This morning in my devotions, God spoke to Job saying, “ ‘Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding?’” (Job 38:4).  The rhetorical line of questioning continues for several chapters. Each question God asks of Job is designed to remind Job that Job is not God and does not possess His wisdom and power.  I am struck once again by how big God is and how limited my understanding of the world and my life actually is. 

I’ve been thinking about this phrase especially in light of this summer’s rain.  We started the year thinking it would be dry and planned accordingly only to live through an historically wet year. We look out and see the promise of unimaginably abundant crops only to see them get struck down by hail and waterlogged by downpours. 

Even as you think about what could have been, grow frustrated with more rain, and wait to get into the fields, may you be reminded of the bigness of God that He is far wiser than you (as hard as that may be to admit) and that He has a plan for His creation (including you!) even when we can’t plainly see it.  Take comfort in knowing that God has been here from before the beginning of time and that He promises to care for and provided for all your needs. 

We face many decisions in our lives. Some are pretty insignificant and others may have life altering ramifications.  Making decisions can be one of the most difficult things we as Christians must deal with because there is an added responsibility placed on us.  We don’t make decisions based solely on what seems best to or for us in the present but based on something bigger.  One of the highest callings we have as a follower of Jesus is to bring glory to God, therefore all that we do ought to bring glory and honor and praise to our God.  I (and I imagine others do as well) often struggle with the question whether I am making a decision that God would have me make. 

There is a spectrum of decision making that on one extreme includes little of God in the decision making process and which goes to the other extreme of not being able to make any decision without a clear divine instruction.  The scale of the choice influences how much consideration we give it.  It probably matters little to God whether I choose a Kit-Kat as opposed to a Coffee Crisp, after all God has uniquely given us humans the ability to think and have free-will.  But if I am deciding whether to buy a new house or to move to a new community, I will do my best to discern God’s leading and wait for clear direction.
The scope of the decision often impacts the amount of seeking God’s direction and leading that we do. This comes down to a pretty simple question: How much of God is enough in making decisions?  (As if that can be measured!)

I was struck this week by Colossians 2:6 which says, “Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.” While this is an encouragement to continue in a life following Jesus, it also speaks to knowing God: Walk in Christ.  That is the key to decision making that isn’t empty of God or paralyzing while we do nothing as we wait for God. 

When you’ve spent a considerable amount of time with someone (like your spouse) you begin to know what they’re thinking and how they will act.  The same is true with God. The more time spent with Him in prayer and in the Word, the more His ways will be known to you.  As you grow with God, the less you have to stop and anxiously wait or exclude God from whatever decision you’re facing.  His ways become yours as you walk with Him, you develop a sense of knowing even as you seek His face in all you do. 

So walk in him.

If you are like me, you might struggle with finding time to be with God throughout the week.  I know I should do devotions, read my Bible, and pray but many times it just doesn’t get done (or isn’t done as well as I’d like). While this is not a new problem for many people, it is growing more acute as our lives fill up with other things, too often God is the first one bumped from our schedule.  Perhaps the best way to make God a priority in our lives is to build Him into our schedule. 

We are a people who thrive on the predictability of a patterned life.  It is well noted that children thrive, feel more secure and confident when there is a daily routine in place where they can anticipate when is coming next.  Even God built a pattern into creation, “so God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation” (Genesis 2:3).  Some take this patterned life to the extreme (see Sheldon Cooper on The Big Bang Theory) while others may not even recognize their need for predictability in life.  Live into a patterned life with Jesus at the centre!

First, establish a precedent of being in church every Sunday.  It is great that you watch Christian programing but it doesn’t replace actually being with your fellow believers worshiping God.  We need each others support and encouragement. Taking an hour and a half out of your week to worship acts as a foundation for your spiritual habits throughout the week.  Our worship services intentionally look similar every week so that the patterns of worship become part of you.  The pattern of singing, confession, hearing Scripture, and prayer is demonstrated each week as a model for our worship life the other six days.  Our liturgical pattern helps us enter into God’s story while orienting our lives around God.  Weekly worship is critical for our spiritual health and vitality.

Second, set apart some time each day to be in God’s Word and prayer.  Some find it helpful to do this in the morning while others like to do it at night.  Experiment with what time works best for you but be sure to schedule in a time, write it in your day planner or put it in your phone.  There are many ways that you can be in Scripture: maybe you start in Genesis and read a few chapters a day, or you start with the Gospel of John and hear the story of Jesus, or perhaps you follow a devotional book that leads you to different Scriptures each day.  No matter how you structure your time, allow God to lead you into His Word. 

Also during this time be sure to pray.  Pray not just for your needs but for the needs of others and for the church. Offer prayers of thanksgiving for God’s provision and action in your life.  Confess your failures and receive God’s words of pardon.  Simply be quiet as you allow God to speak to you words of encouragement, direction, or correction. Just take time to be with and to hear from God in prayer and His Word.  One way we are encouraging our church to be attentive to God through prayer and the Word is with Trinity’s Summer Commitment. 

It is not my intent to guilt you into doing anything, I simply want us to be honest with each other that setting apart time to rest and enjoy the company of God does not come naturally in our sinful world. In fact, sin is continually enticing us away from God. As Christians, we always ought to do what we can to encourage one another into a deeper relationship with Jesus. 

So in these slower summer months when schedules are easier to manage, let me challenge you to establish a pattern of worship in your life: make it a priority to be in church each week, devote a few minutes each day to time in God’s Word and prayer, take time to simply rest in God’s creation free from distractions and stress, and think about Trinity’s Commitment to God this summer.

Some resources to help build God into your routine:
Family Prayer- These devotions follow the structure of daily prayer and can be used in the family (Anglican Church of North America)

Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals (For purchase on Amazon)

Daily Text- A new prayer and Scripture readings every day of the year (Moravian Church)

This past Sunday we talked about the certainty of the return of Jesus and what that means for us now and in the future.  In Bible Study, a question was asked about what it means to hasten the coming of the day of the Lord from 1 Peter 3:11-12: “Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God..”

The reality in which we live as Christians is that the Kingdom of God has already been established on earth but has not yet been established in its fullness.  The only way Jesus’ life on earth makes any sense is if He came inaugurate His Kingdom, an entirely new way of doing things which even His disciples didn’t fully grasp.  The only way Jesus’ death and resurrection make any sense is if they were the decisive acts in human history in which the kingdom of sin, death, and the devil were once for all defeated and a new kingdom was established.  The only way Jesus’ ascension makes any sense is if He is with God the Father reigning over an actual kingdom in which all believers participate.  The Kingdom of God is here.  The church is its visible presence on earth until that day when Jesus comes again; that day for which we as kingdom people long. 

If this is the reality to which we are called into by the Spirit of God, how ought we to live? Should our lives not look radically different as a result of us being partners in Jesus’ kingdom?  Peter gives us a hint when he says, “what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness…”  Holiness and godliness are words thrown around often negatively, in connection with a rigid legalism or as a target of criticism of the hypocritical church that can’t live up to its own standards.  While we can’t live a holy and godly life in our own power, it is nonetheless the ideal God has had for His people for thousands of years. 

Throughout the Old Testament, Israel is continually being called to be holy; to be the people God formed them to be: a people of covenant and a people set apart as a city on a hill.  God called Israel out of all the other nations so that they might be different, that people would look at how different their lives are because of God and desire that for themselves.  The same call to holiness is extended to God’s people throughout the New Testament as well.  Peter, in his first book, instructs his readers using the command from Leviticus 11:44, “Be holy as I am holy.”  Later, he says, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).

In being a people living holy and godly lives, set apart for the glory of God, we look different, we act different, and we proclaim the Gospel with our lives.  The proclamation of the Gospel through our actions and words is central to hastening of the coming of the day of the Lord.  Jesus declares in Matthew, “And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come” (24:14).  And Peter expands this by saying, “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).  God’s desire is that all people would have the opportunity to hear the Gospel, to have their hearts pierced by it bearing repentance and life in Jesus.  Until the Gospel has been proclaimed to all, giving all an opportunity to have their hearts transformed by it, Jesus will not come. 

So, how do we hasten the day of the coming of the Lord?  By being a Gospel people, living and proclaiming that the Kingdom has come in the death and resurrection of Jesus, and by pointing to the hope that is ours when Jesus comes again ushering in the fulfillment of His Kingdom in the new heavens and new earth.

By now, you’ve likely seen the Tweet pronouncing the wildfire which decimated a large portion of Fort McMurray as a Karmic #ClimateChange Fire.  The reasoning is as follows: the oil sands cause pollution in a vastly disproportionate way (which evidence shows is false) therefore nature and/or God is getting back at the oil sands for the damage caused the planet.  Is this a case of what goes around, comes around?  Is that even a Christian way of thinking?

In another way, whenever a natural disaster afflicts a particular region, there are always some who are quick to pronounce the tragic event as God’s wrath or judgment being poured out upon an unrepentant people.  Certainly, God has worked through cataclysmic events throughout history as a way of calling His people back to Himself.  Many take issue with this premise because it does not seem to be consistent with how God is revealed in the New Testament; we’ve so fully embraced a God of unconditional acceptance and tolerance that we forget that God is holy and desires holiness from His people. Part of God’s character (which must remain unchanging while His actions can change as He chooses to deal with issues in different ways) involves wrath, not in a hateful or vengeful way but as a means of preserving His holiness.  Christians love Jesus because He took upon Himself all of God’s wrath toward us as He satisfied the sentence of death placed on our lives because of sin. Is God’s wrath the context we as Christians ought to use to reflect on the current situation in Fort McMurray?

I will be the first to admit that there are no easy answers when trying to reconcile why bad things happen.  And I am fully aware that any answer given may perpetuate hurt or cause offense when heard in the midst of grief and despair; I am trying to avoid this while helping us to see God in the midst of the devastation.  With that disclaimer, I offer a few reflections on the wildfire in Fort McMurray (which is also applicable to any other event which causes us to stop and wonder, ‘why?’. 

First, we need to be clear about what this disaster isn’t

1. It is not Karma.  Certainly, those engaged in risky behaviours are more likely to have ‘bad things’ happen to them, just as those engaged in healthy and positive behaviours are more likely to have ‘good things’ happen to them.  But the notion that good things happen to ‘good’ people and bad things happen to ‘bad’ people does not hold up as there were good and righteous people caught in the devastation.  How often have you thought, “that person doesn’t deserve that” or conversely, “why didn’t that happen to me? I’m a good person, I deserved that!” 
   
   Karma does not fit within the Christian worldview.
   
   God doesn’t save us based on how good we are but simply on the basis of Christ’s goodness which has been given to us. Moreover, God doesn’t bless and prosper just those who are ‘good.’ Matthew 5:45 reminds us, “For [your Father in heaven] makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.” This event was not about getting what they deserved in a Karmic sense.
2. It is not God delighting in the suffering of people: God does not bring evil into the world.  He cannot stand the presence of evil; it is against His entire character.  God is entirely good.  How can I say God is good when people have lost their entire earthly possessions and have been displaced from their homes and work? 
   1. We know already that every material thing we have is but fleeting even though we spend our entire lives building, accumulating, and maintaining our stuff.  As the old saying goes: ‘you can’t take it with you.’  I know this sounds incredibly crass (especially to those who have lost everything) but this is the reality within which we live and from which we must operate.  Everything is fleeting except for life with God (Ecclesiastes 3:18-20). 
   2. It comes back to the cross and the incarnation where God himself was tempted, experienced heart-ache, and died and excruciatingly painful death.  God does not delight in suffering just as He is not aloof from it.  He has entered into it and is ready to walk with those who currently find themselves suffering.  Just as He did on the cross, Jesus actively works to redeem pain and suffering.
3. It is not a direct punishment for specific sin: all of us stand guilty before God because of our sin (disobedience) if it were not for Jesus Christ; we must always remember that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23).  However, the logic that the fire was a direct result of Fort McMurray’s sin of exploiting the resources God put in the ground should be denounced in the same way Jesus refuted the argument that a man’s blindness was the result of his or his parents’ sin (John 9:1-7).  As mentioned above, human action contributed in some way to the devastation as one report pointed to the years of fire suppression and cheaply built homes as compounding factors but to say that it is a direct consequence of sin misses the point when teachers, nurses, children, and others not working in the Oil Sands were so dramatically affected.    

So then, how do we begin to come to an understanding of what this disaster is, without trying to make light of the situation?

1. Even as we are reminded that God grieves and hurts when we grieve and hurt, this could be one way that God is trying to get the attention of His people—not dealing specifically with climate change (although each of us are guilty in some way of abusing God’s creation)—but in calling people back to Himself as their Lord and Saviour, for that is God’s ultimate hope for everyone.  His desire to welcome more people into relationship with Him is the reason He puts up with evil and suffering in our temporal world; He wants all to hear the Goodnews of Jesus and have their hearts changed (2 Peter 3:9; Matthew 24:14).  Sometimes we need the clutter out of our lives to see and hear God clearly.
2. A chance for God’s people to show Christ’s love to their neighbour.  God called us to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength and to love our neighbour as ourselves (Matthew 22:37-39).  Already we’re hearing dramatic stories of people’s selfless generosity and their willingness to give generously as they donate to aid agencies, send urgently needed supplies to the evacuees, and to open their homes to those displaced.  Christians (and non-Christians alike) are already demonstrating powerful love which we know points to and from Jesus. 

So how ought we to respond as Christians?

• With the love of Jesus that can overcome all adversity and hardship, pain and suffering. 
• Pray for those dealing with the shock, frustration, and pain of losing their homes and belongings.
  
• Give to aid agencies on the ground like Canadian Lutheran World Relief or the Canadian Red Cross.
• Keep those affected by disasters (flood, famine, earthquakes, and outbreaks of diseases) in other parts of the world in your prayers and in your giving. 

Photo Public Domain Author: U.S. Department of Agriculture; Source: Flickr: 20120620-FS-UNK- 0009

Picture from Pixaby. License CC0. Public Domain

If you’ve paid attention to the news recently, you’ll know that there is a humanitarian crisis spreading across the Middle East and Europe.  Millions of people are being displaced from their homes in Syria and Iraq because of political and religious unrest and persecution. 

The numbers are absolutely staggering:

While we in North America are confronted with these enormous numbers representing people who are clinging to survival and are inundated with pictures of children and families taking great risks to escape the violence, our first response can be one of paralysis.  We may think, ‘how can we possibly make a difference?’ 

Yes, the scale of this crisis is beyond pale which makes it tempting to give up before taking any action.  But the good news we as followers of Jesus cling to is this: our God created this world, is bigger than it, is active in it, and continues to love and redeem it.  It can seem like nothing could possibly make a difference to this situation: it is out of control and unstoppable.  Throughout history, God has intervened in precisely these moment—perhaps not when or as we think he ought but nonetheless He has been at work and is at work. 

Whenever we pray the Lord’s Prayer we ask for God’s Kingdom to come and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven.  That is precisely how we should pray for Syria, for the refugees, and for those accepting the displaced people.  May God’s Kingdom—that upside Kingdom where the rich and powerful of this world bow at the name of Jesus—come and be established in the villages, towns, and cities of Syria.  And may God’s Kingdom come and be established in the hearts and minds of those who are in a position to help (especially the western world) that we might boldly open our doors to the poor of this world. 

So what can we possibly do? 

• We can pray, trusting and believing that He will act to stop the suffering and loss of life as a result of this war.
• We can donate money to organizations that are working in Syria and around the world supporting the resettlement of refugees. 

• We can open our doors to refugees, sponsoring one/some as they are resettled in Canada.
• We can call on the government to do more, to open more spots for refugees in Canada. 

For more information, check out these resources:

Canadian Lutheran World Relief- http://clwr.donorshops.com/product/685132A/syrianrefugeerelief.php
    or http://www.clwr.org/What-We-Do/refugee-resettlement.cfm

Mennonite Central Committee- http://mcc.org/learn/more/syria-iraq-crisis-response