Text: Psalm 97
What seems to have the upper hand in today's world? Injustice? Terrorists? Rogue nations with nuclear weapons capabilities? Computer hackers ready to destroy the financial infrastructure and/or the nation's power grid? Maybe something more mundane, like cancer, or just plain greed?
To be sure, these things do pose threats to life as we currently know it and expect to live it. In particular places these and other powers have assumed control for a time. And we should not be so confident that it cannot happen to us. How's that for a cheerful thought in the morning?
Believers, however, recognize that nothing can wrest final authority from the God who made the worlds and all that exists. And the smugness of those who pretend to control destinies will eventually be brought down to its rightful place. Nothing can stop Him from doing what He decides to do. Not even death, the final enemy. Not any of the things we will hear and read about when news is broadcast to cover the major events of the day, things which can create considerable anxiety if we forget that none of it can trump the purposes of God.
As we go about our various callings in society it is easy to see things through the eyes of the small piece of the world we regularly inhabit at work or in the communities we are part of. The eyes of faith, however, see the broader view of God's work in history, as we move from the redemption brought in Christ toward the climax of all things, when He is indeed all in all. What we do until then is worship and work. We worship to renew our hope as God meets with us; we work by hating evil where we find it, not just to turn away from it, but to bring the light of God in such a way as to chase evil from the very places that now seem so imposing due to the presence of false power.
As we participate, we can indeed be glad in the Lord, even when the news is foreboding; evil will not win.
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I like His final authority, but the anabaptist in me feels that we have to seek it. The metaphor of the hedge in the OT is striking to me personally. And so first I need to ask for it and be thankful when it comes: the child's safety, the friend's recovery, the food on the table, the safety of the home/town. Then I have to find my place in establishing His final authority.
ReplyDeleteLastly, I don't want to replace the world system's illusion of control with mine which i've done for too long in too many areas - even today. Sometimes I shake my head and laugh at them, and other times I cry.