How to be Successful in Life (pt. 2)
by Drenda Keesee
I’m just not sure what to do.
I don’t know if I’m making the right decision.
What do you do when you don’t know what to do?
Last week, we looked at how Joshua made a mistake by going into battle without asking God about it first. When he lost, he whined and questioned God.
Read all of Part One here.
But God wasn’t having it. He didn’t have a pity party with Joshua. No, He reprimanded Joshua. He told him to GET UP!
Then, He told Joshua exactly what had happened. And that’s where we see that the failure wasn’t just on Achan’s part; it was also on Joshua’s. Joshua hadn’t sought instruction from God before he engaged Ai.
He didn’t ask. He didn’t pray.
Joshua could have known about Achan before he sent his men into battle. He could’ve corrected the problem and prevented the deaths of his men. Instead, Joshua assumed things would go just like they had in Jericho.
NEVER assume things in the Kingdom.
Proverbs 3:5 tells us, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.”
I know that’s not always easy to do. But “all your ways” means all your ways.
That means you have to…
…acknowledge that you don’t have all the answers. That means that you’re going to have to trust Him to lead you in life. That means that you can’t try to do anything based on your past victories. Oftentimes, the enemy is already wise to them, and he’s already changed strategies. And only God knows that.
So, we see where Joshua failed. Now, I’ll tell on myself.
Several months ago…
…my husband, Gary, and I were celebrating our wedding anniversary in Hawaii. The plan was for us to fly back to Jackson Hole, Wyoming on our way home so we could spend a few days with our oldest son, Tim, and his family while they were there on vacation.
While we were in Hawaii, it occurred to me that we should stay a few extra days. I casually mentioned it to Gary, but then we both began reasoning that it didn’t really make sense. The condo in Jackson Hole was already paid for, and Tim and his family were already there. So, we leaned to our own understanding (you see where this is going?), and we stuck with the original plan.
When we landed in Los Angeles at 4:30am Sunday, there was clearly something very wrong. It was the middle of the night and there were huge crowds of people at the airport and news reporters everywhere. We discovered a computer crash had basically brought Delta Airlines to its knees and left hundreds of thousands of passengers stranded at airports across the country. Including us.
We ended up living in airports between L.A. and Salt Lake City for the next 48 hours and getting put on a bus for a five-hour trip from Salt Lake City to Jackson Hole after that. It was a complete mess.
We didn’t pray about it.
See what I mean? Every single one of us has had moments where we lean to our own understanding, or where we do what we think makes the most sense, or where we make assumptions about how things are going to go based on how they’ve “always” gone before. But we end up missing God and failure happens.
The good news is that God has a way out of the trouble, even if we’re the ones who caused it. And the best news is that we don’t even have to deal with the trouble in the first place.
God wants to help you.
~Drenda
ps…Are you looking for a good church? Be sure and listen on Saturday evening or catch the 3 services on Sunday for Faith Life Church!
Drenda Keesee’s contagious zeal and humorous personal experiences help make her ministry of spiritual, emotional, and relational wholeness one that will bless your life and spark a new fire in your spirit.
A wife of over 30 years and a mother of five children, Drenda has ministered at churches, seminars, and conferences, and through the mediums of television and radio, for more than 20 years.
Her books, The New Vintage Family, Better Than You Think, and She Gets It are available wherever books are sold. In these heartfelt books, Drenda shares her personal journey and the life lessons that have brought her to where she is today, as well as practical answers that all people need to live a joyful life.
Drenda and her husband Gary founded Faith Life Now, a ministry designed to spread the message of freedom in the areas of finances, faith, marriage, and family. Tune in for their weekly messages here. Faith Life Now hosts conferences worldwide and sponsors both Fixing the Money Thing, which Drenda co-hosts with her husband Gary and Drenda.
Through their own life experiences, the Keesee’s have found the principles from God’s Word to be powerful and effective. At one point, Drenda was a young, suicidal feminist with no hope of ever being “good enough” for her own standards of perfection. She never wanted the “inconvenience” of a husband or children, and she was on her own path to success. But the stress of trying to achieve perfection and perform for love left her broken and used. She had success, but it was nothing compared to the pain and loneliness it had also brought.
That’s when God got a hold of her heart. It was there—at her lowest point—that she found the One who accepted and loved her, faults and all. Since that transformation, Drenda has had a passion to reach women who find themselves where she once was.
She married Gary after attending college, and there she found herself in a personal boot camp of sorts. She says, “I cried and told God, ‘I can do anything but be a wife and mother.’” She committed to learning how to do it God’s way. Through the many years of raising their children and struggling to make ends meet, Drenda learned from their mistakes. “I didn’t know how to be a wife and mother, but God saved our marriage, taught us how to parent our children for success, showed us how to have financial success, and then the irony of all ironies, He called us to ministry.” It’s truly because of these life experiences that Drenda can now share so many insightful principles for people who are now going through the same struggles.
