9-17-2016

Good Morning All!! 

        John 9:2; “And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”

    The question that often gets asked either out loud or in our hearts.  Why was this man born blind or why do bad things happen?  We all have questions.  Why did that young man die?  Why did that baby die?  Why does my spouse have Alzheimer’s?  Why do so many go to bed hungry?  Why do bad things happen?  I get asked that often.  Honestly, I ask it often but that question is a red herring that the devil whispers to us to cause us to doubt God’s love.

   We can see that bad things happen because of sin; not always someone’s personal, active sin but because sin permeates creation and has corrupted creation.  Paul tells us that creation groans and that it longs to be free from the bondage of decay.  Sin causes degradation and decay even in creation.  Degradation and decay cause problems within our life and within our world.  Bad things happen because it is part of the broken and corrupted creation.   Bad things happen to believers and unbelievers.  They happen because we are part of the broken and corrupted creation.

    The difference is that we as believers, one redeemed by Jesus face our bad things with hope.  The bad things in this life will occur, usually in random and chaotic fashion and to those who have no faith, who have no hope, the results are catastrophic.  People die, people have diseases, people suffer because we live in a broken creation, a creation broken by sin.  So when a loved one dies, we grieve.  Everyone grieves at the death of a loved one but while the unbeliever grieves without hope or a future; we do not grieve in that fashion.  We grieve with hope.  I have seen loved ones die and I grieved.  I miss them every day and that pain is there.  Yet, there is a greater sense of expectation, a longing for the return in Christ when we shall be reunited in Paradise.

    The young believer who died too young will be there.  The baby will be there.  The spouse with Alzheimer’s will be there.  All those who have been redeemed by the blood of Jesus, who held onto his promise of forgiveness and eternal life will be there.  Many people that I know and even more that I will get to know.  For the believers, death is only a nap.  It is only an interlude or an intermission in our existence.  Death is only a door and it cannot hold us.   We have eternal life, perfect in all ways because of Jesus.

    To loved ones who die before us, we need only think, “until we meet again.”  Christ is risen; He is risen indeed!!  We too shall rise to newness at his return.  That is our hope and that is our confidence.

Come Lord Jesus, come and bring an end to the pain and the suffering of this creation.  Heal all of your creation that we may live in perfect union with you.  Until them, comfort our pain, dry our tears and fill our hearts with hope. In your precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret