There is good news in the bad news making news today.

First, the bad news: Large parts of Nebraska and the US Central Plains were underwater over the weekend after a late-winter “bomb cyclone” storm triggered historic flooding. Forecasters warn that more rain is coming tomorrow.

A farmer named James Wilke got a call to assist a stranger during the storm and drove his tractor over a bridge that collapsed. Wilke and his tractor went into the floodwater; he did not survive.

Meanwhile, last week’s shooting in New Zealand continues to dominate headlines as authorities rush to identify the fifty victims and the prime minister promises changes to gun laws. And ceremonies were held in Kenya and Ethiopia for the 157 victims of last week’s Ethiopian Airlines plane crash.

While man-made tragedies deservedly generate headlines and global sympathy, natural disasters affect millions across the country. The global annual death rate from natural disasters has fallen significantly over the years, but such tragedies affect 218 million people each year and claim 68,000 lives.

However, there is a principle here that promises to liberate us with hope that transcends all hardships.

Theology from a crocodile

The book of Job is not usually considered an uplifting work of literature. Much of it is dominated by Job’s understandable complaints to God about the horrific suffering he endured.

Toward the end of the book, the Lord answers him—not by explaining Job’s pain, but by declaring his own omnipotence and omniscience.

For instance, God asks Job, “Can you draw out Leviathan with a fishhook or press down his tongue with a cord?” (Job 41:1). Most scholars believe that “Leviathan” in this context is a giant crocodile.

The creature’s creator warns Job: “Lay your hands on him; remember the battle—you will not do it again!” (v. 8). By comparison to this mighty beast, “The hope of a man is false; he is laid low even at the sight of him” (v. 9).

This is just one illustration of our frailty and finitude in the face of God’s creation. There are more examples everywhere we look. As the Lord reminds Job and us, “Whatever is under the whole heaven is mine” (v. 11).

When last were you awed by God?

Here’s my question: If we fear creation (and we should), should we not fear its Creator even more?

Proverbs 1:7 declares, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.” “Fear” is our healthy response to the awesome power and might of the one true God.

When Ananias lied to God and died as a result, “great fear came upon all who heard of it” (Acts 5:5). The early church walked “in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit” and “multiplied” as a result (Acts 9:31). By contrast, Scripture says of sinners, “There is no fear of God before their eyes” (Romans 3:18, quoting Psalm 36:1).

Across Scripture, whenever people knew they were in the presence of the one true God, their response was one of awe and reverence.

When Isaiah “saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up,” he cried, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:1, 5).

When Peter realized our Savior’s divine power, “he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord’” (Luke 5:8). John testified that when he met the risen Christ on Patmos, “I fell at his feet as though dead” (Revelation 1:17).

When last were you awed by God?

When we trust God with our fears

What is the most fearsome natural threat you can imagine?

It might be a hurricane or a tornado, a roaring lion or an attacking shark. Now realize that the God who made what makes you afraid is infinitesimally more powerful than his most powerful creation.

When we give him the awe and reverence he deserves, we position ourselves to experience his presence and power in life-changing ways. When we acknowledge that God is more powerful than the most powerful threat in nature, we are also acknowledging that our Father is more powerful than anything that can harm us.

Indeed, he is not only all-powerful—he is all-loving as well. As a result, “we are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (Romans 8:37). Say it with Paul: “I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (vv. 38–39).

When we trust him with our fears, our fearful culture pays attention. When we serve him out of selfless gratitude for his grace, our self-centered society takes note.

A record crowdfunding campaign

Dallas Jenkins is director of The Chosen, the first multi-season television series about the life of Christ. Jenkins says the idea behind the series came after “a significant career disappointment. My previous film had done poorly at the box office, and I was uncertain of my future.”

So, Jenkins decided to create a short film about the birth of Christ “just intended for my church’s Christmas Eve service.” The response was so strong that he decided to make an entire television series about the life of Jesus through the eyes of those who encountered him.

However, his team needed funding for the project. They decided to let the body of Christ help. Roughly 16,000 people around the world responded, giving more than $10 million—a record-setting campaign.

Jenkins trusted his fear to God’s power for God’s glory. Job would encourage us to do the same.

Who or what is your Leviathan today?

Denison Forum

Forty-nine people were killed in shootings at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, this morning. Twenty more were seriously wounded.

Four people, including three men and one woman, have been taken into custody. One man in his late twenties has been charged with murder. He reportedly posted a white-nationalist manifesto on Twitter.

This tragedy was the largest massacre in New Zealand history. It reminds us that Satan “comes to steal and kill and destroy” (John 10:10). God is weeping with those who weep today and calls us to join him (Romans 12:15).

In other news, Israeli warplanes struck some one hundred Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip overnight, responding to a rocket attack on the Israeli metropolis of Tel Aviv. The fighting broke out as Egyptian mediators were in Gaza working to broker an expanded cease-fire between Israel and Hamas.

In a world filled with violence and chaos, we can learn a redemptive lesson from an unlikely source.

“The Ides of March are come”

Today is known as the “Ides of March.” In the Roman world, the “Ides” was the midpoint of their months. The date we know as March 15 was marked by several religious ceremonies and was a Roman deadline for settling debts.

This day is especially known to history as the day Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC. The back story is remarkable.

According to the Roman biographer Plutarch (died AD 119), “A certain seer warned Caesar to be on his guard against a great peril on the day of the month of March which the Romans call the Ides; and when the day had come and Caesar was on his way to the senate-house, he greeted the seer with a jest and said: ‘Well, the Ides of March are come,’ and the seer said to him softly: ‘Ay, they are come, but they are not gone.’”

Later that day, Caesar was stabbed to death by as many as sixty conspirators led by Brutus and Cassius.

Most people know the story of his death. But why was Caesar murdered on this day?

And why is his death relevant to our broken world today?

An assassination and stray cats

The Roman Republic was founded in 509 BC. Governed by leaders elected by the people, their representative model influenced the founders of the American republic. Over time, however, the aristocratic leaders of the Republic became less focused on the people and more concerned for their own power and agendas.

Julius Caesar (100–44 BC) rose to power as an accomplished military conqueror. With chaos in Rome, Caesar led his army south across the Rubicon, the northern barrier of Italy, on January 10, 49 BC. By 45 BC, he had become the sole dictator of Rome.

Brutus, Cassius, and the senators who conspired to execute Caesar claimed they were liberating the people from dictatorship. He was killed in a place known as Pompey’s Theater.

The area fell into ruins over the centuries and is currently fenced off from the public and occupied by stray cats. However, the mayor of Rome announced last week that the site will undergo renovation and be opened to the public in 2021.

“We are all slaves of the laws”

What can we learn from the Ides of March?

Mortal Republic: How Rome Fell into Tyranny is a new history of the fall of the Roman Republic. Its author, Edward J. Watts, earned his PhD in history from Yale and has received numerous awards for his research and writing.

He notes that “the men who led the Republic in the third century [before Christ] also understood that their personal achievements had meaning only when they served the larger goals of Roman policy.” There was “a shared understanding that the Republic was a political system subject to no one but the community as a whole.”

To illustrate, Watts cites the famous statement by Cicero: “We are all slaves of the laws so that we might be free.”

Over time, however, Roman political life devolved into “a struggle among individuals seeking honor and power through the complete control of the city and the resources of the empire.” Eventually, Romans would have “a new sort of liberty . . . Freedom from fear, freedom from famine, and freedom from danger now all came from [Emperor] Augustus and Augustus alone.”

When churches and Christians plateau

When the Roman Republic became a means to the end of personal advancement for its leaders, its decline began. The same can happen to us.

When churches are started, they must focus on evangelism and ministry to their communities in order to grow. After a few years, many have gained so many members that some begin focusing on what the church can do for them.

Parents want better programs for their children; adults want programming focused on their needs. The church stops focusing externally on those it is called to reach and starts focusing internally on itself. And it plateaus and often declines.

The same can happen to individual Christians when we focus more on what Jesus can do for us than what we can do for him. We come to church and to God for what we can receive. And we stop fulfilling the Commission to which we are called.

How to experience the joy of Jesus

The good news is that what happened to Rome doesn’t have to happen to us. Churches can renew their commitment to serve the community they are commissioned to reach. Christians can renew our commitment to the One who came not to be served but to serve (Mark 10:45).

Every day, we must decide whether we will live for Jesus or for ourselves (Romans 12:1–2). The tragedies that fill each day’s news show us that this decision is urgent for us and for the broken world we are called to serve.

Here’s the paradox: when we serve God and others, we find a greater significance than we can ever experience by serving ourselves. The disciples received power from the Spirit so they could be witnesses for our Lord (Acts 1:8). When we share the joy of Jesus, we experience the joy of Jesus. When we bless others, we are blessed.

In terms of the Ides of March, we can be an Empire or we can be a Republic, but we cannot be both.

Which do you choose today?

Denison Forum