James 1:2-4

Are you wasting your troubles? Anytime God allows trials to enter your life, He has a purpose for them. He wants you to squeeze out every ounce of spiritual growth instead of letting difficulties squeeze you into despair and discouragement. If you’ll just respond in the right manner, the trial that looks as if it could destroy you will become an instrument of blessing.

The most natural response to adversity is to groan and plead with the Lord to remove it. If that doesn’t work, we might get angry or try to find our own way out of the difficulty or pain. Sometimes we resort to blaming others for the trouble. And in truth, someone else might have caused the problem, but ultimately God allowed it. No matter where affliction originates, who is involved, or how evil their intentions, by the time it reaches you, it’s been dipped in the Father’s love and shaped to accomplish His good purpose. The question is, will you cooperate with Him, or will you resist?

Perhaps the key word is found in verse 4 of today’s reading. God wants to use your trial to develop spiritual maturity, but unless you let it do its work, that opportunity will be lost. If we could foresee all the benefits the Lord designed our trials to accomplish, maybe we’d be more cooperative.

Although we can’t see all the specifics of God’s plan, we know that His goal is to use our adversity to supply something we lack so we can be mature and complete. Even though the experience is painful, rest in the Father’s comforting arms, and let Him do His perfect work in you.

A charge that some people make is that religion in general and Christianity in particular are irrational. It’s ridiculous to believe in God, they say; there’s no evidence that God even exists! Richard Dawkins, in his best selling book The God Delusion, makes this very claim, saying that faith in God is just like belief in Santa Claus!

 But of course, there’s a major problem with comparing faith in God to belief in Santa Claus. I don’t know anybody who came to believe in Santa Claus in adulthood. Yet I know many Christians—often former atheists—who discovered God as adults. This alone should tell you that God and Santa are utterly different. (If they weren’t, one wonders why Richard Dawkins didn’t write “The Santa Delusion.”) Furthermore, thousands upon thousands of great thinkers— now, and throughout history, have believed in God. That alone suggests that belief in God is hardly “irrational.”

 But what about the other claim: “You can’t prove God exists!” What might a believing person say to skeptics? Well, I might start by gently pointing out that there are many good arguments that, whilst not proving God exists, certainly suggest God’s existence is extremely likely. There are philosophical arguments, such as the cosmological argument: (i) everything that begins to exist had a cause; (ii) the universe began to exist; (iii) therefore the universe had a cause. Most philosophers would say that’s a powerful argument.

 There are also arguments from design. The universe and the laws of nature look, as one physicist once put it, suspiciously like a put up job. Or we might talk about the purpose that seems to be inherent in life. Most of us intuitively know that life has meaning and purpose. Indeed, a question one might fire back at our atheist friends concerns this very point: how does the atheist avoid nihilism, the view that life is meaningless, pointless, and nothing really matters. The question for the nihilist becomes “Why not suicide”?

 The Christian would also want to point out that the deepest things that matter to us as humans all lie beyond the physical and the material: morality and meaning, love and friendship, beauty and truth. All of these don’t fit happily with atheism: “Darwinian mistakes,” Richard Dawkins once called them. That to me is tragic.

 But perhaps the most powerful evidence for God is the one the Bible uses most consistently. The Bible doesn’t offer an argument for God, rather it points to God’s involvement in the world. Most significantly, that would be how, in the person of Jesus Christ, the God who created the world took on flesh and stepped into our world to rescue and save it. This is not a distant, remote, theoretical God, but a God who is very much alive. That’s a quite different proposition—and if that God exists, that changes everything. C. S. Lewis put it this way: “I believe in Christianity in the same way as I believe that the sun has risen. Not because I see it, but that by it, I see everything else.”

Andy Bannister is a member of the speaking team at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Toronto, Canada.

 Morning “The city hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it.” / Revelation 21:23

 Yonder in the better world, the inhabitants are independent of all creature

comforts. They have no need of raiment; their white robes never wear out,

neither shall they ever be defiled. They need no medicine to heal diseases,

“for the inhabitant shall not say, I am sick.” They need no sleep to recruit

their frames–they rest not day nor night, but unweariedly praise him in his

temple. They need no social relationship to minister comfort, and whatever

happiness they may derive from association with their fellows is not essential

to their bliss, for their Lord’s society is enough for their largest desires.

They need no teachers there; they doubtless commune with one another

concerning the things of God, but they do not require this by way of

instruction; they shall all be taught of the Lord. Ours are the alms at the

king’s gate, but they feast at the table itself. Here we lean upon the

friendly arm, but there they lean upon their Beloved and upon him alone. Here

we must have the help of our companions, but there they find all they want in

Christ Jesus. Here we look to the meat which perisheth, and to the raiment

which decays before the moth, but there they find everything in God. We use

the bucket to fetch us water from the well, but there they drink from the

fountain head, and put their lips down to the living water. Here the angels

bring us blessings, but we shall want no messengers from heaven then. They

shall need no Gabriels there to bring their love-notes from God, for there

they shall see him face to face. Oh! what a blessed time shall that be when we

shall have mounted above every second cause and shall rest upon the bare arm

of God! What a glorious hour when God, and not his creatures; the Lord, and

not his works, shall be our daily joy! Our souls shall then have attained the

perfection of bliss.

 

Evening “He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils.” /

Mark 16:9

 Mary of Magdala was the victim of a fearful evil. She was possessed by not one

devil only, but seven. These dreadful inmates caused much pain and pollution

to the poor frame in which they had found a lodging. Hers was a hopeless,

horrible case. She could not help herself, neither could any human succour

avail. But Jesus passed that way, and unsought, and probably even resisted by

the poor demoniac, he uttered the word of power, and Mary of Magdala became a

trophy of the healing power of Jesus. All the seven demons left her, left her

never to return, forcibly ejected by the Lord of all. What a blessed

deliverance! What a happy change! From delirium to delight, from despair to

peace, from hell to heaven! Straightway she became a constant follower of

Jesus, catching his every word, following his devious steps, sharing his

toilsome life; and withal she became his generous helper, first among that

band of healed and grateful women who ministered unto him of their substance.

When Jesus was lifted up in crucifixion, Mary remained the sharer of his

shame: we find her first beholding from afar, and then drawing near to the

foot of the cross. She could not die on the cross with Jesus, but she stood as

near it as she could, and when his blessed body was taken down, she watched to

see how and where it was laid. She was the faithful and watchful believer,

last at the sepulchre where Jesus slept, first at the grave whence he arose.

Her holy fidelity made her a favoured beholder of her beloved Rabboni, who

deigned to call her by her name, and to make her his messenger of good news to

the trembling disciples and Peter. Thus grace found her a maniac and made her

a minister, cast out devils and gave her to behold angels, delivered her from

Satan, and united her forever to the Lord Jesus. May I also be such a miracle

of grace!

He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons.   Mark 16:9

Mary of Magdala was the victim of a fearful evil. She was possessed not just by one demon, but by seven. These dreadful inmates caused much pain and pollution to the poor frame in which they had found a lodging. Hers was a hopeless, horrible case. She could not help herself, and no human power could set her free. But Jesus passed that way, and without being asked and probably while being resisted by the poor demoniac, He uttered the word of power, and Mary of Magdala became a trophy of the healing power of Jesus. All seven demons left her, left her never to return, forcibly ejected by the Lord of all.

What a blessed deliverance! What a happy change! From delirium to delight, from despair to peace, from hell to heaven! Immediately she became a constant follower of Jesus, listening to His every word, following His winding steps, sharing His busy life; and in all this she became His generous helper, first among that band of healed and grateful women who ministered to Him out of their means. When Jesus was lifted up in crucifixion, Mary remained the sharer of His shame: We find her first watching from a distance and then drawing near to the foot of the cross. She could not die on the cross with Jesus, but she stood as near to it as she could, and when His blessed body was taken down, she watched to see how and where it was laid.

She was the faithful and watchful believer, last at the sepulcher where Jesus slept, first at the grave where He arose. Her loyalty and love made her a favored beholder of her beloved Master, who deigned to call her by her name and to make her His messenger of good news to the trembling disciples and Peter. Grace found her useless and made her useful, cast out her demons and gave her to behold angels, delivered her from Satan and united her forever to the Lord Jesus. May we also be such miracles of grace!

 Family Reading Plan Jeremiah 37   Psalm 10