100 Days Of Favor (33 page)

In 2003, another brother from my church was in Jakarta, Indonesia, for a business trip. He was staying at the Marriott Hotel and he was in the lobby when a bomb went off just outside the hotel. The bomb tore through the lobby and he saw a body flying past him as the deafening blast reverberated all around him.

After the dust had settled, he found blood spattered on him and debris strewn all around, but amazingly, he was completely unhurt. At the very moment when the bomb exploded, he
happened
to walk behind a pillar and it protected him from the impact of the blast. Just think what would have happened to him if he had reached that pillar just a few seconds before or after the bomb went off!

No matter how intelligent you are, how fat your savings account is or how prestigious your family name may be, there is no way you can know beforehand when to position yourself behind a pillar just as a bomb that you are unaware of explodes near you. Only God can put you at the right place at the right time. It was the Lord who placed this brother behind the pillar at the precise moment. His steps were literally ordered by the Lord. All glory to Him! Jesus is our true pillar of protection!

God’s faithfulness in protecting His beloved by putting them at the right place at the right time was demonstrated even more recently. Two massive explosions rocked Jakarta, Indonesia, again on the morning of July 17, 2009, and this time both the Marriott and the Ritz-Carlton hotels were the targets of terrorist attacks.

A lady from our church was in the lobby of the Ritz-Carlton when one of the bombs was detonated in the nearby restaurant where guests were having breakfast. The force of the explosion sent glass shards flying past her, ripping into the flesh of other guests who were standing in front of her. Amazingly, she was completely unharmed!

She shared that she had initially planned to have breakfast at that very restaurant at the time the bomb exploded. That would certainly have put her at the wrong place at the wrong time. If she had done so, she could have been killed by the blast in the restaurant. However, she shared that the reason she missed her usual breakfast time that morning was that she was caught up in reading a few devotional entries from my
Destined To Reign Devotional
and spending time with the Lord in her hotel room. The “delay” she experienced in reading my book kept her away from the restaurant and saved her life! Praise Jesus!

My friend, nothing happens by chance—the Lord knows how to place you at the right place and the right time! You can depend on Jesus for right happenings. They all come by His unmerited favor. In the new covenant of grace, the Bible says that the Lord Himself writes His laws on your heart (Hebrews 8:10). He can speak to you and guide you in everything that you do. Allow Him to lead you supernaturally!

Today’s Prayer

Father, I thank You that my steps are ordered by You because I am righteous in Christ. And because there is no detail of my plans or my life that escapes Your attention, I can trust You to position me at the right place at the right time, safe from any danger and set up for good success. Father, I look to You and Your unmerited favor to protect me and my family from all harm and make our way prosperous.

Today’s Thought

My steps are ordered by the Lord because I am righteous in Him.

Today’s Reflection On Favor

DAY 76

Pray For
Qarah
Today

Today’s Scripture

Then he said, “O Lord God of my master Abraham, please give me success this day, and show kindness to my master Abraham.” —Genesis 24:12

B
ELOVED
,
I
WANT
to show you how you can pray for and experience God’s divine positioning for good success today.

There is a principle in interpreting God’s Word known as “the principle of first mention.” Every time a word is mentioned for the first time in the Bible, there is usually a special significance and lesson that we can learn. Let’s take a look at the first occurrence of the word
qarah.
¹
It is found in Genesis 24, when Abraham sent his unnamed servant
²
to look for a bride for Isaac, his son.

We need the Lord to give us
qarah
every day.

The unnamed servant arrived at a well outside the city of Nahor in the evening and decided to stop there. There were so many young women gathered to draw water there that he did not know who would be the right woman for Isaac. So the unnamed servant prayed this prayer: “O Lord God of my master Abraham, please give me
success
this day, and show kindness to my master Abraham.”

The word “success” here is the Hebrew word
qarah,
and this is the first time it appears in the Bible. The servant essentially prayed, “Give me
qarah
this day.” It goes without saying that with the Lord’s
qarah
or positioning for right happenings, the servant found a beautiful virtuous woman named Rebekah, who became Isaac’s bride.

We need the Lord to give us
qarah
every day. I encourage you to pray the prayer of that unnamed servant. Tell the Lord, “Give me success—
qarah
—this day,” and depend on His unmerited favor to cause you to be at the right place at the right time!

Today’s Prayer

Father, show me kindness and give me
qarah—
success—today. In whatever assignments, appointments or errands I have to attend to today, I ask that You direct my steps and place me at the right place at the right time, so that I can accomplish all that I need to do with ease and experience Your good success.

Today’s Thought

Success in my endeavors depends on the Lord who positions me at the right place at the right time.

Today’s Reflection On Favor

DAY 77

Have Confidence In The Unmerited Favor Of Jesus

Today’s Scripture

And she went, and came, and gleaned in the field after the reapers: and her hap was to light on a part of the field belonging unto Boaz who was of the kindred of Elimelech. —Ruth 2:3,
KJV

T
HERE IS A
beautiful story of a Moabite woman named Ruth in the Bible. In the natural, Ruth had everything against her. She was a poor widow, and she was a Moabitess, a Gentile in the Jewish nation of Israel. But even after her husband died, Ruth remained with her mother-in-law Naomi. She left her family to follow Naomi back to Bethlehem, and made Naomi’s God—the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob—her God.

Have confidence in the unmerited favor of Jesus and He will cause you to be positioned at the right place at the right time to experience success.

Now, because of their poverty, Naomi and Ruth could not afford to buy grain, and Ruth had to go out to the field to perform the menial task of gleaning whatever the reapers had left behind. I want you to notice that Ruth was depending on the Lord’s favor for she said to Naomi, “Please let me go to the field, and glean heads of grain after him in whose sight I may find
favor
” (Ruth 2:2). Ruth was confident that God would give her favor even though she was a foreigner and had no connections with anyone in the field. She didn’t even know whose part of the field she would be able to glean in.

Look at the Bible’s account of what happened next: “And she went, and came, and gleaned in the field after the reapers: and her
hap
was to light on a part of the field belonging unto Boaz, who was of the kindred of Elimelech.” Of all the spots in the field that Ruth could have wandered into, her “
hap
” was to come to the part of the field that belonged to Boaz, who was a man of great wealth, and who also
happened
to be Naomi’s relative. “Hap” is an old English word and it means “to happen” to be at the right place. However, in the original Hebrew text, the root of this word is the word
qarah!

When Ruth trusted in God’s unmerited favor, she
qarah
-ed or happened to come to the part of the field that belonged to Boaz. To cut a long story short, Boaz saw Ruth, fell in love with her and married her. Ruth was possibly at the lowest point of her life just before she met Boaz. All the natural factors were against her. But because she put her trust in the Lord, who put her at the right place at the right time, her situation was turned around completely. In fact, she became one of the few woman to be mentioned in the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew 1:5, which states that “Boaz begot Obed by Ruth.” What an honor to be included in the genealogy of Jesus Christ. Talk about being at the right place at the right time!

My friend, no matter what natural circumstances may be against you today, have confidence in the unmerited favor of Jesus and He will give you what I call “
qarah
success.” He will cause you to be positioned at the right place at the right time to experience His protection and success in your relationships, career and finances.