By David Phillips
If you’ve done as I do in the mornings, glanced at the news headlines, you’ve been treated to the normal Monday morning screams that appear to be designed to make us so afraid of all that is going on that we wouldn’t dare let an hour go by without checking the news. Well, I’m here to advise you NOT to do that. Reality is disturbing enough, without constantly being inundated with someone’s worst-case-scenario view of current events.
So, what is reality? The reality, here on Monday morning, March 30, is that the kids can’t go to school, many people can’t go to work, we can’t gather in groups of 10 or larger, McDonalds is only available at the drive-thru, you can’t visit anyone in the hospital or nursing homes, and we are under order of social distancing. I know, that just hits the high spots, but we all get the picture.
The reality is also that it doesn’t do any good to brood, pout or worry. To constantly feed on the negativism actually does harm to more than just our attitude. It hurts our influence. It increases our stress. It soils our spirit. It harms our health. Let’s get some Biblical perspective on this. Notice what Paul says in the first five verses of Romans 5.
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through Him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
Notice a few key points:
- Our justification comes through faith, real faith which obeys and follows, not just claims.
- Our peace is with God, the most important kind of peace in existence. Through Jesus.
- Also, through Jesus and by faith, we have access into God’s grace and we stand in that.
- God’s glory makes our hope meaningful, and that gives great reason to rejoice.
- Sufferings make us better, and we rejoice in that as well. What if we had to go through the hardships of life knowing that they would have no spiritual benefit for us?
- The sufferings of today make us stronger to face tomorrow’s challenges.
- The stronger we get, the more positive our character is. Positive character is very influential.
- The more we grow in endurance and character, the stronger our hope becomes.
- God’s love for us is the glue that holds all this together. And His love is not a distant fact, but a living force that resides in our hearts, thanks to the Holy Spirit.
Maybe that’s not the most scholarly exegesis you could find on that passage, but it really gives me a dose of spiritual adrenaline to help make it through the realities of a Monday.
David’s prayer in Psalm 57:1 that I shared with you yesterday still seems really appropriate today.
Be gracious to me, O God, be gracious to me, for my soul takes refuge in You; and in the shadow of Your wings I will take refuge until destruction passes by.
God bless.