heard that, honey. She said, amen, under her breath.
I cannot fix me. Yeah. If I may change for a moment. From the ridiculous to the sublime, God. Fixes Everything.
Everyone. He has never met his match. He has never come to an obstacle he can't scale. He's never come to a situation he can't penetrate. Never come to a problem he can't solve.
Never come to a situation that absolutely defies. Resolution. That is why God can write what He does in the 28th verse of Romans 8, because He knows all. Able to fix all. In his time and according to his plan, we can count on the truth of this verse, even though, don't miss this, even though we can never find it.
fully understand it.
Now We don't like that. Because we like understanding. We not only like fixing, we like understanding. And when we don't understand, then we begin to accuse God of not being fair. And the world is full of people like that.
They're called fools in the scriptures, but that's another subject. Romans chapter 8 verse 25 will tell you part of the reason we wrestle like we do with the plan of God. We do not see. I have those words underscored in my Bible. Romans 8, 25, we hope for what we do not see.
Looking to the future, beyond this second, this moment of the present, we do not see a thing in the future. We think we do. We plan for the future. We budget for the future. We make arrangements for the future.
We do not know. We cannot see there. And because we cannot see and he can see it all. We can trust him. But there's another.
Because we do not see, we tend to turn to Him waiting and praying.
However, there are times we can't even pray.
Next verse. In the same way, the Spirit helps our weakness, for we do not know how to pray as we should. That's the next thing to underline. Not only do we not see, we do not know. Let it say what it says.
Don't try to change it. Don't soften it. You and I do not see. And so we wait and we pray. And we keep waiting and we keep praying, and it doesn't change like we want it to change.
And on top of that, it gets to the place where our weakness is so great we can't even put our prayers into words because we do not know what is best. Many of the things that many of you wrote do not have some prayer attached to it. You don't know what to do about it. You don't know the answer to it. You don't know anyone else who knows the answer to it.
That's why it's so profound. And so what do we do? We groan. That's what the verse states. The Spirit intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.
I've often been tempted to ask congregations all together, just groan together. Just sigh together. From times in our deepest, most arduously difficult times we just Sly. We just grown. And then, out of the midst of this impossible setting.
where we do not see and we do not know. were given an unconditional promise. What does that mean? It means this is what God will do and is doing. apart from anything you do or don't do.
It is without condition. There's no if. If you do this, then God will do that. This is an unconditional Promise. to his children.
Before we can appreciate it, let's understand we tend to focus on the immediate. Because God focuses on the ultimate. We're in the here and now. God is in the forever seat. We see today's x-ray from the physician.
God sees tomorrow, the next day, and the year to come, and the years to come. We are panicked sitting in the chair in the office, in the medical office of our physician. God is not panicked. God is not biting his nails. God is not nervous.
God is not unsure. All we know at this moment is this is what it says, and the doctor has used the C word. And we break out in a sweat. Because we can't see beyond the cancer, the moment the word is used. Or, whatever may be the situation that is marked in the margin of your Bible.
We see the immediate God focuses on the ultimate. We also forget that our knowledge is limited and God's is unlimited. He can do anything with anyone at any time. That's the great thing about our God. He is truly networked.
He is connected. At any moment he wants to use any person or any event he pleases, it gets used.
Now, the verse, this great verse that's for years. Been for some a point of rest and relief, and for others a point of struggle and argument. And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. Start with the first two words: we know. Right beside those words, put these words: this promise is to be claimed, not ignored.
God wrote this promise in His Word to be claimed. Not simply red.
So, at the risk of being a little pedantic, the verse does not say we hope. We guess We suppose We feel We pray. We wish We're told It says we know. The term used for no is the Greek word for absolute unshakable confidence. Our confidence is not in our situation.
Our confidence is not in our working things out. Our confidence is not in someone else working things out. It is in God Himself. We know that He is at work. We know, and in knowing this, it becomes the connecting link between God's working and the solution to our situation.
It's the link. and I hang on to it by knowledge. I know it. I repeat it to myself. I read it.
I say it to myself. If I refuse to know this doctrine regarding God, then I will never rest through the situation in which I find myself. I will never find rest in it.
Now the second. God causes God causes those next two words.
So let's put it this way, the project is God's, not ours. The project is God's. not ours. We think the situation is our situation. It's God's situation.
Since He knows all, and since He loves us with an infinite amount of love, and since He is good to the core and filled with compassion, the situation in which I find myself is the place for God to do His best work. It's the platform of His sovereign working. He's at work on my clay. He's at work on my life. Hold your place and look at Jeremiah chapter 18.
The prophet is given an assignment. And it reads strangely to us, but in those days it would have been a very common assignment. God says to his prophet, Arise and go down to the potter's house. And there I shall announce my words to you.
Now for a moment. I would venture to say that most people hearing me now have never once been in a potter's house. You have probably never seen a potter at work. You've read of it, you've seen pictures of it, you've heard about it. But in those days it was as common as the local service station.
Because every village had potters' houses. because everyone had something to carry. In those days, there wasn't plastic bags located at the local Albertsons or. Um Kroger store. Um There weren't boxes that you could buy down at the joint.
down the road. It's a good word to fall back on when you can't think of UPS There weren't cardboard boxes, there were jars. There were potters who made jars, and containers and pots. That was the most common thing, and even carried water on their heads. If you carried something, you needed a pot.
So he went down to the familiar place and he looked again at what he must have seen since he was a little boy playing in the streets of the town where he was raised. Go to the potter's house. And I went down to the potter's house and There he was making something on the wheel. Watch closely. But the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter.
So he remade it. into another vessel. as it pleased the potter to make. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Can I not? O house of Israel, Deal with you as this potter Does declares the Lord.
Behold, Like the clay in the potter's hand, So are you in my hand? O house of Israel. That's as far as we'll read, but before you turn back. Would you allow me substitute your name for House of Israel? And then read the verse again.
Can I not? Put your name there. Deal with you as this potter does. declares the Lord, behold, like the clay in the potter's hand.
So are you.
So are you In my hand. Again, your name. God needs, K-N-E-A-D-S, God needs and presses, pushes, and pulls. The creative work starts over again patiently, skillfully. God doesn't give up.
God doesn't throw away what is spoiled. That includes your life. And mine. No matter how bruising the past has been. No matter how deep the pain.
No matter how wrong the actions. No matter how long the addiction. You are not a spoiled product. You are being reshaped. And Romans 8:28 is the statement declaring the reshaping because God is causing it to happen.
He knows it all, He is good to the core, He is enveloped in compassion, and because of His mercy, He never stops working on your clay. Never. God's providence means He sovereignly causes all circumstances in our lives, even the painful and difficult ones we can't understand, to to work together for our ultimate good. You're listening to the Bible teaching of Chuck Swindahl, and this is Insight for Living. Chuck titled his message Providence Made Practical.
and there is much more to learn from this passage in Romans. Whether you're a new student of the Bible or you've been reading God's Word your entire life, it's important to renew our minds with these liberating truths. For that reason, Insight for Living offers a number of helpful resources. And today I want to draw your attention to Chuck's compelling biography of Abraham, the patriarch of the faith. and one of the people that Paul refers to in his letter to the Romans.
We've selected a powerful chapter from Pastor Chuck's book, Abraham, One Nomad's Amazing Journey of Faith. It's the chapter that describes how Abraham earned the title Friend of God and cultivated an unshakable relationship with his Creator. and it adds a richer understanding of our study. We'd be pleased to provide you with this deeply personal chapter about cultivating friendship with God. It'll come as a downloadable PDF so you can read it on your mobile device.
and in the chapter titled, Can We Talk?, Chuck wrote these words. God, like a good friend, remains interested and available. ready to hear you express your most private thoughts and ready to offer help for today. Like Abraham, you can maintain your respect for the Almighty while turning to him as a friend. This exclusive offer is available to our current monthly companions and to anyone who joins today.
Monthly companions provide automated monthly donations at whatever amount works for their budget. This is one of the finest ways to support the Ministry of Insight for Living. By giving every month, your partnership has a multiplying effect. In fact, your support as a monthly companion enables millions of people to access Chuck's teaching across radio, Facebook, YouTube, X, and Instagram. To become a monthly companion right now, go to insight.org slash monthly companion.
I'm Bill Meyer. Join us when Chuck Swindahl continues to present his enlightening message about God's providence. Tomorrow on Insight for Living. The preceding message, Providence Made Practical, was copyrighted in 2007, 2010, and 2025, and the sound recording was copyrighted in 2025 by Charles R. Swindahl, Inc.
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