Conflict, Perplexity and Trouble

“Hast thou utterly rejected Judah? Hath thy soul loathed Zion? Why hast thou smitten us, and there is no healing for us? We looked for peace and there is no good; and for the time of healing, and, behold trouble! We acknowledge, O Lord, our wickedness, and the iniquity of our fathers: for we have sinned against thee. Do not abhor us, for thy name’s sake, do not disgrace the throne of thy glory: remember, break not thy covenant with us. Are there any among the vanities of the Gentiles that can cause rain? Or can the heavens give showers? Art not thou he, O Lord our God? Therefore we will wait upon thee: for thou hast made all these things.” Jer. 14:19-22.

Everything that can be shaken, will be shaken, that what cannot be shaken may remain. Should we complain because we live in the midst of trouble and tumult? Would we want to live in complete peaceful retirement, yet never progress? Would we want the world to continue as it has for 1000’s of years?

Again, what if we discover sin in members of the church, or in ourselves where we least expect it? Should we become despondent, give up, and decide that righteousness is impossible? No! God allows us to discover our own sins and weaknesses, and those of others, so that we will flee to Him for help, and in no case put our trust in flesh, either our own, or that of others.

” Thus saith the Lord; Cursed be the man that trusts in man, and makes flesh his arm, and whose heart departs from the Lord. For he shall be like the heat in the desert, and shall not see when good comes; but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, in a salt land and not inhabited.

” Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is. For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreads out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat comes, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.

” The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: Who can know it?
” I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings. As the partridge sits on eggs, and hatches them not; so he that gets riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool.

” A glorious high throne from the beginning is the place of our sanctuary, O Lord, the hope of Israel, all that forsake thee shall be ashamed, and they that depart from me shall be written in the earth, because they have forsaken the Lord, the fountain of living waters. Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed; save me and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.” Jer. 17:5-14.

Every weakness that we see in any other person, or in ourselves is in the Lord’s purpose to cause us to in no case put our trust or hope in any man. The wisest and best are only human and sometimes err. We are prone to look to others for help, sympathy, or understanding, instead of going to God in every case and in every unexpected situation.

This life is simply a training ground for God’s workers – a workshop where the impurities are removed and the gold refined. The fire must often be applied to remove the chaff, and who likes to go through the fire? Who enjoys being chiseled, and burned, and washed, and shaped and put aside, and picked up, and frozen, and heated, thawed and melted, worked and shaped – and the process never seems to end. Who likes living amidst turmoil and trouble?

” Who can understand his errors? Cleanse thou me from secret faults.” Ps. 19:12
But if we desire to be among the white-robed singers, we will rejoice that God sees something worth working on in us. We will rejoice when our own errors are pointed out, even if it is humiliating and painful.

” And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity: and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible. I will make a man more precious than fine gold; even a man than the golden wedge of Ophir. Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of her place, in the wrath of the Lord of hosts, and in the day of his fierce anger.” Isa. 13:11-13

Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory:
The last like the first sentence of the Lord’s Prayer, points to our Father as above all power and authority and every name that is named. The Saviour beheld the years that stretched out before His disciples, not, as they had dreamed, lying in the sunshine of worldly prosperity and honour, but dark with the tempests of human hatred and satanic wrath. Amid national strife and ruin, the steps of the disciples would be beset with perils, and often their hearts would be oppressed by fear. They were to see Jerusalem a desolation, the temple swept away, its worship forever ended, and Israel scattered to all lands, like wrecks on a desert shore. Jesus said, ” Ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars. Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.” Matt. 24:6-8

Yet Christ’s followers were not to fear that their hope was lost or that God had forsaken the earth. The power and the glory belong unto Him whose great purposes would still move on unthwarted toward their consummation. In the prayer that breathes their daily wants, the disciples of Christ were directed to look above all the power and dominion of evil, unto the Lord their God, whose kingdom rules over all and who is their Father and everlasting Friend.
The ruin of Jerusalem was a symbol of the final ruin that shall overwhelm the world. The prophecies that received a partial fulfillment in the overthrow of Jerusalem have a more direct application to the last days. We are now standing on the threshold of great and solemn events. A crisis is before us, such as the world has never witnessed. And sweetly to us, as to the first disciples, comes the assurance that God’s kingdom rules over all. The program of coming events is in the hands of our Maker. The Majesty of heaven has the destiny of nations, as well as the concerns of His church, in His own charge. The divine Instructor is saying to every agent in the accomplishment of His plans, as He said to Cyrus, ” I girded thee, though thou hast not known Me.

In the vision of the prophet Ezekiel there was the appearance of a hand beneath the wings of the cherubim. This is to teach His servants that it is divine power which gives them success. Those whom God employs as His messengers are not to feel that His work is dependent upon them. Finite beings are not left to carry this burden of responsibility. He who slumbers not, who is continually at work for the accomplishment of His designs, will carry forward His own work. He will thwart the purposes of wicked men, and will bring to confusion the counsels of those who plot mischief against His people. He who is the King, the Lord of hosts, sits between the cherubim, and amid the strife and tumult of nations He guards His children still. He who rules in the heavens is our Saviour. He measures every trial, He watches the furnace fire that must test every soul. When the strongholds of kings shall be overthrown, when the arrows of wrath shall strike through the hearts of His enemies, His people will be safe in His hands.” (See 1 Chronicles 29:11, 12)

Consider bread. The wheat seed must be planted, watered, heated by the sunshine, grown, ripened, dried, reaped, threshed, stored, taken out, ground, mixed, kneaded, risen, baked, cooled, sliced, eaten. All to provide energy and life for mankind.

Martin Luther once said, ” I desire to live in repose; but I am thrown into the midst of wars and revolutions.” ?
” He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed.”

” We could not think of these important words, and call to mind the sufferings of Jesus that we poor sinners might receive pardon and be redeemed unto God by His most precious blood, without feeling a holy restraint upon us, and an earnest desire to suffer for Him who suffered and endured so much for us. If we dwell on these things, dear self, with its dignity, will be humbled, and its place will be occupied by a childlike simplicity which will bear reproof from others and will not be easily provoked. A self-willed spirit will not then come in to rule the soul.” EW 112
AMEN.