When God Opens the Moment
When God has already prepared the heart, it opens effortlessly.
📚 Devotional Credit:
Immeasurably More by Ray Stedman
📸 Photo Credit:
Image by Unsplash
It’s easy to forget that the Christian life is not a presentation but a participation—one in which we proclaim, but God performs. In today’s Scripture, Lydia’s heart is opened—not by persuasion or presentation, but by God Himself, responding to a moment of availability and trust from Paul and his companions. They didn’t manipulate or strategize. They simply showed up by the riverside and shared the truth, confident that the Lord would do something eternal.
Ray Stedman challenges the modern church’s tendency to trust in programs and structure while quietly setting aside any real expectancy of the Holy Spirit’s action. Too often, our ministries are built so that they could continue unchanged even if God Himself were removed from the process. But this early encounter in Acts reminds us: God is already at work before we ever speak. Our role is not to generate results—it’s to faithfully speak, serve, and watch for the hearts He has prepared.
Lydia had been primed by grace. She was a worshiper of God, yet had not yet heard the full message of Christ. When she did, she didn’t resist; she recognized. Her openness wasn’t produced by Paul’s charisma, but by God’s orchestration of timing and readiness. That’s our confidence too—not in how well we communicate, but in how perfectly God prepares the soil.
This devotional invites us back to that essential truth: God still opens hearts. Not by force, but by quiet, unseen grace that readies a person to receive what they were created for. Our posture, then, is one of trust. We proclaim the Word and rest in His working—because He still meets people by the river.
📓 Personalized Journal Entry – Voice of the Holy Spirit Through Scripture:
I go before you into every conversation, every room, every quiet corner where My truth may be shared. You never arrive first—I am already there, preparing hearts, arranging moments, softening resistance. I have always done this, and I always will.
Speak freely but rest deeply. You do not bear the pressure of producing change. You are not the gardener of hearts—I am. Your words matter, but My Spirit awakens. Your faithfulness plants, but I cause the growth. Never look at a hardened face and assume I am not working. I often prepare the most tender responses behind the most unreadable expressions.
You walk into situations not to control the outcome, but to yield to Me moment by moment. Be sensitive to My prompting. Trust Me to open what no program can. Just as Lydia’s heart was opened, there are others I have already drawn near—ready, listening, expectant. Let that settle your soul.
I will draw them, open them, and reveal Myself to them. And when I do, you’ll know it wasn’t your strategy but My mercy.
Scriptures woven throughout: Acts 16:13–14; 1 Corinthians 3:6–7; 2 Corinthians 4:5–6; John 6:44; Romans 10:17; Isaiah 55:11; Colossians 4:3–4; John 15:5; Philippians 2:13
🪞 Real-Life Analogy:
It’s like opening a package with a magnetic clasp. You might pull gently at first, unsure whether it will come apart. But then, with no resistance at all, it simply opens—because it was designed that way. The mechanism had been waiting to yield, not to resist.
In the same way, when you encounter someone today—a coworker, a friend, a stranger—you can live with quiet expectancy. You don’t have to push an outcome or manufacture the perfect moment. You’re not the one applying the pressure; you’re the one who trusts that the Spirit has already placed the magnet in the heart. So as you yield to Christ in you today, perhaps in a conversation or an unexpected moment, simply trust: “Lord, I trust You to respond through me as You have already prepared them to receive.”
🙏 Prayer of Confidence:
Father, thank You that You are always working. You open hearts—I don’t. You prepare people—I don’t. And You delight to include me in what You’re already doing. I rest today in the freedom of this truth. Whether I speak to one or to many, whether I see results or not, I rejoice that Your Word never returns empty. Thank You that I get to watch You move. And thank You that You live in me, ready to express Your life in just the right moment.