If the Government Shuts Down: Pray don't Criticize

I’ve just been reading some of the headlines and they don’t make much sense. If the government shuts down, military members are not subject to furlough, they have to work, but they won’t get paid. Congress, on the other hand, is exempt from the shutdown, so they have to work, but they do get paid - but there would be inconveniences: the people who work the elevators in the Senate or staff the free gym for the House of Representatives, not to mention the people who work in the cafeterias and clean at the Capitol would all be furloughed, so our leaders, who got us into this mess in the first place by not doing their job as well as they might have, might have to brown bag it, clean up after themselves, and stand in lines.


On the count of three AAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW. Poor Babies.

Hard to feel sorry for them.

But the proper response from a biblical standpoint isn’t to criticize: check out Matthew 7 and read what it says about ignoring the plank in your eye while you deal with a speck of sawdust in the eye of your neighbor. Or how about how we’ll be judged in the same way that we judge others?

According to the Apostle Paul, we should be praying for those in positions of authority so that “we may live peaceful quiet lives in all godliness and holiness (1 Tim 2:2).

The bible doesn’t tell me that if I hire someone to do a job and he doesn’t do it, that I’m obligated to keep him on the payroll, and so come the next election day, some of the people who aren’t doing such a great job, may find themselves out of work, but in the meantime, it’s time to get on our knees. It’s time to pray for our leaders, our country, our troops, and time to pray that solutions will be found to the problems that face us.

It would be a lot easier to criticize, but I think I’ll start praying. Won’t you join me?

When God gives you more than you can handle.

I know, since you were a little kid in Sunday school class, you’ve heard that God won’t give you more than you can handle – and wouldn’t it be nice if that were true. You may have heard it in church on Sunday morning, and wouldn’t it be nice if it were true. You’ve probably had well-intentioned friends tell you that you can do it, because obviously God would never give you something that you couldn’t handle. And wouldn’t it be nice if that were true?

If you take the time to read through the New Testament, you’ll see that God gave the disciples a lot more than they could handle. Check out Moses, Hosea, Jeremiah and a slew of others in the Old Testament and you’ll see that they had more than they could handle.

But somehow they got through it.

12 steppers (groups such as AA, NA, EA, OA) in their “12 steps” say that their lives have become unmanageable, but that a power greater than themselves could restore them to sanity, and in the ‘promises’ are reminded that they will suddenly ‘realize that God is doing for [them] what [they] couldn’t do for [themselves]”. AA Groups are also reminded on a regular basis that ‘no human power could relieve their alcoholism, but that God could and would IF He were sought”.

Many years ago as a substance abuse counselor, I remember telling clients that just stopping drinking wasn’t going to solve all their problems. That would be a good start, but they needed something more than white knuckling through a desire to drink: and that God would be a good place to start.

A lot of the familiar Bible heroes were in some pretty dire circumstances, and there was no way that they could handle things. God obviously gave them more than THEY could handle. But they got through it. How?

The same way 12 steppers get through things, and the same way that we should be able to get through things: not by any human power (ours, or that of someone else) but through the power of God.

Those seemingly impossible situations suddenly seem a lot more possible when God is involved.

Bottom line: there are things in our lives that fit into the category of ‘more than I can handle’. That doesn’t mean that they can’t be handled. Just that we’re going to need some help.

Next time it seems like you’re out of your league, maybe you are. Instead of thinking that God won’t give you more than you can handle, maybe it’s time to think “I can’t handle this by myself, maybe I should turn to God and seek his guidance, maybe I should ask God for help, maybe I can’t handle it alone, but with God's help I can.

When there’s more than you can handle, God's probably asking you to come closer to Him.

Review: The Reason Why: Mark Mittelberg

Deceptive.


This is a deceptively easy read: it seems so simple; it reads quickly, you can read it in under an hour, but…

…it’s really quite a bit more complicated and if you read through it too quickly, you’re bound to miss the meat of the message: ‘faith makes sense, and here’s why’.

If you’ve already accepted Jesus, this is the book that will help quell those doubts that are bound to pop up from time to time, and answer those questions that you never realized you should have asked. If this is the first time you’ve considered asking Christ into your life, this book answers those questions that every pre-believer is faced with.

And if you’ve been ‘thinking about it’ for some time this book pushes you to make the decision that you already know you should have made.

Years ago business man Robert A Laidlaw wrote a book for his employees explaining “The Reason Why.” Mark Mittelberg has updated the book. When Laidlaw wrote, Christianity was the ‘norm’ in this country, today with modernism, postmodernism and politically correct, pluralism and universalism, it’s even more important that we understand “The Reason Why Faith Makes Sense”.

Warning: reading this book may cause you to question your worldview!

I received a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for this review.