If you will put God first in your life, seeking his Kingdom, doing His will, and giving priority to His concerns, you will see that He will honor that by personally taking care of you in return. It can be exciting to watch God Himself intervene to make sure that your needs are always met, always on time, every single time. Your trust in Him will grow as you see that you can safely depend on Him to care for your needs.
In July 2009, I was on my way to minister in Scotland. I arrived in Edinburgh on my second day of travel. Because of flight changes, my luggage did not arrive in Edinburgh when I did. The problem was that I was about to catch a bus to St Andrews, fifty miles away, and I would not be back in Edinburgh for a week. As I spoke with the airline agent, he took my lodging information and assured me that my bag would be delivered to me after it arrived. So, I thanked him, got on the next bus to St Andrews, and I was off.
I arrived in St Andrews a couple of hours later, checked into my room, and walked down the road to the conference that I had come to attend. When I went back to my room that night, my bag had still not arrived.
The next day, I attended the morning sessions of the conference wearing the same clothes for the third day since I left home. Meanwhile, my friends offered to drive me to stores to buy clothes and toiletry items. I turned down their offers because I didn’t want them to miss part of the conference to take me shopping, but I was more concerned now.
I stopped to pray.
It had not been necessary for me to have my bag until now, but the next day, I would begin ministering to the children in the morning and to the adults in the afternoon. In my prayer, I stated my case to God by saying that if I did not get my bag that day, His Kingdom work would suffer. I would be forced to minister to the children with a three-day beard, bad breath (because I didn’t have toothpaste), and smelly, dirty clothes. I made my case that some of the children might not respond to me in that condition, and they might even be afraid of me. (I was beginning to look like a pretty scary sight!)
After lunch I went back to the residence hall where I was staying and asked at the front desk whether my bag had arrived. The clerk behind the desk replied, “Yes, Mr. Drake. Your bag is waiting for you in your room.”
The next morning, I was able to greet the children with fresh breath, a clean-shaven face, and wearing fresh, clean clothes.
It is interesting to me that my bag didn’t show up until it was needed for my ministry at the conference. When it was really needed to help me prepare for the ministry, it was there for me. You could say that this was a coincidence of timing, but I’ve noticed that as I seek God’s Kingdom first and trust Him to take care of meeting my needs, these “coincidences” happen more consistently.
Making a Way Where There Was No Way
Three years later, I was on my way back to Scotland to minister again at the same annual conference. I arrived at London’s Heathrow Airport with just enough time to make it to my connecting flight to Edinburgh.
But this was the summer of 2012. When I arrived at Heathrow, the Summer Olympics were being held in London. Security was as tight as I’ve ever seen it in an airport. I passed through no fewer than six passport checks. (Maybe seven!) At one point, I found myself at the end of a long line at one of these security check points. There were probably 60 or 70 people ahead of me in this line that snaked back and forth in front of two security officials who were using laptop computers to check passports.
After several minutes in the line, I began to get concerned. The passport checks were going very slowly, and the line … was … not … moving! If something didn’t happen to speed things up, I could miss my flight to Edinburgh and be late for the conference.
I felt that soon I would need to get the attention of the officials and let them know that I was in danger of missing my flight. I’m sure there were others in the line who had the same concern. As these thoughts were going through my head, a third official, evidently very frustrated with the slow process, threw up his hands, walked up to the rope directly in front of me, unhooked it, and opened a new lane with no one in front of me!
“I can help people here,” he said.
I hesitated only for a moment, because it didn’t seem fair to the others who had waited in line for so long, but the new open lane was directly in front of me. No one else made a move, so I quickly jumped up to start the new line, bypassing the 60 or 70 people who had been waiting for who knows how long! I handed my passport to the official and was soon on my way, making it to my flight without a problem.
There is nothing special about me. There is no reason that I should receive special treatment, but I was seeking God’s Kingdom first. I was on my way to Scotland to minister to people. That was the whole reason for my trip. Jesus promises us that if we seek God’s Kingdom and His righteousness first, He will make sure that our needs are met in return (Matthew 6:33).
You may experience times when you won’t have all that you think you need, but that is because God knows that there are other things that you really need more than the things that you think you need.
As you place your trust in God, putting Him first in your life, you will find that God will make sure that you always have what you really need. He will always meet your needs on time; and when necessary, He will make a way where there seems to be no way!
“I have been young and now I am old. And in all my years I have never seen the Lord forsake a man who loves him; nor have I seen the children of the godly go hungry.”—Psalm 37:25 (TLB)
