Many cynically believe that God created the universe, but now remains distant, aloof and uninvolved. But the truth is that God holds intimate knowledge of every person and is always working behind the scenes to draw them to Jesus. And when He wins a person's heart, He faithfully works to conform them into the image of His Son.

Host: Rose, as we continue our discussions on Steve Gallagher’s book, “Living in Victory,” we want to talk this week about Chapter 9: “The God Who Works.” And when you think of all the men and women who have ever existed, and ever will exist, God really is busy at work, isn't He?

Rose: It’s mind boggling. It’s impossible to even wrap your mind around it. He's huge.

Host: What a God we have. You know, there are different views on how God interacts with man. There are those who believe that God has created everything and then basically took His hands off His creation and is just kind of letting things wind along on their own. But I don't know how you can come to that conclusion reading Scripture, because Scripture certainly paints a different view of God's interaction with man.

Rose: If you look at Scripture or even our own lives you will see how involved God is in every detail in our lives. I think about Psalm 139 where it says, “For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb.” (Psalm 139:13, NKJV) And then it goes on to say, “My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, and skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, the days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them.” (Psalm 139:15-16, NKJV)
       Every single person on this planet, God sees them and knows them from the minute they are conceived in their mother's womb. And everything about that person's life, God already knows about from the beginning to the end. To me that is just so amazing. Just think about all the ways God goes out of His way to work in our lives through different circumstances, or situations that go a certain way. And it’s all to bring us to a place where we see our need for God and cry out to Him so that we can turn to Him and come to know the One who created us.

Host: Right. It's pretty obvious when somebody is converted. They can say, as Paul said, “we were bought at a great price.” When you are born again, you can really see the work of Christ and what He did. But sometimes I think we forget about all the things that God did in our lives leading up to that point.

Rose: If you look back from there, you see that God has been involved in every single thing you’ve gone through. Whether it was good or not good, He’s been involved in it all. He’s been quietly behind the scenes working, and the whole thing He’s been working towards is to draw us to Himself.

Host: Yes. And when we come to that point of salvation, that certainly isn't where His work stops. He doesn't stop working on us at that point. And the mistake I made was thinking, “OK, I'm saved. It's all over. I can go live my life the way I want to live it.” But no! He's very involved in our lives after that point.

Rose: He really is. It's amazing how He'll put people in our lives even. I can remember when before I began walking with the Lord. He had me working alongside a woman that was constantly sharing Jesus with me. And then even after I gave my heart to the Lord, He positioned other people in my life. In the workplace. At the college I was attending at night. I was seeking a church to get involved with and He put people in my pathway to help me find the right one. He constantly brought people into my life that were able to speak into my life and help me to grow in my relationship with the Lord, people who would give me godly counsel and wisdom.

Host: Amen. But sometimes He brings people into our lives to rub us the wrong way so that we can see what’s in our heart.

Rose: That too. And you know, many times we think it's the enemy coming against us, and we don't see that it's the hand of God that is all over things. There may be someone at work we're not getting along with. Or someone that we have a completely different personality than. Maybe our personalities rub against one another. And then we get all upset and blame the devil for what we are going through. And meanwhile the Lord is saying “no, I'm bringing this situation or this person into your life because I want you to see what's in your heart.”

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Host: Yes. And that's one of the wonderful things that we experience here at Pure Life Ministries, because we work together and we live in such close proximity to one another. We're together so often and it's wonderful to see how God uses different personalities in this little family of ours to do a work inside of each of us.

Rose: Yeah. He does. And I think about the verse that says iron sharpens iron. (Proverbs 27:17) There's a lot of sharpening happening here.

Host: Yeah. There's a lot of sharpening going on here for sure. But it's a wonderful mercy of God to allow that sharpening to happen.

Rose: It really is, because He's wanting to conform us into the image of Christ. But we often don't realize how much we're not like Christ until we're around other people. Especially other people that aren't like us.

Host: Yeah. And what we see through this is that God has tremendous care and concern for His people.

Rose: He does. Romans talks about how there's a groaning going on and that the Sons of God will be revealed on the earth in the last days. And the Lord is trying to work in our lives to bring that about so that when people look at us will see a living epistle not written with ink, but an epistle of the Holy Spirit flowing out of our lives.

Host: You know, Rose, we're talking about the God who works, and what you're talking about kind of reminds me of the Potter and the clay. And if you've ever watched a potter put the clay on the wheel, sometimes the clay gets all messed up and he has to kind of bring it back down and start over. And I think if we understand that, then it will help us to understand how God works in our life. There are going to be good times and bad times. There are going to be times where we feel close to the Lord and times where we feel far away from the Lord. But in the midst of it all, our Father's hands are still on that clay and He's still molding us.

Rose: Yeah. What's so amazing is that as He's molding us and shaping us, His imprint is being placed on us. And the finished product has His imprint all over it. Think about it. When someone's working on that piece of pottery, they beat it down and it looks ugly, but they keep working with it and working with it until it becomes something beautiful. But that beautiful piece of pottery now has the master’s imprints all over it and around it, inside of it and underneath it. And that's really what He's after in our lives.

Host: I was in high school when I tried putting clay on the wheel and it ended up flying off the wheel. But God doesn't do that. He is perfectly balanced. He knows just what we can take, just what we need.

Rose: Yeah. He's perfectly balanced in what He's creating, and we just have to cooperate with Him just like the clay does. It just lays there and basically says, “go ahead, do with me what you want to.”

Host: Yes. It’s a wonderful work that He's doing in us and wants to do in all of us.

Rose: Amen.