My family spent the past week nervously watching the progress of a storm that was predicted to hit our area about the time we planned to leave on vacation. The storm arrived 2 days before we were scheduled to leave, grounding flights and pushing travelers onto already overbooked planes on future days. On the morning of our scheduled departure, the airline called and offered us five round-trip tickets to anywhere if we would allow them to bump us to the next day. We quickly took them up on their offer, consoling our disappointed children with the promise, “Now we can fly to the Bahamas next year!”

As I reflected on our good fortune, it struck me that the very storm we feared had turned out to be God’s blessing in our lives. Some might chalk up our “jackpot” to fate (as even Solomon observed in his skeptical mood)—that life “is all decided by chance, by being in the right place at the right time” (Ecclesiastes 9:11). And I understand that it’s easier for me to write this than if our family had waited out the storm on the tarmac, with nothing to show for our delay. The same storm that blessed my life was bad news for others.

True enough. But no matter what, we are the recipients of God’s gracious care. Paul declared that “everything comes from Him” who “makes everything work out according to His plan” (Romans 11:36; Ephesians 1:11). We may never know why this or that misfortune happened to us, but we can trust that whatever comes our way passes first through the hands of our loving Father. He never stops providing for His children, and He uses even the storms of life for our good.

Whether your experiences today are good or bad, you can rest in the God who planned your life “before a single day had passed” (Psalm 139:16).

NLT 365-day reading plan passage for today: Genesis 27:1-40