What sort of life do you want? Is that the life you're living?
I took some time to think about that yesterday. Some little disturbance had me all aflutter. But I turned (and notice you really have to physically turn away, which is repentance) from that which is diferent and essentially bad for me to someting that is good for me.
As Mr. Armstrong sang, "I see trees of green, red roses too, I see em bloom for me and for you, and I think to mysef, what a wonderful world. I see skies of blue, clouds of white ... bright blessed days, dark sacred nights, and I thnik to myself, wa a wonderful world this would be."
Buttressed by the song and the quiet in which I yanked it into being in my mind, I was better, stronger, tougher than I was when the arguable matter appeared. Things, little things but things, that were there before but went unnoticed as the darkside began to win, suddenly were swept away by what I read and thought.
Then I got up this cold, cold morning and I read that we're in the midst of a global food crisis, the second in three years. World food costs hit a record in January. We're being destroyed from within by bread and milk, not fire and water.
Meanwhile (which certainly means at the same time), wheat prices doubled since summer. Since SUMMER. Clearly wheat is a basic substance that we MUST have. Why though has this happened? Why? Last year was the warmest year on record. Drought happened all over the world, especially in Russia, one of the largest growers of wheat outside the United States. Heat means more than a problem with air conditioning, though I remember being scorched myself.
If food prices weren't enough to persuade you that skies of blue and clouds of white weren't quite what the world is about today, there's the weather that's happening out beyond our double insulated windows. We're being blitzed by something that sounds like Mexican beer. La' Nina is a killer, really. It is helping cause some of the extreme highs and extreme weather in general.
Now before anyone labels me a liberal anything and asks, "Do I believe in global warming?" Well, yeah I don't see how anyone can not think something is going on. "Do I believe man made it happen?" Well, no. And for the (literal) life of me I can't see how that has become the deciding line on the issue. Whomever or whatever causes it be warmer last year did a fine, fine job of it. Whatever or whomever has caused the extreme cold and extreme snowfall of this winter, we should be grateful they called for just this much and no more.
Seems to me there are few who can argue about the heat we suffered through last year or the cold we're fighting back this winter ot even the cyclones and floods we're seeing every other day in other parts of the globe.The temps and the snow just is.
All that is to say this: While we stumble about worried about the weather (which as someone once said we do nothing about), Isiaih wrote this long ago about a all-powerful God: "Oh, yes, you shaped me first inside, then out, you formed me in my mother's womb. I thank you, High God -- you're breathtaking: Body and soul. I am marvelously made. I worship in adoration -- what a creation: you know me inside and out. You know every bone in my body. You know my every bone in my body. You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit, how I was sculpted from nothing into something. Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth, all the stages of my life were spent out before you. The days of my life are prepared before I'd even lived one day."
God created me. Created you. Created the world. There was a time when nations around Judah all offered help of some kind as Assyria threatened to attack it and over-run it. But King Hezekiah refused to bargain with the nations. Instead, he waited on the Lord. Waited on God's help. Waited on God's special-ness. This did not make him a popular king in the eyes of the people who thought that since Hezekiah wouldn't seek help, they would be destroyed.
What they didn't see is that the nation was breaking its covenant with God. That would eventually cost the southern kingdom, Judah, so much so that God ravished the earth and left it in ruins around Jerusalem.
But for the immediate future, God rested his hand on the mount (Jerusalem) and did miracles and made the promise that one day Jacob would put down roots, Israel (the northern kingdom) would blossom and grow fresh branches and fill the world with its fruit.
It was a promise of trees of green, red roses too, seeing em bloom for me and for you, and seeing a wonderful world.Why? Because they turned to God for protection, for food, for help to return to thier land. It was a promise of skies of blue, clouds of white ... bright blessed days, dark sacred nights, the thought of what wonderful world this would be if they no longer were captive and lived a remarkablly free life.
I'm not saying that the Lord will provide all that to everyone. If so, none would go hungry and there are millions who believe in the Lord who are hungry.I'm not saying that everyone would be healed of everything. Millions pray for healing and never get it, and they still believe strongly in God. But if he healed everyone every time they prayed, no one would die. Eventuallyeveryone would suffer. Food would not only cost more but it would be consumed by the now forever-living population and eventually those non-perishing people would starve and suffer.
I'm saying that if we turn to God, skies are bluer, clouds are whiter, and the days are dramatically brighter. With God in our lives, it is a wonderful world, no matter the temperature.
The Bible concludes that he will turn to the good all that love him.
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