The Sky Is Falling

Winter Precipitation.

Just hearing those words makes you want to go out and buy bread and milk doesn't it? I am just amazed at how we respond to the very mention of anything like snow or ice. If you were brave enough to go to the store yesterday you know exactly what I am talking about. The shelves were empty. You would think that the world was about to end or everyone was going to be stranded for days with no food.

I know there is always the chance that the weather man will be wrong and the storm will be worse than predicted (what, a weather man wrong? Never!), but really, we typically don't get stranded by ice or snow around here. We probably won't need to stockpile food and supplies to ride out the winter storm. But for some reason we tend to respond like that when we hear about the possibility of a winter storm.

It's funny to me that we don't respond like that to the storms of everyday life. We know that we will have junk happen in our life. We may lose a loved one, lose our job, get really sick, or any number of things could happen that will leave us feeling "stranded" by the storms of life. Yet we fail to prepare for them. Mention snow, go to the store. Be fully aware of the storms of life, go on like nothing is happening.

So What? God does not want us to be unprepared for the storms of life. By checking in with Him daily we can prepare ourselves for whatever comes along during the day. I want to encourage you to start every day by talking to God and listening to Him with your heart. Spend a few minutes every day reading the Bible and looking for one thing that you can use to help you face the storms of life.

Consider this a "Life Weather Advisory." Storms are coming. Get ready now.

No Other Option

Last night at our men's event, MAFIA, we had the privilege of hearing from Rob McCully. Rob and his family were featured on Extreme Home Makeover last October. I won't go in to all that his family has been through the past several years but here is the Reader's Digest version.

His son, Job (as in the guy in the Bible), was diagnosed with leukemia at the age of 4. He has since been through tons of junk including a bone marrow transplant, lung transplant, and his heart stopping for about eight minutes one time. Job is now doing "as well as he's done in a long time" according to Rob. He is in a wheel chair and has diabetes to go along with his other difficulties.

There are two obvious questions (well, three if you include "Why did you name your kid 'Job'?"). The other two are "Why has God allowed all of this to happen to this family?" and "How in the world do you deal with all of this?"

The name question was answered in his talk. You should have been there.

The "Why" question is still being answered and might be handled in another post sometime.

The "How" question is the one I want to talk about.

Rob said about a hundred times in his talk that he and his family have had to "lean on God" through all of this. They have had to "trust in God" through it all. While those things may have different meanings to each of us, this is the statement he made that really stuck with me. In talking about giving this to God and trusting God to handle it, he kept saying, "What other option is there? What other choice do we have but to give it to God and trust Him?"

What other option is there? What a huge statement of faith (even though I know it's a question). The fact is this. When it all comes down, there really is no other viable option to handling the junk in your life than to trust God to handle it for you. To trust Him to help you get through it. Yes, it is true that you can try on your own and you can put your faith and trust in people. But those things will fail you. You run out of strength on your own and people, even the most well meaning, will let you down at some point. God won't.

So What? When you are faced with junk in your life, go ahead and take the most reliable option and trust God to handle it for you. Trust Him to walk through it with you. Trust Him to give you all you need to make it through. If you really stop and think about it, what other option is there?

You can read more about the McCully family at www.caringbridge.org/ar/job