Retirement
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I’m having a surgery this week.
I’m having a surgery this week.
It’s to remove part of my thyroid.
The doctors say everything should be easy.
I’m not worried about the surgery itself.
My concern is my voice.
The handful of people I know who’ve had this surgery, have had the very rare affect of losing their voice, or having it affected.
I’d rather that not happen.
This morning as I was thinking about that, I was thinking, if this was my last sermon, would I want this to be how I go out.
Would this be the sermon, I finish my time as a preacher preaching?
If I had it my way, I’d like to have a sermon like Jonathan Edwards, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.
Something that goes down in history as a powerful, life changing message.
I then drifted back to something I heard about John Calvin this past week.
John Calvin became pastor of the church in Geneva.
He preached faithfully from the word.
But after 2 years, he was run out of town.
After he was run out the people of Geneva realized they’d run out a great preacher.
So they called Calvin back.
His first week back he preached right where he left off 2 years earlier.
As if to say that he will preach what Scripture says, and not be motivated by his surroundings.
That said, would I like to go out with a bang?
Sure I would.
But this isn’t about me is it.
This is about God and His revelation to man.
This is about opening up God’s Word and proclaiming it to you.
So … if this is the last time I get to stand up and preach.
I hope I am faithful to the Lord’s text.
Pray
Introduction
Introduction
Are you familiar with Murphy’s Law?
Murphy’s Law says that if something can go wrong it will.
The other day I was at a coffee shop with a few of our guys.
He’s crying.
While there, a little boy, looked like he was maybe 2 or 3, was left outside on the patio, while his mom bought her cup of coffee.
Here are some examples.
There was the boy, at the door.
His head on the window.
Just crying away.
Law of Mechanical Repair - After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch and you'll have to go to the rest room.Law of Gravity - Any tool, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible corner.Law of Probability - The probability of being watched is directly proportional to the stupidity of your act.Law of Random Numbers - If you dial a wrong number, you never get a busy signal and someone always answers.Law of the Alibi - If you tell the boss you were late for work because you had a flat tyre, the very next morning you will have a flat tyre.Guy's Variation Rider - If you change queues or traffic lanes, the one you were in will always move faster than the one you are in now. This also works in supermarkets and shops.Law of the Bath - When the body is fully immersed in water, the telephone rings.Decree of Close Encounters - The probability of meeting someone you know increases dramatically when you are with someone you don't want to be seen with. This is also the case if you are female and you have gone out with no makeup and wearing your worst clothes and with greasy hair.Murphy's Office Law - When you try to prove to someone that a machine won't work, it will. Will also finds this when he shows someone that something on the computer is easy and it doesn't work.Law of Biomechanics - The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the reach.Law of the Theatre - At any event, the people whose seats are furthest from the aisle arrive last.The Starbucks Edict - As soon as you sit down to a cup of hot coffee, your boss will ask you to do something which will last until the coffee is cold.Murphy's Law of Lockers -If there are only two people in a locker room, they will have adjacent lockers.Law of Physical Surfaces -The chances of an open-faced marmalade sandwich landing face down on a floor covering are directly correlated to the newness and cost of the carpet.The Conundrum of Logical Argument - Anything is possible if you don't know what you are talking about.Brown's Law of Physical Appearance - If the shoe fits, it's ugly.Oliver's Rule of Public Speaking - A closed mouth gathers no feet. Will's favourite!Wilson's Law of Commercial Marketing Strategy - As soon as you find a product that you really like, they will stop making it.Doctors' Law- If you don't feel well, make an appointment to go to the doctor, by the time you get there you'll feel better. Don't make an appointment and you'll stay sick.Will and Guy's Law - If you don't save things on your computer you will, sooner rather than later, delete them.
After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch.
“Mommy.”
I felt bad for the little guy.
I could see his mom.
He could see his mom.
Any tool, or screw, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible corner.
But he thought he was abandoned out there.
Forgotten in the coffee shop patio.
The probably of being watched is directly proportional to the stupidity of your act.
As a child, my family would take trips to Magic Mountain.
If you lie to your boss you were late because you had a flat tire, the next morning you will get a flat tire.
All the kids would go together.
If you change lanes on the freeway to get into a faster one, the one you were in will always move faster than the one you are now in.
My sister Jessie, would usually get motion sickness at some point.
This same rule applies to grocery stores and Costco.
My parents were going to let her motion sickness ruin the day.
They’d find a bench outside the nearest ride.
Lay her down on it, and say, just lay here till we get back.
We’d go on the ride, and Jessie’s gone.
No where to be found.
We’d look everywhere.
When you try to show how great a piece of technology is, it will not work.
Finally, we’d go to security.
And there she was, on the chair.
My parents would ask what happened, and security said there was this girl alone on a bench.
The severity of an itch is directly proportional to how hard it is to reach the itch.
My mom would ask Jessie if she knew where we were.
This one I experience quite often, if there are only 2 people in a locker room, they will have lockers right next to each other.
She’d say yes.
The chance of dropping a piece of food, face down onto either the floor or clothing is related to how new it is and how much it cost.
That is Murphy’s Law.
Then my mom would ask, “Why didn’t you tell the security guard we were on the ride?”
If it can go wrong, it will go wrong.
Murphy’s Law proves that we are in a fallen world.
Jessie said, “They didn’t ask.”
Things will not be easy.
My favorite example of being lost is when you’re in Target, or Wal-Mart, and you hear over the intercom, “Jane Smith, would you come to customer service. You’re daughter is lost.”
Things will not be perfect.
I like to put a different twist on it.
I’m pretty sure it gets Amanda irritated.
If something can go wrong, it will go wrong.
Murphy’s law can be cute and ironic at times.
Cause there’s nothing I love more than hearing, “Amanda Kirkendall, would you come to customer service. Your husband is lost.”
But there are other times, Murphy’s law is not only not cute, but it’s downright torturous.
I look for a chance to leave her, just so I can do that.
But the truth is there are many times we are lost.
So today, we will look at 4 ways to live in a fallen world.
We will be in .
Again, it’s a big passage, so we won’t read all of it.
We may not be lost in the same way that:
A child gets lost in a coffee shop patio.
I’ll signpost each of the points so that you know where we are.
Or a girl gets lost in an amusement park.
Or a husband gets lost in Target.
But we feel lost.
We feel out of our element.
There are many times, we are just making things up.
Hoping we make the best decision.
So often, life is confusing.
And we need some sort of foundation.
Because the reality is that this is a fallen world.
That means it’s not the ideal situation.
Murphy’s Law says that if it can
The first way to live in a Fallen World is to be Promise Grounded.
The first way to live in a Fallen World is to be Promise Grounded.
Look if you will at .
Read .
If you remember where we’ve been, Joseph, the son who was lost, has been found.
It turns out that he is in charge of Egypt, right underneath Pharaoh.
Joseph has sent his brothers back to Jacob, and told them all to come to Egypt.
Jacob, begins taking his journey.
He makes his way to Beersheba.
Beersheba is the southern most portion of Canaan, the Promised Land.
This is a land that God has said will one day belong to Jacob’s descendants.
Jacob is about to step out of the land, and go further south then he’s ever gone before.
Before he leaves Beersheba, he offers a sacrifice to God.
After making his sacrifice to God, God appears to him in a dream and gives him a series of promises.
You can see them in verses 3-4.
Don’t be afraid, go to Egypt.
I will make you into a great nation.
I will go down with you.
I will bring you back.
Joseph will close your eyes.
Meaning, you’ll die in Joseph’s presence.
And because of this assurance from God, Jacob embarks on his final journey.
He’s at the threshold of Beersheba, the point of leaving his homeland, and he takes that bold step out, becoming a stranger in a foreign land.
But he doesn’t go hopeless.
He goes with the blessing from God.
With him are his 70 family members.
But while in Egypt, they will become a great nation.
God not only sends him off, but God says He will be with Jacob.
And so, Jacob is promise grounded.
God’s sovereign promises motivate him in his actions.
Therefore, he can go to distant lands, knowing that God has made a promise to keep him and to hold him.
But notice that he doesn’t leave thinking that nothing bad will ever happen.
The promises of God do not guarantee an easy life.
Jacob is not going on a pleasure cruise.
He’s leaving his homeland.
He’s going to another nation.
His descendants will be stuck there for 400 years.
But the promises God does give are very specific.
Go there.
God will be with them.
They will grow into a nation.
God will be with them.
And God will eventually bring them back.
But also notice that he will die there.
He’ll see his son.
But he will never return from Egypt.
Here we are in this fallen world.
We are surrounded by uncertainty.
Murphy’s law reigns - if it can go wrong it will go wrong.
What hope do we have?
The promise is not that everything will be easy.
We live in this fallen world.
We will even die in this fallen world.
But God will not abandon us in this fallen world.
The promises of God.
- I will never leave you nor forsake you.
- I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.
- Fear not, for I am with you, be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
- But the Lord is with me as a dread warrior; therefore my persecutors will stumble; they will not overcome me. They will be greatly shamed, for they will not succeed. Their eternal dishonor will never be forgotten.
But the Lord is with me as a dread warrior; therefore my persecutors will stumble; they will not overcome me. They will be greatly shamed, for they will not succeed. Their eternal dishonor will never be forgotten.
And if you are in Christ, He will not leave you here.
- And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.
We live in this fallen world, not because we ignore it’s fallenness.
But despite its fallenness.
Because we know that one day, Christ will return.
And like the words that God spoke to Jacob.
We will become a part of the greater Kingdom of God.
We will rule over it with Christ.
With God right at its center.
So Jacob, packs up the family, and all 70 of them make the long journey down to Egypt.
They go because they are promise grounded.
But Jacob doesn’t go down in arrogance, he goes down Professing Weakness.
But Jacob doesn’t go down in arrogance, he goes down Professing Weakness.
That is our second point to living in a fallen world, is to be professing weakness.
Jacob has lived an extraordinary life.
He’s had personal encounters with God.
He’s wrestled with God.
But none of this gave room to brag.
Jacob makes the long trek down to Egypt.
He finds himself in front of Pharaoh.
Pharaoh sees an old man. His first words to Jacob are, “ How old are you?”
Look at Jacob’s response in , “The days of the years of my sojourning are 130 years. Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life, and they have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their sojourning.”
These are the words of a wise old man.
When he was younger, Jacob was filled with deceit.
His name means Trickster.
He took advantage of his brother.
He lied to his father.
He ran away from his in-laws in the middle of the night.
But no more.
He’s seen the affects of his sin.
His family suffered.
His marriage suffered.
His children suffered.
And here in his old age, 130 years old, how does this patriarch summarize his life?
“Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life ...”
Some of your translations may say something different there.
Some may substitute the word evil for hard.
As if to say, Jacob’s lived a hard life.
That is remarkably different from evil.
Think about if you were to come home and describe your day at work.
“Honey did you work hard today?”
You think,
“Did you work up a sweat?”
“Do your knees ache?”
“How’s your back?”
Did you work hard means was it difficult.
What bout if you came home and your wife asks, “Honey did you work evil today?”
What are you to think?
He’s in the mafia?
There is a difference between hard and evil.
Jacob defines his life as evil.
And the word there means evil.
Wicked.
No good.
Immoral.
Sad.
That’s how Jacob describes his life; he says he has lived an evil life.
Being blessed by God does not mean, we are somehow the best people on the earth.
Being blessed by God does not mean we are somehow better performing people, or more deserving than other people..
Jacob is the absolute proof of that.
says, “... Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad—in order that God’s purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls—”
Before Jacob was born, God’s plan was for him to be over his brother, for him to receive the promise.
So we can’t say it’s based off of action, because it’s not.
That was God’s plan before there was action.
And the same with you and I.
God has made wonderful promises.
And if you are a Christian, you will receive these promises.
But these promises are not because you were somehow better than anyone else.
Or somehow smarter than everyone else.
Not even a little bit.
I’m often surprised by the language describing Christians within the Bible.
Because it’s so different from how we talk about each other.
Think about your average funeral, with the average eulogy.
Bob has died.
And a friend who has known Bob for many years is given the task of giving the eulogy.
To say a few words about the deceased.
Does this friend ever say, “Bob’s days were few and evil”?
No. At least no eulogy I’ve ever heard.
He says, “Bob, was a nice guy. He wouldn’t hurt a soul. He loved his family. He loved God. I can’t think of a nicer guy. Bob was a good man.”
That’s how we talk about ourselves.
Here’s how the Bible describes us.
Concerning, all of mankind, “None is righteous, no not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God.”
Concerning the church, he says, “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. “
We served Satan.
Talking about the Colossian church, Paul said, “And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds,”
We did evil deeds.
Talking about the Corinthians, “Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. ...”
That’s quite the description of Christian’s lives.
That’s how the Bible describes us.
That’s how the Bible describes the church!
And yet at funerals, everyone is a good man.
I remember talking to a funeral director one time.
He’s a funeral director, he owns his own funeral home.
The man is a believer.
He said out of all his years doing funerals, and he said this very sarcastically, he said every single person who has died has gone to heaven.
You never hear at a funeral, “few and evil were his days.”
So when we look at the world around us, and we compare them to us, or us to them, be careful.
Jacob, was in front of a pagan man, who thought himself to be a god, Pharaoh.
Jacob, was a holy man, chosen by God.
And when describing his life what does Jacob say?
“Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life.”
He doesn’t pretend to be an equal to the Pharaoh.
He’s a simple man.
He doesn’t live up to the standard of his fathers before him.
It’s by God’s grace he’s where he is.
If we are going to live in a fallen world, we better be honest about what we are in this fallen world.
Many times the accusation against Christians is that we are arrogant.
We think that we are better than others.
We act as if we are on a pedestal, higher than everyone else.
And this arrogance is demonstrated by complaining about everything and everyone around you.
I say that, and you probably, think well of course I don’t think I’m better than others.
And the reason is it’s easier to complain about others, then be honest with ourselves.
It’s easier to point out the speck in someone else’s eye, while I walk into walls with the log in your own.
When you are honest about what you are … it takes the pressure off of you, and puts the glory on Christ.
I’m a sinner saved by grace.
And even greater, when you profess your weakness, when you confess your sin, it brings you to Christ.
It is your sin that Jesus died for.
It is your sin that He has forgiven.
When you confess, you demonstrate an understanding of the power of God demonstrated by Jesus Christ in your own life.
says, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
By professing weakness, by admitting your own depravity, your own sin, you state your inability, and point to Jesus as the only way for salvation.
First, if we can’t acknowledge our own depravity, and the extent of it, then we don’t understand what we’ve been saved from.
Plain and simple.
Second, we are called to preach the Gospel and to make disciples of people in the world.
Because if we are not honest, we place people under a burden they can’t carry.
We are not the cream of the crop.
This is needed in a fallen world.
Because if you want to be saved from this fallen world, you need to see that you are a part of it and need rescued out of it.
Then with the help of Joseph, Jacob’s family was Persistently Distinct.
Then with the help of Joseph, Jacob’s family was Persistently Distinct.
Pharaoh says that Joseph’s family can have any of the land in Egypt.
Well, it turns out that Joseph’s brothers are all shepherds, and Pharaoh needs shepherds.
So they get this spot of land called Goshen.
Goshen is in northeastern Egypt.
It’s fertile ground.
It’s lush ground.
It’s fed by the Nile river.
It’s also away from the beaten path.
Meanwhile, the famine is getting worse.
The people continue buying grain from Pharaoh, and eventually the people of Egypt run out of money.
Pharaoh now controls the economy.
So with no cash, they sell their livestock to Pharaoh.
But eventually run out of land to sell.
Now Pharaoh owns all the livestock in Egypt.
Now the people are broke; they have no money, they have no animals.
They are still hungry, what do they have to offer?
So they sell their remaining dignity, their lives and their land to Pharaoh, in exchange for food.
Pharaoh now owns all of Egypt.
He owns the economy.
He owns the animals.
He owns the land.
He even owns the people.
But there is one group of people Pharaoh does not own … this family of Hebrews that are all related to Joseph.
Joseph’s brothers meet Pharaoh.
Pharaoh asks what they do.
The brothers say they are shepherds.
What do you know, Pharaoh has recently come into quite a bit of animals and land, and he needs shepherds.
Pharaoh says that Joseph’s family can have any of the land in Egypt.
Well, it turns out that Joseph’s brothers are all shepherds, and Pharaoh needs shepherds.
So they get this spot of land called Goshen.
Goshen is in northeastern Egypt.
It’s fertile ground.
It’s lush ground.
It’s fed by the Nile river.
It’s also away from the beaten path.
says, “Thus Israel settled in the land of Egypt, in the land of Goshen. And they gained possessions in it, and were fruitful and multiplied greatly.”
I’m pretty sure, this is the first time in the Bible, the people of Israel, are called Israel.
Israel lives in Egypt, but they are not a part of Egypt.
They are not owned by Pharaoh.
He owns the Egyptians, not the Hebrews.
They are distinct.
They are persistently distinct.
They could have chosen to live in any of the Egyptian towns.
They could have lived in luxury.
“You know my brother, Joseph, he saved this place. How bout I be one of you?”
But instead, they were different, and remained different, persistently distinct.
Israel would remain in Egypt for 400 years.
But they would never become assimilated to Egypt.
They would never lose their identity in Egypt.
They would keep their language.
Their families.
The tribes.
Their culture.
Always different.
Persistently distinct.
Here we are living in a fallen world.
But we are not a part of the fallen world.
We have been pulled out of it.
And like Israel in Egypt, we must be persistently distinct.
There must be a reminder of what we were in our sin.
You were enemies of God.
You were not in a good place.
When you were saved, you were pulled out of that system.
You changed your citizenship.
You became a new creation.
And so the fight isn’t to try and blend in with the world around us.
says, “Do not be conformed to this world,” - that’s the fight.
To not be conformed, “- but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”
says, “See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ.”
The fight is to remain persistently distinct.
How do we do this?
By remembering how it is that you became different.
At one time you were not different.
We’ve seen that already in professing your weakness.
At one time you were just like the world.
But something has changed.
addresses this change, “See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.”
Something has changed.
And the change occurred when Jesus purchased you on the cross.
says that you were transferred out of the domain of darkness.
Positionally, you have been changed.
You are now called children of God.
Now we must be persistently distinct.
Another way to describe this distinctiveness, is we are to be holy.
says, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”
Therefore we cannot live how we used to live.
Jesus said we are to be the salt of the earth.
Salt is flavoring.
You put salt on food because it’s missing something, it’s missing flavor.
You’re at the dinner table, and you say, “Pass the salt.”
You are about to add some flavor to your food.
But if the salt is tasteless, all you are doing is adding white specks of grain to your food.
It’s useless.
In fact it’s harmful.
Too much salt will kill you.
Like salt in your food, you are to stand out.
Persistently distinct
This means we think differently, and we live differently.
We think differently.
Our values are different.
What we love is different.
What we approve of is different.
Not just our thoughts, but also our actions are now different.
This is a radical thought.
Many think that becoming a Christian means walking an aisle, making a decision, but never moving beyond that.
They think Christianity is purely intellectual.
But this is not acceptable.
To the person who merely thinks different, but does not act different, Jesus will say, “depart from me you worker of lawlessness.”
If we are going to live in a fallen world, we must be persistently distinct.
We think different.
We speak different.
We talk different.
We walk different.
Are you persistently distinct?
Or are you blending in to the culture around you?
The family moves to Egypt, but Jacob had Persevering Faithfulness
The family moves to Egypt, but Jacob had Persevering Faithfulness
That’s our final point, to live in a fallen world we must have Persevering Faithfulness.
This move was not just a little move.
He was 130 years old when he went to Egypt.
And he lived to the age of 147.
He was in Egypt for 17 years.
Look at some of his final words.
They are found at the end of chapter 47.
Look at .
Read .
Jacob’s our hero.
He’s the father of this nation that God is building.
And yet … he is going to die in Egypt.
That’s not how it’s supposed to go.
The hero doesn’t die.
Yet, God had promised him that his descendants would return to the Promised Land.
So at the end of this chapter.
Near his death, he doesn’t die yet.
Jacob makes this request at the end of verse 29 and into verse 30, “Do not bury me in Egypt, but let me lie with my fathers. Carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their burying place.”
Even in death, he is looking for the promise of God.
And yet isn’t that how we experience life?
We live in a fallen world.
And we will die in a fallen world.
We die looking forward to Christ returning.
We long for him to return.
But we don’t know if that will be during our lifetime.
So we live in anticipation of it.
And we die in anticipation of it.
There will be times when it seems as if the world has won.
The world will have its victory politically.
Bad laws will be made.
Wars will come.
You will be disappointed.
Tuesday is election day.
I’m surprised how often in California we vote to raise our taxes.
Then we complain that our taxes are high.
That is disappointing.
The world will have its victory physically.
This is a fallen world.
In that fallenness there will be illnesses.
There will be diseases.
You will get sick.
Your body will break down.
And yet, there is a persevering faithfulness, that transcends our lives.
I like the way Paul described it in .
“But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death is at work in us, but life in you.”
Our bodies are dying.
But there is life in Christ.
The Christian’s confidence is not that bad things won’t happen.
Because they do.
But even in death, we have a hope.
Paul says he was afflicted in every way.
He was persecuted.
Beaten.
His suffered miserably in life.
And yet, he was never:
Driven to despair.
Forgotten by God.
Or hopeless.
If we are going to live in a fallen world, we need to have a persevering faith.
But so often we don’t have a persevering faith.
You know why?
Because we have a sense of entitlement.
Our culture loves to mock the younger generation.
We call the younger generation, Millennials.
Sometimes they are mockingly called snowflakes.
We characterize them as thinking they are unique snowflakes, that have miniscule self-esteems and have a sense of entitlement.
But this attitude is not limited to the millennials.
It’s present in every generation.
Every generation has this feeling that no harm can or should come to him.
Every generation thinks they are better than they are.
One of the proudest people to ever live, was the late boxing great, Muhammed Ali.
After defeating Sonny Liston, he said these proud words.
“I want everyone to bear witness, I am the greatest! I'm the greatest thing that ever lived. ... I must be the greatest. … I shook up the world, I'm the king of the world. You must listen to me. I am the greatest! I can't be beat!”
And just so show how far his words go.
One time he was on an airplane.
The plane hit some rough weather.
The plane started bouncing around in the turbulence.
The weather got worse.
The passengers were told to fasten their seatbelts.
Everyone complied but Ali.
The flight attendant approached him and requested he obey the captain’s orders.
And Ali proudly said, “Superman don’t need no seatbelt.”
That’s pride.
Nothing can happen to him.
Just to complete the story, the quick thinking flight attendant said, “Superman don’t need no airplane either.”
When we think we are entitled, we think nothing can harm us, because we deserve the best, because we think we are the best..
Many, have claimed to be believers, and when harm came, they were caught off guard.
Unlike Paul, they did despair.
They walked away from the faith.
Because their entitlement told them they’d receive the best in this fallen world.
Maybe this is you.
You’ve been afflicted.
You’ve been struck down.
And your faith is quivering.
Like the boxer who took a shot to the head, you’ve been stunned.
This is time for a persevering faith.
Jacob knew he would die.
Jacob knew he would die in Egypt.
The promise was that God was with him, and God would bring his family back to the promised land.
Which he did in over a little over 400 years.
Your faith is not that no difficulties will come.
But that God is with you.
By the power of the Holy Spirit, God is in you.
And because of Christ’s victory on the Cross, one day there will be a resurrection.
Where you die i will die
We live in a Fallen World.
We live in a Fallen World.
That’s not changing anytime soon.
At least not until Christ returns and makes things new.
Like Murphy’s Law, if something can go wrong it will, at least until Christ returns and makes things new.
Until then what do we do?
We remain promise grounded, remembering the promises of God.
Confident in our faith.
Never becoming proud, we profess our weaknesses.
This reminds us of how we have been reconciled to God, and keeps us humble.
We remain persistently distinct.
Not blending in with the world, but remaining salt of the earth.
Living under the Lordship of Christ.
And then we have a persevering faithfulness.
Knowing that despite our conditions, the Lord is with us.
How are you doing living in a fallen world?
It’s hard.
But with your eyes on Christ, you will endure to the end.