6 Christian Places to Visit in Rome You Should Know About
Rome is famous for its standard tourist sites: The Trevi Fountain, the Forum, Piazza Navona, the Colosseum, the Pantheon—and many other historic...
The first Christmas looked like a coincidence. From a human perspective, politics set the agenda: Caesar took a census of his people. End of story. But it wasn’t.
(Photo: Bethlehem Fields with Herod’s Herodium in background. Courtesy of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands)
From the divine viewpoint, God orchestrated ordinary events for extraordinary outcomes.
Think about this past year in your life. Many ordinary events occurred. Most of them you don’t remember. But God has been working. It isn’t just the Christmas story.
It’s your story too. God uses the power of providence in your life.
Most citizens saw the census as an inconvenient, brazen abuse of Roman power. Count the people so you can tax them.
But we, the readers, see God’s providence arranging the details so that God’s purposes would come to pass.
Don’t miss the message there. This isn’t just the Christmas story. It’s your story too.
(Photo: Camel rider approaching Bethlehem. Courtesy of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands)
Think back through the last few years of your life. Notice how would-be coincidences and seemingly insignificant circumstances have brought you where you are today.
From the human perspective, we can misinterpret God’s providence as inconvenience. Or even as divine cruelty.
But it isn’t.
Fast-forward to today. If God has worked so in the past, you can be sure He is guiding you by the events you’re experiencing right now. Do you believe that? That’s called walking by faith.
As with the first Christmas, so it is today. Our chances are really God’s choices. The power of coincidence is really God’s providence.
And He calls us to trust Him that it is so.
Tell me what you think: How has a coincidence in your life shown to be God’s providence? To leave a comment, just click here.
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