November 2020...

Dear Friends,

Its November, 2020, and what a year we have had! With a worldwide pandemic, fears of illness and death, political power struggles, racial tensions, it seems there’s no peace to be found in our fallen world. I’ve been thinking about Thanksgiving in light of the fires, hurricanes, natural disasters and human brutality of this summer and fall. Do we still have things for which to be thankful?

Yes! As Christians we have the Prince of Peace to lean on! We have the steady hand of God ordaining our future. I don’t know what tomorrow holds but “I know WHO holds tomorrow and I know WHO holds my hand.” I don’t write that casually, because our Lord has never promised nothing bad can happen. Jesus said he would never abandon us (Jn 14:18), but he also said “In this world you will have trouble” (Jn 16:33). So you might be asking, “If Jesus didn’t promise safety what should I understand trusting Jesus to mean?”

FIRST, our God does deliver his people from danger. Paul wrote in 2 Cor. 1:10 “(God) has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us.” Paul personally testified that God had rescued him and his friends from overwhelming danger.

SECOND, remember the promise of rescue from danger is not a promise of the absence of danger. Again Paul wrote, “We do not want you to be uninformed, ... about the hardships we suffered... We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life” (2 Cor. 1:8). Paul, the great apostle of faith, despaired. Paul’s faith was exhausted, and his suffering was beyond his ability to endure. Still God was present and God was faithful. “But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God who raises the dead” (2 Cor. 1:9).

The presence of trouble is not the absence of God.  Current sorrow is not a hindrance to future comfort. Continuing danger is not an obstacle to ultimate deliverance.

Here is our guarantee: “Nothing in all creation... is able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Ro. 8;39).” Since we are inseparably in his love we much for which to be thankful!
​
Your Pastor,
​  ~ Byron Myers

---