No expiration date.

I went to chapel this morning with a friend from our unit, a Southern Baptist friend at that.  As it goes with church-visits as well as dates, the first one is always akward.  The newcomer anxiety only rises as they say "if you're new with us, stand up!"...but wait, we're all deployed for little stints at a time, so everybody is new all the time!  It was akward, but it didn't get to the point of the old women trying to match us up with their grandsons living a state away; and besides, I'm thoroughly taken.

The chaplain (and I use chaplain because it's an ecumenical service with worship choruses) spoke for about 20 minutes on Matthew 16:21-28.  In the beginning of the passage, Jesus is revealing the plan of His Death ad Resurrection to the disciples, and Peter tells him "no way" (in more eloquet words.  Jesus' response to this is "Get behind me, Satan...For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man."  While the "sermon" was filled with personal stories, the truth of God's word came through in this point: God's will be done.  The idea is that we have plans, we make plans and try our best to follow through and avoid trouble.  But the Lord, he has a plan for us.  If he had listened to and agreed with Peter, and not rebuked him, our redeptive history would not exist. 

I was also reminded of this in my reading with Jonathan.  There is a story of a couple who basically got married in college because they had a perfect picture in mind, and the story goes that their plan was put to the test and their "dream" marriage ruined, only for God to enter in and redeem their marriage.  It was only when their plan had failed, that failure being within God's will, that their marriage was upheld and made strong in the Lord.

It's a very pertinent truth for us at this time, one that never expires, gets old, or has less meaning at any time.  The truth is that we cannot step outside of God's will, and that the trouble we face and try to avoid is also part of God's plan.  The Lord be praised for his work in all of these things.  "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." (Jeremiah 29: 11...read more for great encouragement).  God is good and he is good all the time.  It will never get old.

ps. I realize that I really miss singing aloud in my own home.  Another reason to be thankful for chapel!
pps. The book I keep referring to is "What Did You Expect?", a book on marriage by Paul Tripp.  All good marriage books point to the gospel, and this one does for sure.
ppps. If there are mispelled words, excuse my poor writing but the spell-check on my computer at work is connected to an Arabic network, so it highlights about 95% of the words when I tell it to check my work.  Oops.