Losers can be winners too

   In sports, there can only be one winner.   In Super Bowl 51, the first ever overtime Super Bowl game was played.   Before the referee flipped the coin to decide who got the ball first, he told both teams that overtime would be played until there was a winner.  No ties are allowed in the Super Bowl.   There has to be winner and there has to be a loser.

    We read in Romans 8:28 :

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

  Too many who read these words, read into the word "good" as meaning "rosy outcome" or "good ending" but is not always the case.  Take for example of the Super Bowl I mentioned earlier.  How can God work for the good of players who may be on different teams where one will go home "happy" and the other "depressed". 

   The answer is in the 3 words "who love him". 

   When we love God, we love what he loves.  We love what he gives to us and also what he gives to others.   We are pleased because God is pleased.   Maybe our "purpose" is to LOSE so someone else can WIN.   Jesus gives us the best example of this.   He loves the Father and loves us so much that for us to WIN he had to LOSE.  He suffered hell so we could receive heaven.  If God is pleased that someone else wins then I can be pleased that God is pleased.

   In God's world the losers are really the winners.   Their loss is someone else's gain.

Lord,
      Please help me to love what you love and to want what you want.  If my loss is someone else's gain and you desire it to be so, then let me be happy with whatever comes.  In Jesus' name!

Amen