6. Welcome to day 6 of our 4 week prayer adventure.

Receive hope by recalling God’s sovereignty. “Who has spoken and it came to pass, unless the Lord has commanded it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come?” Lamentations 3:37,38

The Lord is still in control. In all this heartache and confusion, we need to remember this. It allows us to ask what is God trying to teach me through this? (Feel free to let me know what God is teaching you through all this!)

It allows us to be more patient. He has not given up the throne. The devil is still God’s devil. What God has planned will happen. God is the One who allows prosperity and adversity to occur. He often uses other things to accomplish it, just like He used the Babylonians to punish Jerusalem, the Babylonians did it and they will be held accountable because they did it willingly, joyfully, but ultimately, they were just an instrument in God’s hands.

The Lord is in control. vs. 32- ‘but though He cause grief’. Notice, who caused the grief? Job knew this and it helped him handle his great loss. It also helped him when even his own wife broke down and told him to curse God and die, yet he wisely and rightly said: ‘Shall we receive good from God and shall we not receive evil?’ He also said ‘The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord.’! What a great faith he had! God in His infinite power and wisdom is able to use both prosperity and adversity for our ultimate good.

How should we consider this coronavirus pandemic? Many today still have a ‘blizzard’ outlook. Like a blizzard, we hunker down, wait it out and very soon everything will return to normal. This was where I was at, but no more. Others have a ‘winter’ outlook. Like winter, its longer lasting, may have a few blizzards in it, where we stay inside, but in the not too distant future, spring will come and life will return to normal once again. Others have a ‘mini-ice age’ outlook, where they see this as something that is going to be around for awhile, in various waves and stages, maybe for up to 18 months or more, thus causing certain changes in our routines for some time.

Certainly, medical interventions can change all this fairly quickly, that’s what I’m hoping for. But for awhile, I was thinking let’s just wait this out and really quickly things will be back to normal. Now, I’m not so sure. I’m not so sure the Lord wants His church and our society to return to normal. Our society’s normal seemed to be going downhill fast.

Yet, in the midst of this very serious time, as we see the bodies pile up on the news, we can have peace. God’s people can have peace as Phil. 4:11 says: “I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content.” Yes, even in a coronavirus situation too.

Also, we tried to get something online in terms of a service or message for last Sunday, but due to an amazing set of weird circumstances, it just didn’t work out. So, we are working hard for this Sunday, (Palm Sunday!) to livestream from church a service which you will be able to access through this website. Pray for all the technical details and equipment that are needed for this to occur. And keep praying that God will protect our people from this silent killer stalking our land. Thanks.