Whew!
The first six months of 2020 have been…challenging (?) to say the least. We have faces some suddenly and expected challenges and dealt with some long-brewing issues that have now come to the forefront of our societal awareness. There is no way to sugarcoat it: The first half of 2020 has been hard for all of us.
In a year filled with bad news, however, we are reminded of the unique hope offered to us through the Good News of the Gospel. The Gospel is the only kind of news that is actually BETTER than it appears to be. As a matter of fact, the bad news of life in a fallen world actually makes the Good News of the Gospel more joy-inducing. The Gospel offers us a better ending that then frames how we view the temporary suffering and hardships (Years like 2020 for instance) and still remain hopeful. The Gospel resets our expectations of life in a fallen world by raising our expectations of the life to come in the New Heaven/New Earth that awaits us.
Charles Spurgeon puts it this way:
Do you think you were going to be carried into heaven on a feather bed? Have you got a notion in your head that the road to Paradise is all a lawn, the grass smoothly mown, still waters and green pastures and anon to cheer you? You have just got to clear your heads of that deceitful fancy. The way to heaven is uphill and down hill; uphill with difficulty, down hill with trials. It is through fire and through water, through flood and through flame, by The lions and by the leopards. Through the very mouths of dragons is the path to paradise”.
Stay hopeful Christian.
Chad Williams
Develop to Deploy 