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(This is the first in a series of thoughts on the eternal question all struggle with.)
FEW MEN or
women, by the time they reach forty years, have escaped some kind of
suffering. Death, disillusionment, pain, problems-all have had their
opportunity and have not passed them by. Why? Why, if God is good,
doesn't He act like it? If there is a heaven, why must life sometimes be like hell?
The subject of pain and suffering has been studied objectively in the classroom anti felt subjectively in the human heart.
Every one of you has at one time or another cried out, "My God, my ...God; why hast Thou forsaken me.
Well, has He? This God-forsaken us?
Are we Just children of a forgetful Father'? Has he given us up for lost and gone off somewhere out there?
There to minister to a better, more obedient,
more worthy set of children? Did we have our
chance and muff it The cross with its crucifixion says, "No."
The Bible teaches that God is love, and that the worst of pain still has meaning.
We all know that one never appreciates health half so much as after sickness. At 10 A.M. bed is a bore, but by 12 midnight it is a friend.
Each
generation has to learn all over again that war is hell. Young men
fight battles. Old men have long before learned better or they should
have.
Pain is a teacher. Problems teach you things you could never learn in any other way.
In short, three cheers for the devil. He makes our moments of goodness worthwhile.
Three cheers for sickness. It makes our prayers deeper and our searching for God greater.
Three
cheers for floods, hurricanes. fire, and even famine. They remind us
life is for the living. Take away our pain and problems, and while we
might cry less, we would also be less.
"If I
am very, very good in heaven," asked the little girl, "shall I
sometimes be allowed to have a little devil up to tea?" To bring an end
to all devilish quarrels would produce indifference.
To
end all devilish doubt would make faith an anemic piece of spiritual
apparatus -I must be free to feel a curse against God, or else I am not
free to love Him.
He must be free to cause me pain, or else He is not free to show me mercy.
I teach my own children sometimes by caresses, sometimes by anything but.
Someone
has compared life to a seesaw-a lot of ups and downs yet still the same
beam. In short, without both, you wouldn't have much of a seesaw, and
neither would you have much of a life.
Hume,
in Paris, once wrote , I ate nothing but ambrosia, drank nothing but
nectar, breathed nothing but incense, and trod n nothing but flowers."
I
know people who live on as bland a diet of living as they can possibly
concoct. They don't visit friends in hospitals because it unnerves them.
They don't argue for any cause because it upsets them. They don't run
because they. might get heart trouble , and they don't walk, for it
might make them tired.
They live to get '" what they want, and miss what they abhor. They can't stop hurricanes or other natural disasters. They can't escape the day of their death or other sickness if it has to come.
But what part of life they can, they divorce themselves from.
Perhaps there are two things that stand out above all the others. What can God do, and how much should He do?
The first question deals with omnipotence an d the second with intervention . Omnipotence and intervention.
The stakes are high; God's power and our freedom. For just how much do you expect God to do that you do not do yourself?
How many battles do you want Him to fight for you? What kind of job do you want Him to get for you? How many problems do you want Him to solve? Where does God's power stop, or should it stop anywhere?
Now God could crush all evil, as many prayers have asked Him to do. But where would the dividing line be? And what would happen to repentance?
Maybe you've always been a saint, but I haven't.
How old would you have to be before the avenging hand of the Lord struck you dead for being too bad,
too often?
Do you see the danger of in intervention-the danger of that innocent little question, "Why doesn't God do
this, or that, or the other thing?"
The Apostle Paul teaches a lesson we would
all do well to remember.
"You do not change men's hearts by coercion. In
I
Corinthians I: 23, 24 he says, "We preach Christ crucified, unto Jews a
stumbling block, and unto Gentiles foolishness; but unto them that are
called ... Christ the power of God." (A.S.V.)
Not
Christ with a whip in His hand, but with a cross on His back. Not God
shoving goodness down our throats, but knocking patiently at our hearts.
We may make a mess of our lives and the lives of others, but God patiently suffers with us and for us, because this is His way.
(To be continued tomorrow)
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POSTED ON WYRICK'S WRITING THOUGHTS ENTITLED ""Arrogance and Humility
When a company takes over another company, there is often a sign placed outside the premises announcing, UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT.
Such a sign accurately summarizes what takes place in Christian conversions. When Christ takes over a life, that life is literally under new management.
So consider, is God now managing your pride? Or is your pride still managing you?
click on the following
TO TAKE YOU TO THE WYRICK'S WRITING'S SITE
Yes, God loves you the way you are but he loves you too much to let you stay that way.
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Click
on the URL below to WATCH NEIL IN HIS WORLD FAMOUS ONE MAN
DRAMATIZATIONS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, BEN FRANKLIN, CHARLES WESLEY AND
MARTIN LUTHER
To Order and Read Neil's 9th book THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN
GO TO amazon.com
QUOTES ABOUT THIS WONDERFUL INSPIRING INFORMATIVE book
STILL RECEIVING RAVE REVIEWS 8 YEARS AFTER IT'S PUBLICATION.
"Positive,
powerful utterances...skillfully enhancing our understanding and
appreciation of Lincoln while revealing the Divine source of his
strength."
Lt. Colonel C.A. Olsen (Ret.) Asbury College (Professor Ret.)
"The Spiritual Abraham Lincoln is an
extremely well written book that investigates what might be termed the
spiritual side of President Lincoln. It's both scholarly and very
readable. I came away impressed at Mr. Wyrick's portrayal of the
President and with an altered and enlarged vision of the man:'
William Hoffman, Award winning fiction writer; author of Blood and Guile, and Wild Thorn
"Wyrick
has authored a wonderful examination of the spirituality of one of
American history's most devoutly religious leaders...a pleasant and
readable book that has a rich depth of information."
Maynard Pittendreigh Presbyterian minister
"When
it comes to invoking religion in support of any of their decisions,
politicians need to sit at the feet of Abraham Lincoln. Reinhold Niebuhr
once called him 'America's greatest theologian.' Why so great? Because
he invariably distinguished between human works and the works of the
Almighty. As Wyrick
says, 'He wore the mantle of humility easily: because he was more
impressed with what God was doing in the world than with what he,
president of the United States in the midst of an awful crisis, was
doing. That is why in his last major speech he distinguished between
both human causes in the Civil War and the Almighty's 'own purposes.'
Lincoln would have agreed that it is better to leave God-talk out of
politics than to decorate human proposals with divinity. This is a book
for our American time. Through his careful study of Lincoln's career,
Wyrick compels us to remember that piety belongs in politics only when piety transcends politics."
Dr. Donald W. Shriver
Emeritus professor at Union Theological Seminary in New York. Author of An Ethic for Enemies: Forgiveness in Politics
"v. Neil
Wyrick's fine work allows the reader to appreciate Abraham Lincoln's
Christian commitment and his prophetic role in American history. Should
have a wide readership."
James H. Smylie Professor of Church History (Ret.) Union Theological Seminary, Richmond, Virginia
"Neil Wyrick's The Spiritual Abraham Lincoln should be read
by anyone attempting to understand the man who was probably the most
complex person to ever hold the office of president of the United
States. Dr. Wyrick is intent on demonstrating that the spirituality so
often expressed in Lincoln's writings and speeches was not merely lip
service to a Deity, but rather expressions of a profound faith in a real
God. It was this faith that provided the wisdom, compassion, insight
and sometimes steel that Lincoln would need in full measure
as he led the United States through the Civil War. Dr. Wyrick's clear
and unpretentious style of presentation is very much in keeping with the
character ofhis subject, and in so doing, Wyrick makes his point very
well that Lincoln, his beliefs, and the faith that formed them, are as
relevant to a troubled America in 2004 as they were in 1863."
Daniel Allen Butler, author of "Unsinkable"; The Full Story of the RMS Titanic, The Lusitania and The Age o f Cunard
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