Sparks fly upward

The wildfire in our province is still burning. Many evacuees from the city that was hit the hardest have come to our city, some with amazing stories of escape. Two young women rode their horses through the flames. Many families came out with a car full of small children, and took up to 48 hours to get to food and shelter without losing patience with the cries of their little ones. Strangers are helping strangers.

This has been an awful yet incredible week. We have seen patience in dire straits rising above the ordinary. We sometimes joke about praying for patience because the Bible says we learn it through tribulation, so don’t pray for it unless you want trouble, but this really isn’t a joke.

One of Job’s friends declared that a man is born to trouble as sparks fly upward. We live in a world filled with trouble, and if I’m having a good day today, tomorrow might bring the opposite. No one in Fort Mac expected that devastating fire and many are now facing years of recovery. This will take a great deal of patience.

Chambers talks about patient endurance from the perspective of what God is doing behind the scenes during those trials of life. He gave a promise to the church in Philadelphia (an ancient city in Asia Minor):

Because you have kept my word about patient endurance, I will keep you from the hour of trial that is coming on the whole world, to try those who dwell on the earth. (Revelation 3:10)

This church was noted for enduring under trial. Did they see their trial with any clarity? Chambers uses a word picture: patience is more than endurance because a Christian’s life in the hands of God is like a bow and arrow in the hands of an archer. God aims at something we cannot see. He stretches and strains, and every now and then we cry out that we cannot take any more of this, but He doesn’t listen. He goes on stretching us until His purpose is in sight, then He lets fly.

This image is a good one. God uses it to tell me to trust God’s hands for whatever is testing me right now. The key is to maintain my relationship with Jesus by this patience that comes from faith, the patience describe by Job when he said, “Though He slay me, yet will I hope in Him.” (Job 13:15)

Chambers insists that faith isn’t a ‘pathetic sentiment’ and I agree. Rather than a mousy acquiescence to the trials of life because I’m helpless to change anything anyway, it is an active confidence based on who God is. I cannot see Him every moment of every trial, nor can I always understand what He is doing, but I know who He is. I can be like those horses who trusted their young owners to get them beyond the wall of flames, or that child who took her father’s hand and lets him lead her through the fire.

Chambers also says faith is the heroic effort of life. I can fling myself in reckless confidence on God because I know and trust Him. He gave His all in Jesus Christ to save me. Now He wants me to give my all in total trust to Him, living through trials knowing that His life will touch all the places in mine that are yet to experience Him, places that will be exposed by the trial.

Eternal life is the kind of life that can face anything tossed at it without wavering. This makes life an adventure, even a great romance filled with opportunities for seeing the awesome goodness of God all the time. God keeps stretching me so as the sparks fly upward, I will rise with them, not to destruction or disaster, but to a place of great confidence and power.

Glimpses of heaven in the dark corners of life

Physicist Stephen Hawking now says that heaven is an invention of those who are afraid of the dark. How can he possibly know that heaven is not real? I’m always amazed by the conclusions made by people who have not been there. I would rather to take the word of those who know for certain what they are talking about.

Jesus Christ came from the presence of God and returned there. He has lots to say about heaven, even more to say about the alternative. Because of who He is, I choose to believe Him. However, His eyewitness account also has support from others who have not been to heaven yet, but have experienced a taste of it on earth.

The most amazing accounts of life with faith in God (and belief in heaven) are not from people who know earthly delights and call it “heaven on earth.” Rather, they are from those who have experienced a taste of glory in the middle of terrible strife. Life for them has been rotten and full of sorrows, but in the midst of it, the assurance of the glory of God gives them hope.

Jeremiah was one of these people. He was not a popular prophet in his day. When he told the leaders of the land what God was going to do because of their idolatry and disobedience, they dropped him into a miry cistern. Knowing all that happens is either directed or permitted by the hand of God who is sovereign, he attributes his sorrows to Him.

I am the man who has seen affliction under the rod of his wrath; he has driven and brought me into darkness without any light; surely against me he turns his hand again and again the whole day long. He has made my flesh and my skin waste away; he has broken my bones; he has besieged and enveloped me with bitterness and tribulation; he has made me dwell in darkness like the dead of long ago. He has walled me about so that I cannot escape; he has made my chains heavy; though I call and cry for help, he shuts out my prayer; he has blocked my ways with blocks of stones; he has made my paths crooked. He is a bear lying in wait for me, a lion in hiding; he turned aside my steps and tore me to pieces; he has made me desolate; he bent his bow and set me as a target for his arrow. He drove into my kidneys the arrows of his quiver; I have become the laughingstock of all peoples, the object of their taunts all day long. He has filled me with bitterness; he has sated me with wormwood. He has made my teeth grind on gravel, and made me cower in ashes; my soul is bereft of peace; I have forgotten what happiness is; so I say, “My endurance has perished; so has my hope from the LORD.” (Lamentations 3:1–18)

Jeremiah could not get much lower. However, he starts thinking about the past. At first his thoughts go to times in his life that are just like what he is experiencing and I can relate to that. When I am experiencing trials, I tend to think that life has always been one big trial. But Jeremiah does not stop there. He keeps on remembering and pulls out of his mind some of the positive things that he has also known.

Remember my affliction and my wanderings, the wormwood and the gall! My soul continually remembers it and is bowed down within me. But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. “The LORD is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.” The LORD is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him. It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD. (Lamentations 3:19–26)

Those who trust in Jesus Christ are not immune from “the dark” nor do we invent things to make it go away. Jeremiah experienced sieges of darkness that were real and awful, yet he was not giving in or giving up to despair. He let the darkness swirl around him, but in the end remembered not to judge the character of God by the trauma of life.

In reading his story, I see the power of God to give His people hope no matter what is going on. While others may go into denial, try to escape, or even invent something that does not exist to help them cope, God does the most amazing things for those of us who trust Him. He gives us encouragement and hope in the midst of our worst situations. Our hope is not that it will soon be over, or that we will escape, but the reality that He is with us and is our portion. He loves us and is merciful toward us. After all, we are not getting what our sins deserve. The trials may be unpleasant, but we have His promise that He is using them for our good (Romans 8:28), shaping us into the image of His Son.

We don’t have to invent heaven because we know it is a real place. We don’t have to fear the dark because we have been delivered into light. We have not yet seen heaven, but we have seen the goodness of God in the land of the living during our darkest hours in this place. This is a mere taste of the light and the glory that is to come.

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Lord, as I read about and speak with those who do not know you, my heart actually aches for them. You have offered so much, yet so many people are not interested in Your offer, only in their own interpretation of things they cannot see. I feel some of Jeremiah’s angst, but for others, not myself. Hear my prayers for those in the dark. Bring them out of that darkness and into the light of knowing Jesus Christ, who is light, even the Light of the world. Help them understand that heaven is the hope of those who have not so much feared the dark as we have learned to fear and love You, the One who controls our destiny.

To Live is Christ — trusting others to His grace

Yesterday morning before nine, I received news that a first cousin had died. I’d been praying for him several months. He had cancer and had been in severe pain. I prayed about that, but also that God would make Himself real to this man. I’d not known him well, or even seen him for years. Not knowing his spiritual condition put an urgency in my prayers.

Today’s verses are not about salvation. They are about Christians who need to persevere in their faith and in fellowship with one another. We need it. The Bible says that we grieve when someone dies, but not the same way as those “who have no hope.” In our sorrows, our Christian family provides much understanding and comfort.

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching. (Hebrews 10:23–25)

The last part of this passage uses a term, “the Day” which usually refers to the return of Jesus Christ. However, those who do not live to see the Second Coming will also experience “the Day” when they must face God after they die. I cannot imagine the horror and fear in a heart that has no assurance of where they stand with God.

This passage refers to the confession of a Christian hope. My hope is in the promises of God and His provision for my salvation. Jesus died to take my punishment for sin. He rose from the dead, showing me that He has power over death. He is eternal life, but also lives in my heart and says, “He who has the Son has life.”

I believe that and hold fast to it, not because I have any merit or means to gain favor with God and eternal life, but because He is faithful. Those who believe in His Son will not perish.

Attending church and getting together with other Christians puts me in a good place. There I am encouraged to love others and obey God. The more the world looks like it is ready for Jesus to come again, the closer I want to be to Him. His people help me do that.

I’ve wondered how those without that amazing hope can face the end of their lives. Do they panic? Are they filled with dread? Are some in denial right to the end? Or are most simply oblivious? I don’t want any of that for anyone. For that reason, I prayed that God would make Himself known to my cousin and somehow help him be aware of the grace available to him. I wanted him to be aware of Jesus. I prayed that he could cross the threshold from this life to the next knowing that His Savior was there waiting for him.

My hope also includes the reality of a God who answers prayer. On this earth I have no assurance at all about my cousin except that his sister said he was kind and peaceful for the past few days. Was that because the Holy Spirit assured him of forgiveness and eternal life? I do not know.

However, I hold fast to the confession of my hope for him. This is not because of what I can see, or “hope so,” or can imagine, but because of God. He promises to hear and answer my prayers — and He is a faithful and merciful God.

To Live is Christ — anchored in truth

The man in the cartoon raises his fist in the air and says, “God, why do You allow so much injustice and pain in the world?”

The next pane shows words coming from the clouds that say, “I might ask you the same thing.”

In this life, we have trouble. It is with us because we are sinners and want our own way. Unfortunately, we don’t always have the wisdom or farsightedness to see what will come of that, or we don’t care. Also, we resist admitting that human selfishness and sin are at the root of the injustice and pain. It is not God’s fault that people kill people, or that children suffer abuse, or that wars happen; it is our fault.

It might seem more plausible to blame God for earthquakes and the resulting devastation from “natural” disasters, but the Bible says that the whole world has been affected by human sin (and supporters of global warming would agree). The first couple lived in an ideal Eden, no bugs or weeds and no sin, at least for a while. Then they disobeyed God and were expelled into the world that we live in now, an imperfect place.

When I was reading the paper this morning, this biblical big picture of human history flashed through my mind. Also, I thought of the ideas in these verses:

Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles! Laud Him, all you peoples! For His merciful kindness is great toward us, and the truth of the Lord endures forever. Praise the Lord! (Psalm 117:1–2)

My heart was heavy as I looked at bad news, but as soon as I thought of God and His merciful kindness, the heaviness lifted. Truth about God does that. So does praise.

Praise reminds me that we are not in heaven yet. We are in a sin-stained world, one that is imperfect. It didn’t start out like that, but human choices have made it so. Heaven is still to come.

Praise also gave me a sense of being anchored. The evil that goes on all around could pull me into despair or cynicism. Sheer volume makes me feel helpless and useless against its dominance. Yet God is still sovereign. Praising Him gives me hope. I cannot put a dent in all of it or even much of it, but I can obey Him and do whatever He asks of me.

Praise also helps me think of other good things. Last night a local radio station did a feature on a local agency for children’s advocacy. This place, unique to our country, brings doctors, lawyers, police and other services to a safe environment where the child is given priority consideration. It was described as a “community” effort where many well-trained staff and volunteers go to bat against a form of evil that makes my heart so heavy. This center has more than 250-300 open cases at any given time, but most people do not know it exists.

Unfortunately, the news is interested in other things. Concerning the selection of what to print, they say, “If it bleeds, it leads.” The good that people do, sometimes under the leading of God through faith and obedience, seldom gets printed. Besides that, our sin makes us want to read about people who are worse than ourselves.

However, whether we want to or not, in this life we do see awful things. This is not a surprise. Before He was crucified, Jesus said, “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).

Jesus overcame the world by refusing to enter into its sin. Instead, He resisted until He was crucified, not for the crimes charged to Him by the Jews and the Romans, but God laid on Him the sins of all humanity for all time and that sin killed Him. But His sinlessness meant that He could not stay dead. He rose from the grave and in the power of an eternal life, He offers hope to a sin-sick world.

Life can be difficult and look dark. Most of the news is bad news. But when my mind turns to the mercy and kindness of Jesus Christ, and when I think about these truths that endure forever, I cannot help but praise the Lord.