The Lord works out
everything for his own ends.
—Proverbs 16:4
“Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails” (Prv 19:21). God is in ultimate control of all things. As Dr. A.T. Pierson put it, “History is His story.”
That being so, the closing line of Henley’s Invictus is flawed: “I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul.”
We struggle with the seeming conflict between God’s sovereignty and humanity’s free will. But we must keep in mind that God, who decrees the end, also decrees the means to that end. For example, he mandated the overthrow of Pharaoh, and he also mandated that Moses would be his agent to confront Pharaoh.
He determines how things will end. And he determines the part you play in bringing those things about (Eph 2:10).
God assigned your role in his plan
before the world began.