Dear BPCWA worshipper, Man has the responsibility to plan and use his time well. However, despite the best of all planning, things can change. This was what I experienced recently in my trip to Singapore. I believe others have also encountered similar experiences. And such occurrences will not be a once-off in the circumstances of life. As the saying goes,“Man proposes, God disposes”. But when God changes our plans, He is merely working out His plan. Hence, God reminds us in James 4:15, “For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that.”  My purpose in sharing this experience is so that when something unplanned (and perhaps undesirable in our human thinking) in our lives happen, we need to remember some key lessons so that we will always exercise faith to see God’s Hand and work. Faith in God must cause us to learn lessons from what happens in our lives.

Man’s planning. It is common to hear people contracting COVID or some severe illnesses when travelling to visit relatives. I still recall that I had requested prayer before my departure that we would be healthy so that my planned return to serve in BPCWA would not be affected. We had our plans down to how each part of each day would be spent and with whom. Our time was tight, our schedule was planned, and we hoped not to face unexpected hiccups, especially COVID. My experiences with COVID have not been good, often riddled with complications and extended periods of sickness. I have caught it twice and hoped not to go through a third episode, God willing, because there was much to be accomplished in Singapore. But as God so willed, I was the one who first caught COVID, a few days after arriving in Singapore. Who from, when, and how is still a mystery to me, but known and planned by God.   While Sharon would remove her mask at the earliest opportunity due to the heat, I would diligently keep it on while out in public. This truly shows that even while man plans and exercises human responsibility, which we always should, man’s precautions are at best precautions. God is the ultimate protector and decider of what will occur. God can use an unseen virus to change our carefully thought-out plans.

Lessons from God’s plan. 1) To know God’s peace in chaos, we must remember that when man’s plans fail, we must continue to submit and attribute all that occurs to God’s perfect plan. Everything we learn about God’s sovereignty and omniscience will be tested by how we respond. And applying the knowledge will bring great comfort and peace instead of frustration. So, how we respond when God brings it our way is important. We could have thrown up our hands in exasperation that we would spend the larger part of our trip in isolation, unable to do much except sleep and eat, and isolated from the family we had travelled back to visit for a short time. After all, God “worketh all things after the counsel of his own will” (Eph 1:11). But the remembrance of God’s Word about His sovereignty and all-wise providences enabled us to embrace what God has allowed and even look forward to seeing what His “unexpected” plans entail. What peace it afforded us. 2) God disposes but also provides the solutions. Obviously, I could not go for my prebooked cancer centre appointment since I was COVID-positive. It was a concern because when I initially tried to change my yearly cancer centre follow-up appointment before going to Singapore, there were no alternate slots available. How will I get another slot at the last minute in Singapore? But when I called them, a slot “suddenly opened up” which allowed me to go for my yearly checkup after I was no longer COVID-positive. Moreover, we had to find hotel accommodations so that we could isolate ourselves from our elderly mothers who were both more than 90 years old. It was a difficult task because we could not anticipate how many nights and what if Sharon got COVID (which she eventually did). Last-minute extensions are not easy for most hotels because they have customers checking in who have pre-booked rooms. Yet, God led us to one which enabled us to keep extending again and again for more than a week, while we lived day by day doing our RAT tests, waiting to turn negative. 3)God’s plans are always the best.  But the most wonderful outcome was that our delayed return allowed us to share the gospel with Sharon’s nephew who also went to Singapore to visit. Because of the needed extension in Singapore, we found out that he had received Christ just a few months back at Easter. He shared how God moved his heart irresistibly to go to a Protestant church on Easter even when he could not get his friends to go to the church with him on Easter and he had to go alone, not knowing anyone there. Our extended stay enabled me to share with him what the Christian walk should be as a new creature in Christ and what to beware of in the end times. Moreover, it taught us that God does not need us to share the Gospel. He can move and save without us. It is entirely our privilege when He involves us! We need to have faith and trust in the fact that God not only does not make mistakes but plans the best. When we see how circumstances are timed “just right”, it is by His planning. When circumstances are timed to make us wonder “Why now?”, it is also by His planning. 4) Time is in His hands and is at His disposal. Life is made up of time. Even a period we may personally treasure as a short, rare, and precious time must be laid on the altar for God to determine and use as He wills. We may think that we are the master of our own time, but we must yield to how God wants us to spend our time. We may think that it is better spent up and about in spiritual conversations with man, but God may deem it best that we be on the sick bed to have spiritual communion with our Lord. He is God and His ways are wiser than ours. 5) One body in Christ (Col 3:15), no matter where we are in the world. God uses the unexpected events in life to let us experience the love of the covenantal family. God used a BPCWA family who was also visiting Singapore to enable us to experience not only His providence when He disposes of our plans but also the kindness that warms our hearts even while we are sick. This family brought RAT kits from Perth and also insisted on making diversions in their journeys to drop off medications for us, simply to help the covenantal family. Then there was my sister and another Christian family in Singapore who readily gave up what they had in their homes to provide us with the necessary medications that helped us go through the COVID symptoms. No holiday food and sights can compare to the experience of the love of the brethren!

I hope that whenever God disposes of our plans, we will always remember to see His Hand of providence, give glory to His sovereignty, and praise His wise ways, no matter what the outcome may be. When we do so, we will experience the peace and the joy of His will fulfilled in our lives for His own plans and purposes.

Yours in our Lord’s service,
Pastor