Is God actively manipulating circumstances to bring about His will?
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You know the strange thing is that "manipulation" gets a really bad connotation in our current thinking. When we think of it, we think of someone doing something selfishly and arrogantly to better their cause. But when you think of the Body, salvation, the gospel, the Scripture, and all of truth... whose show is it really? Is it ours? Or is it His?

"In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated (proorizo) according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:" Ephesians 1:11

The question becomes... whose will is God working all things according to? His or ours?

So is He manipulating circumstances? If, by that, you mean, "Is God skillfully persuading circumstances to His advantage?" Then, yes. Does He do it in all things? I'd like to say no, but then I'd be removing the phrase from Ephesians 1:11.

The strange thing is, though, while many seem to find "destiny" (in the mind and will of God) to be restraining or confining, I find it to be securing. It's as though I have no confidence that I'll make the wrong turn that He has not already seen or made provisions for.