Our family is hurting.  One of us is experiencing a major health challenge and all the rest of us are feeling the pain.  Different personalities respond differently.  How do you respond when someone you love is facing something hard?  

Knowing we’re hurting, a dear friend sent us a podcast about God’s life being available for us.  With the grimness of sickness staring us in the face, thinking about God’s life felt like a refreshing breeze.  It got me thinking beyond the podcast commentary.  I started meditating on God as the source of life.  Did you ever stop to think about God as the life source of the universe?  All life emanates from him.  Every living thing that has ever existed has its source in God.  He initiated life of all kinds; human life, animal life in all its forms, and angels.  From microscopic organisms to whales, the complexity of their individual bodies and their role in the biosphere is staggering. 

At the beginning, all God’s creatures were perfect and living harmoniously.  But rebellion entered flawless Eden and corrupted the created goodness.  As a result of that rebellion against Perfection, we experience harm from broken lifeforms.  Viruses kill thousands, bacteria destroy health, wild animals attack, diseases cripple, and cancer breaks into our lives.  And besides that, broken people destroy others.  

Yet God didn’t create his creatures, watch them choose their own way instead of his, and then abandon them to stumble along their own rocky path.  From creation to this day, he sustains his creatures and is intimately acquainted with them.  

“Have you watched as deer are born in the wild?
Do you know how many months they carry their young?
Are you aware of the time of their delivery? 
They crouch down to give birth to their young
and deliver their offspring.”  God speaking to Job in Job 39:1-3

“O Lord, you have examined my heart
and know everything about me.
You know when I sit down or stand up.
You know my thoughts even when I’m far away.
You see me when I travel
and when I rest at home.
You know everything I do.
You know what I am going
to say even before I say it, Lord.
You go before me and follow me.
You place your hand of blessing on my head.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too great for me to understand!”  King David in Psalm 139:1-6

“What is the price of two sparrows—one copper coin? But not a single sparrow can fall to the ground without your Father knowing it.  And the very hairs on your head are all numbered.  So don’t be afraid; you are more valuable to God than a whole flock of sparrows.”  Jesus in Matthew 10:29-31

Because God is life, his desire for his creatures is life.  Overflowing life.  Now and in the future.  He has a plan and a purpose for each one in their time on earth and his plan will ultimately come to completion in everlasting perfection on the new earth for those who choose him.  This is good news for us who live in a broken world.  We have help here and now, and so much to look forward to in the next life.

“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”  Jesus in John 3:16

“. . . those who drink the water I give will never be thirsty again. It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life.”  Jesus in John 4:14

 

“Life will flourish wherever this water flows. . . . Fruit trees of all kinds will grow along both sides of the river. The leaves of these trees will never turn brown and fall, and there will always be fruit on their branches. There will be a new crop every month, for they are watered by the river flowing from the Temple [of God]. The fruit will be for food and the leaves for healing.”  Ezekiel 47:9,12

“Then the angel showed me a river with the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb.  It flowed down the center of the main street. On each side of the river grew a tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, with a fresh crop each month. The leaves were used for medicine to heal the nations.”  Revelation 22:21-22

The enemy of our souls desires to steal, kill and destroy us. He operates on the physical, as well as, the psychological level. He accuses us before God, and in our hearing. He impugns our motives, he points out our shortcomings and tells us we’ll never improve. He attempts to steal our peace, our dreams, our hope.  He tries to destroy our unity with others, and our intimacy with God.  He can instigate others under his control to attack us.  But we are not defenseless.  God holds ultimate power and his Spirit lives within us to insure our victory.  Life will triumph over destruction and death.

“The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.”Jesus in John 10:10

“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. . .He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”Revelation 21:1,4

When the grim reality of our broken world overtakes me,  I’m reminding myself to be alert and recognize the voice of evil that speaks loss, death or destruction into my thinking.  I don’t deny these things or run from reality into LaLa Land.  But by God’s grace, I don’t allow them to push me into the pit of fear, despair, and rebellion.  Instead, I’m letting these grim realities push me into the open arms of my life-giving Savior.  He is victorious over these and I share in his victory.  I don’t listen to fear because I’m listening to the voice of my Good Shepherd who is leading me to good places.  I don’t listen to rebellion because I’m happier doing things God’s way.   I don’t listen to dispair because I listen to the sweet whisper of hope from God’s Spirit.  “My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.  And afterward, there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain.”

“I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.”  Jesus in John 16:33