Sometimes it’s just plain hard to live in this world. You read about the rich getting richer, and you start to envy your next-door neighbor and their new car. How do people “get” so much stuff? What are they going to “do” with it all? And, why can’t I “have” some?
No matter where you are in life, you are bound to experience these feelings at one time or the other. It’s common, and it’s natural. It all comes down to where our eyes are focused.
A couple weeks ago, tornadoes suddenly came upon our area. Many of us were holed up in our closets praying and waiting for the sirens to stop. Me and my family were kept safe and sound, but many were not. My heart goes out to these people who in an instant lost everything.
Living in this world is hard, and there is so much that we just cannot understand. In just the past year, two dear families in our church lost their homes and all their possessions to sudden fires. Why?
But God never told us life would be easy, did He? There’s a cost to following Jesus – we must be willing to give up whatever He asks of us in order to be His disciple (Matt. 8:18-22). Some of us on this earth will have plenty monetarily, yet others will have barely enough. Some of us will have all our earthly possessions stolen away, and some of us will have disabled children. Some of us will experience constant ill health, and some of us will be involved in troubling abusive relationships.
However whatever our situation in this life, the key to remember is that God promises to always provide for our needs:
And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus (Phil. 4:19 NAS).
This verse became very real for me personally when we were moving Jeffrey into his dorm room at college a few years back, and then everything started to fall apart at the last moment and we came very close to having to move everything back out of the dorm room and take everything back home. I began to have a major meltdown.
I started quoting whatever Scripture I could remember, and then remembered that verse: Lord, you promised to take care of our needs, and this is definitely a need! And He provided – of course! So no matter what happens, we need to continue to keep on trusting that God has everything in control. Things don’t always make sense to us in the here and now, but our lives belong to the Lord – we are His jigsaw puzzle – and He never has any missing pieces!
Just 2 days ago I saw a post from a gal at our church whose home was destroyed so badly in the recent tornadoes that it now is going to have to be completely demolished and rebuilt. This same gal had just gone through a couple of excruciatingly painful years – why did this now have to happen to her?
Yet her comment, in part:
The rubble will be removed and we will rebuild. There is so much spiritual significance… Choosing not to live in the devastation and rubble – allowing it to be torn down and removed. Choosing to move forward and not bring the rubble with me. Allowing healing. Beginning again.
As for the two families in our church that lost everything they owned in fires? They, as well, are still attending church faithfully, serving joyfully and praising God. They have been blessed by all the help and love they have been receiving. Because, you see, they now have an even greater realization than they did before that God is indeed all they need.
The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God stands forever” (Is. 40:8 NIV).
The things in this world are temporary, and they will pass away. We can’t hold on to all this stuff, so why do we mourn for it so? Lord, forgive me for all the times I have envied others! All I need is You…
The God Of All Comfort 