SURVIVING THE HAZARDS OF LIFE
Eugene Peterson was a pastor exterior of Baltimore for over 30 years. He talks in considered one of his books about how one afternoon he was donating blood at a Pink Cross bloodmobile. The nurse came visiting to ask him if there was any purpose to disqualify him from giving blood. She requested him about his medical historical past, his present well being, and his life-style. The ultimate query on the listing was “Do you have interaction in hazardous work?” Peterson answered, “sure.” She checked out him, shocked, simply going via a routine and anticipating him to say no, and requested him what line of labor he was in. When he answered, “Pastor,” she smiled, ignored his reply, and marked “no” on the shape. Earlier than she walked away she mentioned, “I don’t imply that form of hazardous.”
It doesn’t matter what we’re doing on this life, pastoring, instructing, shopping for and promoting, policing, or working in authorities, it’s all hazardous work, as a result of life is hazardous. We’ve develop into properly conscious of that over the previous few weeks. Confronted with the fact once more that one thing too small to see with our unaided eyes can sicken us or kill us. We all know that on this world we get sick, our family members get sick, and we or our family members can die. We all know that different hazards stare us down at completely different occasions: we lose our jobs, we will’t pay our payments, our marriages start to crumble, sudden tragedies come from nowhere and smack us proper within the face. We wrestle with a besetting sin that threatens to eat us from the within out, or another person’s sin towards us that threatens to eat us from the skin in. We’re surrounded on all sides by injustice and struggling and ache and loss. Life is hazardous.
So what will we do? Some individuals flip to issues to cowl up and attempt to numb the ache: alcohol, pot, pornography, prescription drugs they don’t want, or worse. Others develop into bitter, shrinking into themselves, offended at life, offended at God, and offended at everybody else. Others reside in concern and nervousness, despairing and dropping hope, slowly disconnecting with life and others. But when we all know the one true and residing God and his Son, Jesus Christ, we’re instructed to show to him for assist. All of us need assistance. We’d like God’s assist. We all know when one thing like a pandemic hits our world, the very first thing we have to do to arrange is to show to him and to be prepared to fulfill our Maker.
One passage of Scripture that helps us do that is Psalm 124. This psalm serves as a witness to God’s assist, even in our most hazardous circumstances. It’s a testimony to the fantastic fact that God is for us, that he’s on our facet. Take a while to meditate on the phrases beneath. Pray via them. Flip to God in Christ via the Spirit. Our basic actuality on this life is God, not this world, or our circumstances. It’s Jesus Christ who defines us and facilities us.
PSALM 124
“Had it not been the Lord who was on our facet,” Let Israel now say,
“Had it not been the Lord who was on our facet When males rose up towards us,
Then they might have swallowed us alive, When their anger was kindled towards us;
Then the waters would have engulfed us, The stream would have swept over our soul;
Then the raging waters would have swept over our soul.”
Blessed be the Lord, Who has not given us to be torn by their tooth.
Our soul has escaped as a fowl out of the snare of the trapper; The snare is damaged and we now have escaped.
Our assistance is within the identify of the Lord, Who made heaven and earth.
