Prepared for the Worst

Prepared for the Worst

          by Todd Friel  

(www.wretchedradio.com)

The drought, the Aurora shootings and the economy have many asking, “Where are you God?” The Bible answers that question in what I like to call the 2-2-2 Principle.

Providence

God is running the world two ways. He either causes or allows events to happen. If it is “natural” or good, then God gets credit. If an event is sinful or wicked, than man gets credit. God hates evil, but He uses our sin sinlessly to accomplish a greater good.

Two Kinds of People

God classifies only two types of people on the planet, the saved and the un-saved. God is sending only two messages to each group.

  1. The Un-saved

Through calamity, struggle, hardship and pain, God is sending two messages:

1.       I am now punishing you for your sins. “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness." (Romans 1:18)

2.       When Jesus was asked about two national tragedies in Luke 13, He interpreted the tragedy for His hearers, “Repent unless you likewise perish” (Luke 13:1-5) In a tragedy, God is preaching, “Repent!” to the unsaved.

  2. His Children

God is trying to teach Christians one of two things (or both) in a tragedy.

1. Discipline. “In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.  And have you completely forgotten this word of encouragement that addresses you as a father addresses his son? It says,

    My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline,
    and do not lose heart when he rebukes you,
    because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, 
    and he chastens everyone he accepts as his so 

           2. God is preparing you for future service or getting you to look more toward heaven (Romans 5:3-4)

Please have your theologies of suffering, sovereignty and the doctrine of providence firmly in place before anything bad befalls you. It won’t take the pain away, but it will help you cope with it and find the good in it.

-by Todd Frield

In addition to what Todd said above it sure seems like America is morally, spiritually, and fiscally going down the drain, doesn't it? It seems as if Christians are being vilified left and right for moral stands they take. Recently there was the big Chick Fil A day. After the day ended the secular humanists, homosexual activists, and even lame duck "Christians" pointed out that you couldn't get that many Christians to feed the homeless (they even have the tag line at the bottom "something Jesus actually said to do"...which again....is not in the Bible...haha) and that we were terribly misguided and evil for buying Chick Fil A sandwiches on that day. All of these people fail to realize that while they say "just not, lest ye be judged" they are turning around and doing the very thing that they say we shouldn't do! I liked what Trevin Wax says in this article (click HERE to read it) -

That’s why, at the end of the day, this conversation isn’t really about marriage, gay rights, or restaurant permits. It’s not about the cultural divide between north and south, liberal and conservative.
It’s about Jesus. It’s about the radical sexual ethic He put forth in His teaching – a moral zealousness that hits our current culture’s sexual permissiveness head-on. And it’s about His forgiveness offered to all sexual sinners, so long as we agree with Jesus about our sin and embrace Him instead. (emphasis mine)

Most of the "issues" actually are rooted in a rejection of Jesus and a refusal to embrace Him in repentance and faith. Most of us love our sin too much to say "no" to it and "yes" to Him. We would rather have our "rights". Don't get me wrong. I don't think participating in the Chick Fil A day makes any one person more holy than the next (or a lack of participation on the flip side) and I definitely would love it if we could mobilize that many Christians to spread the Gospel and participate in social issues (as long as they are Gospel centered service activities) like feeding under privileged children and families. I am of the opinion that the passage below from 2 Timothy is coming true right in front of our eyes. We have difficult times ahead as the end draws closer (either with the return of Jesus or our physical death). First Paul tells Timothy what the problem will be and then in 2 Timothy 4 he tells Timothy how he is to engage and combat the increase in lawlessness among people. Hopefully I can carry out the marching orders that Paul gave to Timothy!

2 Timothy 3:1-5

But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; Avoid such men as these.

2 Timothy 4:1-5

I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. But you, be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.