Tag: Hard times

God Is Big Enough

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If you have a problem at work that you need help solving, you don’t go to the lowest employee on the org chart. You go to the person who has the most power and authority you can get on your side. And, when you have that person firmly on your side, the size and scope of the problem aren’t nearly as intimidating as they were before you secured their support. When we look at the world around us, it’s hard not to be completely overwhelmed by the problems we see. Sometimes it’s hard not to be overwhelmed by the problems just in our own lives. There’s a solution for this. When Habakkuk was feeling overwhelmed by the problems he was facing, he prayed and came away with a new perspective that was up to the task. Let’s talk about what he learned and what we can learn from him in this third part of our teaching series, Asking God Hard Questions.

God Is Big Enough

So, I was watching the Chiefs play the other night, and Mahomes was running from a defender who looked to be about three times his size and absolutely intent on sacking him. Now, Mahomes has been there a lot over his career, and has a remarkable knack for getting out of those kinds of situations unscathed. Mahomes ran out of the pocket and back about 10 yards toward the sideline. Then, just when it looked like he was going to get caught and brought down hard for a rather devastating sack…he was. Rather than throwing the ball away like he should have so we didn’t get hit with a huge loss on the play, he just held onto it and got tackled while he was all by himself. There wasn’t another Chief’s player within 10 yards of him. That meant there were lots of available guys in whose direction he could have thrown the ball just to throw it away and avoid the loss. But he didn’t. He just let himself get sacked. Meanwhile, I’m busy hollering at the screen, “Throw the ball!” 

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You Are Not Alone

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Jesus’ journey to the cross in Mark’s Gospel is almost complete. This week we are walking through the rest of Mark 14 from where we stopped last time. We left Jesus having announced the arrival of His betrayer to His sleepy disciples. As we pick up this week, Jesus does indeed get betrayed and abandoned. He is subjected to all kinds of abuse and injustice. And in the end, He is left alone to face it. It’s a pretty dark chapter, but it’s one that reminds us that Jesus has been through it. When we are going through it ourselves, we’ve got a friend in Him. Let’s explore all of this in more detail as we take the next step on our journey to the cross with Mark.

You Are Not Alone

Misery loves company. Have you experienced that? When we are miserable, we want to know that we are not alone in our misery. This desire manifests itself primarily in a couple of different forms, one of which is more helpful than the other. The less helpful way that misery seeks company is for us to try to drag down the people around us so they are as miserable as we are. Have you ever been around somebody like that? They’re like a gloomy Eeyore all the time because they secretly hope that can make the people around them as morose about life as they are so there’s at least one other person as miserable as they are. 

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Morning Musing: Exodus 15:22-24

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“Then Moses led Israel on from the Red Sea, and they went out to the Wilderness of Shur. They journeyed for three days in the wilderness without finding water. They came to Marah, but they could not drink the water at Marah because it was bitter – that is why it was named Marah. The people grumbled to Moses, ‘What are we going to drink?'” (CSB – Read the chapter)

There are some stories that just stick with you. One my dad told a lot when I was growing up, and which I have now told my own boys often enough that when I start it they say, ‘We know. You and Grandpa have both told us before,’ is about one of his teachers in school. Every day the teacher would flip a coin. If it was heads, they had a pop quiz. If it was tails, they didn’t. Sometimes life throws tests our way that we don’t want or expect. How we handle those, though, matters a lot. They both test and reveal our character. Israel didn’t get very far into their journey before they experienced one of these tests. It became a story that would eventually be told a lot. Let’s talk about it.

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Digging in Deeper: Exodus 1:6-10

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“Joseph and all his brothers and all that generation eventually died. But the Israelites were fruitful, increased rapidly, multiplied, and became extremely numerous so that the land was filled with them. A new king, who did not know about Joseph, came to power in Egypt. He said to his people, ‘Look, the Israelite people are more numerous and powerful than we are. Come, let’s deal shrewdly with them; otherwise they will multiply further, and when war breaks out, they will join our enemies, fight against us, and leave the country.'” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Today will be the first step in a new journey I have been looking forward to starting for quite some time now. For the next few months, we are going to be working through the narrative of Exodus. Exodus plays a powerful role in terms of creating a context in which Jesus eventually makes sense. It is a reminder that although history doesn’t repeat itself, as God writes His great symphony across the ages, He does sometimes develop in more detail themes He first introduced earlier on in His masterwork. Through the Exodus, God took the next major step forward in terms of revealing Himself to us so that we could be in a relationship with Him. As we journey through this together, we may not cover every single detail, but we are going to be as thorough as we can. Let’s start here near the beginning as Israel finds itself becoming an actual nation (thus fulfilling God’s promise to Abraham) through a process of suffering.

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Digging in Deeper: Amos 3:11-12

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“Therefore, the Lord God says: An enemy will surround the land; he will destroy your strongholds and plunder your citadels. The Lord says: As the shepherd snatches two legs or a piece of an ear from the lion’s mouth, so the Israelites who live in Samaria will be rescued with only the corner of a bed or the cushion of a couch.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

We long for security. So much of what we do is prefaced on the idea that it is going to make tomorrow better than today. Or at least, it is going to make tomorrow more likely to come than not. We save money, we invest, we diet, we build big houses, we fill our pantries, we recycle, and so on and so forth. Israel longed for security too, and they thought they had it. Unfortunately, they had “found” it in the wrong things and God had to help them see that. Let’s take a look at this and explore what lessons there might be for us in it.

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