[Faith-talk] Good Night Message for Sunday, April 7, 2013

[Paul]

Well folks, once again the end of another Lord's Day is approaching us here in the Americas, whereas you in other countries outside our hemisphere are already in your Monday.  I hope that your Sunday went well, and that your Monday is going well.

Alvin Henry, a writer from Texas, contributes today's article simply entitled "Today," rendered as follows:

I grow so weary of bad news and forecasts of disaster.  Some current headlines that have come across my desk include:

Swine Flue Pandemic Hits Texas
Few Signs of Recovery From Recession
U.S. Losing Drug War

And the list goes on.  As I try to absorb this daily dose of bad news, I begin to imagine all sorts of terrifying things about to happen.  My next reaction is to try to figure out what I ought to be doing to stem the tide.  Should I get some flu medicine? Stock up on canned goods? Contact my congressman?

And then a still, small voice speaks within, calling to mind the words of my Lord's sermon:  "So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own" (Matt. 6:34).

The Apostle James, along with others, reminds us that we really do not know what tomorrow holds.  All our worrying about it, together with all those carefully laid out plans, will not change it (James 4:13-15).

Time travel is a classic science fiction topic.  A popular television program explores this topic, together with the implication that if we could travel back in time to make some different choices we could change the future.  That makes for some interesting and complex fiction, but that's all it is--fiction!

Such stories (and there are many) assume that time merely happens--blindly; that the universe is some kind of machine governed only by physics and scientific laws, understood or not.  The only beings with free will are humans.  We make choices and these choices influence these fixed laws, changing them.  Then things happen to our lives.  If we could travel back in time to make other choices, then other--presumably better--things will happen instead.  So goes the story line.

Time, like everything else in this creation, is a creation.  The universe is not a blind machine that merely happens to be.  We Christians rejoice that God created everything through Christ (John 1:1-4).  He not only created all things, He sustains them by His Word of power.

It is this same Lord Who, in the fullness of time, entered His world to carry the burden of our choices, our godless choices, our sin.  He is the One I turn to whenever my heart grows weary with all this bad news.  On the first day of a new week He came out of the grave to announce once and for all that in Him our sins are forgiven.

We can't change the past, but in Christ we have confidence for the future.  So I'm going to focus on today.  How may I give glory and honor to Christ and His Father today? How may I care for my neighbor today?

Yesterday cannot be repeated.  All I have is today.  And that is enough.

And there you have Alvin's article for today.  I hope that you found it spiritually enlightening.

And now may the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob just keep us safe, individually and collectively, throughout this night or day and especially in these last days in which we live.  Your Christian friend and brother, Paul