Somebody asked him at the end of a meeting whether God had done anything about it, and he heard himself say no.
He was not being dramatic. It was an honest answer and it was accurate about the situation, which is exactly where it was four years ago, in the same shape, with the same people in it, and nothing about the facts of it has altered.
And driving home he thought about the question again, and something small caught.
It used to wake him at three in the morning. Every night, for a long stretch. Not a nightmare and nothing dramatic: he would simply be awake, entirely, at ten past three, with the whole thing already running, and he would be there until half past four.
It does not do that any more.
He could not tell you when it stopped. That is the part that unsettled him at the traffic lights. There was no night where he noticed, no moment of relief, no morning where he thought: that has gone. It simply stopped happening at some point and nobody, including him, marked it.
So when a man asks whether God has done anything, he says no, because he is looking at the situation. And the situation is a fair place to look. It is not the only place, and it may not even be the main one.
And somebody at that same meeting said he ought to fast about it again.
He said he would think about it. And this time what he felt was not the usual tiredness. It was a question: what exactly am I asking to be given, if part of it has already been happening in the dark where I was not counting?
If nobody has ever counted the thing that stopped waking you, come and sit down at this table.
Nobody is going to tell you it moved
Let us settle that in the first minute, because everything else depends on it.
Nothing on this page is going to reinterpret your situation. It is where it was. If somebody tells you that it has secretly shifted or that you are simply not looking properly, they are asking you to disbelieve your own eyes, and that is not what is happening here.
You are not being told to see something that is not there, and your reading of the facts has been accurate the whole time. That is not a soft opening. It is written that the Lord looketh on the heart (1 Samuel 16:7), and the Holy Spirit is the one who has been with you in a situation that genuinely has not changed, and He has never once asked you to pretend otherwise.
What is being suggested is smaller and it is different: that a circumstance is one location, and there is another, and nobody in your life has been keeping records there.
What the verse actually promises
There is a sentence people quote at each other constantly, and the location it names is the interesting part.
Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.Philippians 1:6
Read where the work is being done. In you.
It does not say a good work around a person, or in their situation, or in the people they are asking about. It names one site of operations and the site is the person, and the tense of the first clause is worth sitting with: hath begun. Past. Already under way. Not scheduled.
That is a sentence about a project that started before anybody noticed and has been proceeding in a location nobody has been checking.
You are the site of a work that was already under way, and it has not been waiting on the circumstance to move first. I am not saying it to console a man at a traffic light: it is where the verse puts the work and what tense it uses (Philippians 1:6), and it is His Spirit, not this page, who is doing the actual work, which is the difference between this and a suggestion that you cheer up.
And nothing here is going to become a prediction
Here is a thing that has to be said plainly, because it is where a page like this normally goes wrong.
What you noticed at the lights is not a sign. It is not the beginning of a pattern and it is not evidence that the situation is about to change, and it does not mean anything at all about next month.
You are not being handed a forecast, and nobody here knows what happens next. Scripture says it is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power (Acts 1:7), and it is His Spirit who makes that a relief rather than a disappointment, because a person who is not carrying a forecast is carrying a great deal less.
And what you went without bought nothing, in either direction. It did not fail and it did not secretly succeed in you. There was no transaction anywhere in it.
Now the sentence this site says everywhere. Some people must not go without food at all, and being one of them takes nothing away from you. Diabetes, pregnancy, medication, any hard relationship with eating, being underweight, unwell, elderly or simply unsure: speak to your doctor and let their answer be the answer. You are not one step further from God because of what your body needs. Scripture says the Lord is good to all, and his tender mercies are over all his works (Psalm 145:9), and the Holy Spirit has never once come in a smaller measure to anybody on account of a body.
And if this week has more in it than a page can carry, if you are frightened for yourself, put this down and ring somebody real: your doctor, a counselor, a crisis line, and the emergency services if you or anybody near you is in danger tonight. That is not a road around God. That is help He put in the world on purpose.
Here is the turn, and it does not ask you to feel anything about your situation.
You are being worked on, and it has been going on in the only place you were not checking. He is not waiting on you to notice and He is not withholding anything until you produce some gratitude, because the verse says the good work hath begun and puts the whole of it in you (Philippians 1:6). You have permission this morning to look in a different location without concluding anything about the first one. The word puts it in your hands, casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you (1 Peter 5:7), and it is His Spirit who has been at work at three in the morning in a house where nobody was counting.
The situation is where it was. Both of those sentences are true at once and you do not have to choose between them.
Declare this over yourself
Say these out loud, at your own table, in your own voice. The standing to speak this way is yours in Christ and it is not issued on the strength of how much you have noticed. Scripture is the ground under it, the Holy Spirit is what makes it living rather than merely observant, and what God does about your situation and when is His, however He answers.
- Nothing has moved out there, and you are not the only place God works. He which hath begun a good work in me will perform it, and Philippians 1:6 puts the site of it in a person and uses a past tense for the beginning. In the name of Jesus I look in that location today and I stop reading the circumstance as the whole report.
- Fear that noticing something small is just talking myself round, you are not God's word about me and you are not sitting in this car any longer. It is not for me to know the times or the seasons which the Father has put in His own power, and His Spirit is the one making that a relief rather than a disappointment. I am carrying no forecast, and I am not pretending anything, and I am free.
- Father, You have been working at three in the morning in a house where nobody was keeping records. Your written word says the good work has begun and that You will perform it (Philippians 1:6), and Your Spirit is the one doing it rather than any effort of mine. The list is written and nobody will read it, and I am going to go and do something ordinary now.
Philippians 1:6
This message is free, and always will be. There is nothing to unlock, nothing to subscribe to, and nothing you owe for having received it.
