God is Not Far from Where He Started You
26 and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation, 27 that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; 28 for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His children.’
Acts 17:26–28 NASB Read More
I know there isn’t a lot of other evidence on it, but I’ve used this verse as an answer many times to the “Why would God put me in this life?” question. As far as “Why would God let me into a drug addicted family?” or “Why would God choose to give me abusive parents?” God never wills anyone to sin, but He knows what kind of people we will turn out to be in various circumstances.
When God determined the times and places each of us would live, it wasn’t random or in order to punish us. God determined the times and boundaries of our lives so that we would seek Him and find Him. It is out of God’s desire to be found and to be our Comforter that He decided our wheres and our whens. This even counts for little Buddhist kids in the third world that feel moved to pray to the Creator of the Mountain or the little Muslim girl that hides a Gospel of John in her sock drawer for 20 years before reading it and believing in Jesus.
God wants us to seek after Him and to find Him, so He is also not far away. The depth of our search is often as deep as our pride. If it takes us forever to be convinced of this or that, it isn’t because the arguments weren’t good enough. People that witnessed to me for years were surprised to find out I was a Christian after a single night of being unable to reconcile the evil that I realized was in me. I could take on facts all week long, but I had no good answers against loving evil.
God is not far from each one of us. If we call on Him and seek Him with a genuine desire to find Him, He shows up. We are created to seek and to find Him.
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