“See, I am doing a new thing

Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?

I am making a way in the wilderness

And streams in the wasteland.”    Isaiah 43:19

Have you ever found something or someone in a completely unexpected place?

Maybe car keys in the fridge? Or, perfume makers out working on re-building a wall (Nehemiah 3:8)?!  How about seeing your KYB group on the computer screen?!  Yes, this time last year, we would have put such an occurrence definitely in that category!

KYB groups in Australia have been meeting face-to-face around a table at someone’s home or in a church venue for nearly 50 years!  But not now.  Not this year.  Covid-19 has caused so much change, quite suddenly, in our lives.  Some groups have been able to switch to online meetings via platforms such as Zoom or Skype; others have organized one to one bible study interactions using their phones; some groups have, for various reasons, decided they needed to wait for the isolation restrictions to be lifted before continuing with their KYB study.  It has been strange, unexpected and unsettling … but not for God.

While the media chorus to our earthly leaders is: ‘Give us a roadmap!’ or ‘Tell us your plan!’ in relation to the coronavirus lockdown — believers have assurances, in Scripture, regarding more than just their present circumstances of coronavirus isolation.  Now, more than ever, it is important for us to meditate on the unshakeable, always true Bible verses in which our Creator God makes it very clear that our future is secure in Him.

We see in the great persecution which broke out against the fledgling new Church in Jerusalem a seemingly disastrous situation which resulted in the immediate far reaching spread of the Gospel – a wondrous outcome! This should enable us to place our trust in divine control rather than human problem solving, and we can hold onto God ‘s promise, in the book of Romans, that in all things He works for the good of those who love him.

My dear KYB women, meeting together around the word has been a source of great spiritual growth, comfort and encouragement for us all.  To varying degrees, this has been taken from us, in Victoria, at the present time.  Nevertheless, I urge you to counter finding yourself in this unexpected situation by holding onto the certainties we have found in our KYB study:

God is in control:

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”  — Isaiah 55:8–9

His plans for us are good:

But, as it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him.” — 1 Corinthians 2:9

He will never leave us on our own: 

“As the mountains surround Jerusalem so the Lord surrounds his people both now and forevermore.”  — Psalm 125:2

Jenny Droppert

South Eastern Regional Board