Major Dalton - October 6, 2024
"God's Purpose" Over "Our Plan"
How do you respond when someone’s choices wound you? When their actions leave you feeling betrayed or hurt? Onesimus made a choice that hurt Philemon. His decision to runaway and break his commitments created problems for his former employee and caused a conflict between the two of them. But in this letter, Paul argued that someone else’s plan might be at work—God used Onesimus’s actions, which caused pain, to ultimately accomplish something eternal in his life. This is what our God does. He turns pain into purpose. He did it through the cross. And now he does it through his people. Through this conflict, God was transforming Onesimus and bringing about reconciliation in ways no one expected. What if the pain caused by someone else’s plans is part of God’s bigger purpose? Could it be that, through the very wounds we suffer, God is working to accomplish something eternal in them? And in us? Join us this Sunday as we explore how God uses conflict to transform hearts and lives, turning pain into purpose.