Upheaval

Friends of mine, pastors, are writing long statements about how to respond to the political situation in DC. In our church, I’m sure, we have people who are celebrating and people who are in mourning, but I’m not going to join my friends in adding my words (or fuel) to the inferno of opinions. People are already quite torn apart from each other. I don’t need to add to that. Whether you support the destruction of governmental institutions or see this as the breakdown of democracy, we are all living in a season of upheaval. Having a positive attitude toward the changes doesn’t diminish the challenge of living through them. No one knows the full outcome of the choices being made. So, what do we do? I just read a true story of a bark beetle infestation that devastated a small forest of pine trees owned by a family. Every tree in the forest was killed… except one. For some reason, this one tree survived. It survived the bug, “lightning strikes, droughts, and even a few hurricanes.” It never produced a single pinecone until one day when a boy in the family discovered that it was overloaded with cones. Now, years later, those pinecones have reproduced a forest that had been reduced to barren dirt and shrubbery. Regardless of which political side we may choose, our life does not come from it. Our help and health don’t come from rulers (as the Bible says). They come from the Lord. It is the God who created us that helps us to live through upheaval, to endure change, and to withstand the choices that come now and come again in 2 and 4 years. We are leading a longer life than the stretch of a political season. The promise we have in enduring in faithfulness is that we will become fruitful. Blessings, Geoff