Are You Ready?

It is not a question of God allowing or not allowing things to happen. It is part of living. Some things we do to ourselves, other things we do to each other. Our Father knows about every bird which falls to the ground, but He does not always prevent it from falling. What are we to learn from this? That our response to what happens is more important than what happens. Here is a mystery: one man’s experience drives him to curse God, while another man’s identical experience drives him to bless God. Your response to what happens is more important than what happens.

Chip Brogden




1Peter 4: 18, 1918
 And   "If the righteous is scarcely saved,  what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?"   Therefore let those who suffer according to God's will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator while doing good.

I believe that this is an important fact for all those that identify themselves with the cause of Christ, regardless what name you might put over the top of what you believe.  Have you researched what it is that you have decided to dedicate your life too? C.S. Lewis said it well, "pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world."

God constantly from the very beginning knew our habit of forgetting who He was, again a good reason for God to call Himself, "I AM."  We have such short memories. "Yahweh" gave his beloved children instructions for different ceremonies for His people to come and gather and remember what He had done for them, in the deserts, in the valleys and finally on the cross. It wasn't an easy journey for any that chose to follow Him. It was marked with suffering and with sacrifice, something we tend to "forget" in the country and the world that we live in.

Americans are the most spoiled people in the world.  We have so many blessings and we are so unaccustomed to suffering that we do not know how to handle it, and our enemy knows it. Hence Satan's request to God after he had taken all of Job:s possessions and his children, "let me touch his flesh and he will curse "You."   This should cause us also to remember God's Word to us in 2 Timothy 3:1; But understand this, that ^yin the last days there will come times of difficulty."

Are you and I ready to answer those questions without banging our heads in frustration? Will we be faithful witnesses when things get rough? When the fig tree has no blossoms and no fruit is on the vine, and everything is collapsing around us, family, possessions and our faith is on trial before God and "The World."  Not without prayer, not without fellowship and the encouragement of the family of God.  We must be reminded every day where the power comes from, and fall at His feet for strength, for we, more than all before us, live in the "Last Days. We must continue to do good, and trust God through all that happens around us that He is in complete control of our lives...God Bless.

Pastor William