Tried With Fire

Pastor Ryan taught Sunday school yesterday on the Christian and Anxiety. I've transcribed a section below which really hit home. I learned to love the sovereignty of God during a very dark time for my family. So much evil was turned for good, that I can honestly thank God for the trial. But knowing God is sovereign doesn't necessarily make the pain go away. So it stings when it's used as a pat phrase to insensitively buck someone up in a trial or to romanticize suffering in a pietistic way. That's why I appreciate Pastor Ryan's frankness about how it can seem scary at times and his reminder that God is sovereign and the Giver of precious promises to cling to in the darkest times. You can listen here . He also wrote a booklet on the topic . "But when we think of God's sovereignty, sometimes it is very difficult because we might have been through very challenging or traumatic events, and God's sovereignty is scary. Because I went through this hurt a...

To oppose one class perpetually to another - young against old, manual labour against brain-worker, rich against poor, woman against man - is to split the foundations of the State; and if the cleavage runs too deep, there remains no remedy but force and dictatorship. If you wish to preserve a free democracy, you must base it - not on classes and categories, for this will land you the totalitarian State, where no one may act or think except as the member of a category. You must base it upon the individual Tom, Dick and Harry, and the individual Jack and Jill - in fact, upon you and me. Dorothy L. Sayers from Are Women Human? pg. 36. I am not a very political person, but I will be voting in my first primary today because my conscience demands it. I feel like I am in the middle of a bad movie - a dystopian farce where an entire nation is adrift in the Bermuda Triangle. We've lost our common sense, integrity, and moral compass, and now we must choose between a crook, a communist, ...

In this broken world you need a place to run for comfort, encouragement, motivation, strength, and rest. There is no better place to run than into the arms of the One who reigns over it all for your sake. No, you won't always understand. Yes, there will be moments when life will seem overwhelmingly difficult. Sure, you will wonder why he has chosen you to go through what you are enduring when the person next to you seems to have it so easy. And there will be times when you are tempted to question his wisdom and love. But in those moments, determine to do this one thing. Determine to run to him and not from him. Run to him with your questions, doubts, confusion, and fear. He loves you; he will not turn you away. He wants you to know rest. This is precisely what he has told you again and again in his Word - that he is in control, so that in those moments when you are confronted with your lack of control, or when life seems out of control, you would know pea...

Today is election day. I have probably prayed more for this election than any previous race in my adult life. I am very concerned for this country. Very concerned.  It's tempting to vent, but enough ink and bandwidth has already been spent by folks who are more articulate and knowledgeable. I'm going to cast my vote today and continue to pray. But as I exercise my right as an American citizen and wait for the returns tonight, here is something I need to remember not just today but every single day: Who is regulating affairs on this earth today- God, or the Devil? What saith the Scriptures? If we believe their plain and positive declarations, no room is left for uncertainty. They affirm, again and again, that God is on the throne of the universe; that the sceptre is in His hands; that He is directing all things "after the counsel of His own will." They affirm, not only that God created all things, but also that God is ruling and reigning over all the works of His ...