Ten minutes before the bad times end

1 Reply

I received some good news recently, and it was great! It made me so happy; my emotions began soaring, and the whole landscape of my world seemed brighter. I felt inspired and alive, so naturally, I did what you probably would have done in that moment—I threw up a quick prayer of thanks.

I said something like, “God, thank you for this moment. Thank you for answering prayer, and thank you for being so good.”

A little while later though, I started thinking about that prayer and I realized something. God hadn’t suddenly become good just because my bad news finally came to an end. He wasn’t an aloof, indifferent God who suddenly turned good once my good news finally arrived.

God was already good ten minutes earlier, before the good news finally found me.

It might be helpful for us to ponder this. In the middle of bad news everything seems bad, including God. And then when good news breaks through the gloom we suddenly feel like God is good again.

It’s not true. Ten minutes before the bad time ends He is still good.

At this very moment—whether you are buckling under bad news or soaring because of good news—God is at work. He is working goodness and an eternal purpose in and through your situation. Or course you probably can’t see it when everything looks bad, but it’s there. God’s purposes are still being done, and they will eventually be seen.

Romans 8:28 is a verse that often gets applied too quickly to painful situations. It is the famous passage where the Apostle Paul declares, “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.”

We have to be careful with this passage, because it is almost impossible to see or believe in an overarching cosmic goodness when we face news of shootings, abuse, or personal loss or breakdown.

Paul wasn’t telling us that all things are good or that all things become good. They don’t. Some things are ferociously and appallingly bad. However, even amid the bad God works for the good, and if we hold steady during the bad we will eventually be reuinted with the good.

Let’s just remember when we do, that the goodness we sense from God during the good times was still there ten minutes before the bad times came to an end.

Advertisements

Fear of bad news versus actual bad news

1 Reply

You have no doubt heard Mark Twain’s oft repeated quote: “I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened.”

There is profound truth inside Mr. Twain’s witty remark, and when you and I reach our own old age, we will undoubtedly say the same thing: we will have worried about countless things that never actually happened.

The Scriptures speak to this dynamic in Psalm 112:7. It says that the righteous “will have no fear of bad news.” I love that! It doesn’t say they won’t experience bad news (we all know that everyone does); it says that they won’t fear it—they won’t worry, fret, and live out their anxieties in advance.

Yes, you and I will experience bad news in life, but we don’t need to be afraid of it in advance. First of all, if the bad news strikes, God will still be with us. And second, most of it probably won’t strike anyway.

“God has delivered us…and He will deliver us again.” (2 Corinthians 1:10)

I’m not done yet (are you?)

2 Replies

Have you ever had an overly efficient server at a restaurant try to take away your plate before you were finished eating? Have you ever gotten into such a great conversation that you neglected to eat, and then had to tell your server, “Sorry, I’m not done yet”?

It is not uncommon in the life of faith to reach a moment when you are tempted to quit and you have to declare, “I’m not done yet”. Life can be so mysterious, perplexing, and painful that sometimes we can be tempted to lose heart and give up on our vision and our ideals. Even Jesus’ closest followers had moments like this.

Once when people were losing heart, getting offended, and bailing out on the faith, Jesus turned to Peter and the gang and said, “What about you? Will you also go away?”

Peter’s words still echo through history, instilling strength into sinking hearts. He said, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words that give eternal life. We believe, and we know you are the Holy One of God.”[1]

Let’s follow Peter’s lead and let’s declare with him and the other apostles, “Jesus, we’re not done yet! We’re not jumping ship! We haven’t exhausted all of the life that you promised to give. You are the Holy One of God and our journey with you is just getting started!”

Statements like that invite courage back into the human soul. As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Courage is an inner resolution to go forward in spite of obstacles and frightening situations…courage breeds creative self-affirmation…courage faces fear and thereby masters it…we must constantly build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.”[2]

Are we done yet? Not by a long shot!

 

[1] John 6:68-69

[2] Martin Luther King Jr., Strength to Love (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1963), 119.

Addiction–where were the parents?

Leave a reply

In a recent sermon at Grace, I read a blog from Katie Donovan called, “Addiction–where were the parents?” I received a number of requests for copies of the blog so I thought I would share the link here. Katie’s words can certainly encourage everyone, but they are especially poignant for anyone who has helped a loved one battle with addiction in any of its forms.

Know you are loved!

Chris