REFLECTIONS

Life's Circumstances

My, how things can change! The circumstances that end a day may not be the ones that confront the next morning. Life’s circumstances alter our plans.

They certainly affected the plans of Gerald and Robbie as they began a new day. No one could have expected circumstances to change so dramatically. Gerald, fulfilling his blessing, his training, and his dream, was a rising star who provided leadership and leadership training to a developing nation. He was a branch of the vine producing much fruit just as Jesus asked us to do. But that day, with no warning, God called Gerald into his heavenly home. The vine was pruned. Life’s circumstances changed

As a teenager, Gerald Sseruwagi was forced to leave home because of his faith.  He lived on the streets of Kampala, Uganda surviving on food from garbage piles until a compassionate stranger met him and paid for his high school education.  He found his way to the America to attend and graduate from seminary. Recently he earned his PhD in Organizational Leadership and began to work in a pastor-training program in Rwanda.

Gerald had plans. He had a passion for his country, his family, and most of all, Jesus Christ. God had positioned him well, trained him well, and granted him the gifts to lead and train other leaders. He aspired to make his nation free from corruption and his people free from poverty. One friend observed, “The impact of his life and ministry will only be measured in time and eternity.” But plans made yesterday are not to be. Plans for tomorrow are yet to unfold. And they weren’t just Gerald’s plans or his wife, Robbie’s.

More than a few others had plans around his, mine among them. So, as God pruned a most promising branch from the vine, he pruned my branch a little bit too. Life’s circumstances have changed and so must plans adapt to God’s.

Surely, God calls us to make plans, to look toward tomorrow, and to bear much fruit. But our plans are not God’s plans. He knows the plans he has for you and me, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future,” declares the Lord. (Jeremiah 29:11-12) And the Lord’s purpose prevails above our own.

So we grieve the loss of our dear friend. And for reasons not yet clear, our own plans must change as God sheds light on our paths. But for now we are simply called to:

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;

in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will direct your paths. (Proverbs 3:5-6)

Tomorrow the sun will shine. A glorious light will illumine the fruits of Gerald’s beautiful life, the glory it brought to God, and the Lord’s purpose it so faithfully served.

You are the light of the world,

Richard +

www.reflectingthesavior.org

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