Day 3156 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

2 Peter 3:17 NIV

For us to underappreciate the opportunity of pre-awareness is to invite negligence into the outcome of an entirely critical circumstance.

But alas, we've become quite opposed to embracing the sternness of Scripture. Instead, as a result of our understandings as given us by the world around us, we've grown only concerned about the coddling of our feelings to the point that most find that the warnings kindly offered throughout God's Word are simply overbearing and therefore an unnecessary burden that we shouldn't have to carry.

No, to many around here, He's supposed to be just this big fluffy teddy bear that should bring nothing but sunshine and happiness along every step we don't want to have to take along a path that's a bit too tight for our liking followed across a lifetime that we'd otherwise like to spend focusing on ourselves and the happy hopes we keep insisting He fulfill on our behalf.

And thus, a vast majority of Scripture and the awareness toward which it calls us regarding the very real fallen reality into which we're naively headed are entirely discounted so that it can all discontinue its disagreeable discourse which we feel is rather rash as it tends to feel more than slightly abusive and entirely alarming. All because we don't want to be alarmed, because it's unsettling, unnerving, uncomfortable. And Lord knows how much we all disdain all that agitates our inclinations.

Unfortunately, God's not worried about our otherwise entitled preferences. No, if you'd dare read through Scripture a time or two you'd find that He's clearly focused instead upon our preservation.

And considering this discrepancy exists between our preferences for our preferences and His proving to have always prioritized our preservation, the question begged becomes why don't we care about more than the comforts we find inside our complacencies considering He literally died to prove them as dangerous as I think we've always truly known them to be?

I contend that the answer to that question is found in looking at where we stand. Or, considering that most of us don't stand for all that much anymore, perhaps a consideration of what we do stand for providing that we actually stand for anything.

What's your main focus in life? What do you fight for every day that you're given? What are you willing to hurt for, try for, die for? What is there in your life that gives meaning to your life, a kind of meaning that means everything to you? Do we even have anything of such importance in us, around us? Or, as we see inside the bleak existence of most, have we forgotten the gift of life and the necessity to actually live it like it matters?

How much sand is in your plans?

You see, the Bible warns against building houses on foundations of shifting sands. It's this proverbial lesson aimed at helping us see the solid basis we've been beckoned to build ourselves upon. He is the Rock, the stable, the constant, the enduring outcome that we can come out from amongst this dark and darkening world and exist upon for all of forever. But unfortunately for us, that opportunity is presented as a warning against something we've all been doing.

Red flag, hold up, slow down, why you coming at us like this Jesus?

That's what we tend to struggle with the most in our studying of Scripture. It doesn't pull any punches. Doesn't slow down to consider our preconceived preferences. He didn't breathe out His Word for our perception of our well-being but for His definition of our benefit. But to we who are almost instinctively fearful for our feelings, His Word often feels like it's simply there for our belittlement.

It bashes us, puts us down, points out the endlessness of the egregiousness of our errancies. It's this massive book piled thick with evidence of our ignorance. And well, that just cuts right down to the bone.

But can't we see the necessity of it all? Is not that we're wounded by His honesty honestly evidence of the uncertainty of these foolish foundations we've been building our lives upon? That we take offense at the same Word which brings us healing through the hope of a home filled with eternal peace purchased for us by a Savior who loves us enough to die for us is something only possible when seen through these eyes blinded by selfishness.

We want the hope. We love the sound of that home in Heaven. We thoroughly enjoy every uplifting promise and passage presented throughout the parts of Scripture that promote our happiness. But the problem is that we can't pick and choose which parts we embrace and those which don't agree with our tastes. All or nothing. As it should be.

Why should it be that way? Because we can't understand the hope we've been given until we come to terms with the hopelessness in which we've lived.

So He warns us. Rebukes us. Comes at us rudely, crudely in order to truly undo all we've learned to do which we don't want to have to find reason to want to not do anymore. But the beauty in our breakdown is that once we've broken beyond worrying about ourselves we can then find that Scripture isn't there just to make us feel bad. No, that's a misconception humanity has made in regard to what a warning is.

We see warnings as promises of punishment. We feel they exist to simply harsh the happiness we hope for up ahead. To us, a warning is merely a threat against our better assumptions. But in reality, to be warned is simply to be made aware of a coming predicament which deserves our attention. It's a chance to make ready for something that we'd otherwise have no reason to expect. It's a promise of something unseen, given us to help us learn to stop relying so much on what we can see.

For days we've been talking about the turning of the tides in the times into which we're treading. The world is in the beginning of yet another war. Another place falling into disquiet and discontentment and disagreement so divisive that to blow one another up seem the only way to settle the deal. It's a calamity, constantly in this unimaginable culture we're either creating or watching be created through all this crumbling.

Catch that one word though? Unimaginable. We can't imagine what the world will be like in the days ahead. Nobody imagined the horrors seen in all the violence chosen across the centuries now left to history. Nobody expected to have already endured world-wide wars. Nobody expects the coming of the next. Nobody knows the sides that will be chosen. Nobody knows much of anything about tomorrow.

Other than God.

He knows. He knows what's coming. He knows when it'll show up and how bad it will be. He knows who will win and who won't, considering no one really can when the world is the one making the choices. He knows that things will get worse, the promise we find in Scripture. Read Revelation. Wow!

But that's the whole point. He knows, we don't. Probably a good idea to stop playing around with perfecting our preferences and come to terms with the fact that the world doesn't care about what we want. I think we could all agree that most of us want peace. We want calmness. We want tranquility, equality, the beauty of common community. We just want everyone to get along. But it seems more clear every single day that we just ain't getting that are we?

No, what we see is a world insistent upon the nonexistence of any who are different. Different from what? Doesn't really matter anymore. If you believe in something, someone somewhere will believe in something different. If you live in one place, someone from another place will think that's enough reason to not like you very much. If you say a certain thing, well, you're all but taking your life in your own hands at this point because to speak is all that's needed to be despised anymore.

But He told us all this ahead of time. Told us what was coming. Promised us that hatred would rule the hearts of those who grow heartless amidst the hopelessness of the hollowness held inside those with priorities Heaven-less.

He didn't say these things to scare us into submission to Him. Didn't promise persecution to invite us to start looking for a way around it before it begins. No, He told us all these shaking things so that we'd find reason to reinforce our resolve upon the foundation He's readied. It's that we can find shelter in Him before the winds of change blow in.

Because they're coming sooner than our preferences would prefer.

Friends, we need to stop looking at what the Bible takes away in the rebuking nature it presents and instead look upon the cruciality of the promises and portents that it presents. Because while it does hurt us at first, it only helps us in the end. How? Because only once He's blown to bits our foolishness can we begin building on a foundation of His Son. And that's right where He knows we need to be in order to be able to weather the storms we can't see coming through eyes that don't want to see the rain.

He has always done what needed done to get us where we need to be. Just so happens that we hate moving. We hate learning. Hate letting go. Hate having to embrace the fact that we don't know as much as we've often pretended to have already figured out. Without divine intervention, ain't a one of us has any idea as to what tomorrow holds.

But the whole point is that we've never needed to know that part. No, the only part that truly matters is that we know that He holds us, and that He will still uphold that tomorrow.

All the wars and threats and violence we see unfold, be it today or tomorrow, none of it is a surprise to Him. He's seen the depths of depravity to which the inhumanity of humanity can dive. He knows the worst that's coming. And so He warns us that it's on the way that we might come to our senses and begin building our lives in the Way. A foundation firm enough to withstand whatever may come, all because He is able to see what's coming before it gets here.

We can't.

Sure, we can hope. We can vote. We can debate and discourse over whatever topic has the potential to become problematic. We can try to avoid things, but in the end, we can't prevent much of anything. No, all we can do is react. Now, we can live our lives hoping that our reactions are good enough and fast enough to not be too surprised when life comes at us.

Or we can surrender our lives to the One who protects us far better than our reactions ever could.

The point is that we've been offered a place upon the foundation of Christ Jesus, a Rock proven unbreakable. If we can't say the same about ourselves, our hopes, our preferences in that they too are unbreakable, unchangeable, unmistakable, well then we're mistaken to entrust our lives to them. And while many will make that mistake, we've been forewarned so that we don't.

Please understand that the promise of a deepening darkness isn't meant to inspire fear in our hearts any more than His correction is there to instill shame in our souls. It's all for our good, for our benefit. Because we need to know the darkness is coming so that we can find urgency in seeking shelter in the Son. Just as we need to know that judgement is coming that we might finally stop living in such a way that deserves a deadly outcome.

Humility makes all the difference in this. Because until we embrace humility, we'll never be able to allow ourselves to admit nor accept that all of this is out of our control. And until we can come to terms with that fact, we'll never appreciate the fact that it's all in His control.

He's already proven to embody a love strong enough to overcome the grave, and so I'm certain He can handle whatever else this wicked world has in mind. Can we? In truth, no, not without Him.

And that's the point. Without Him, we're at the mercy of a merciless world. But with Him, we've mercy to see us through the misery that this place desires.

And because we’ve both been told and have seen for ourselves the fires this world ignites over the calamites this world craves, safe to say we should make ready for the worst. Because like it or not, the worst is coming and there’s just no reason to be kicked, knocked, dragged, shoved, beaten, broken, deceived or scared off of our feet when it shows up finding us ill-prepared and entirely uninterested in the struggle.

Because all that’s just unnecessary. We don’t have to be always waiting for the next bit of worldly brokenness to break off inviting a war to breakout. We don’t have to live in constant uncertainty despite the insanity which keeps anymore everything entirely uncertain. We don’t have to wake up just hoping to be able to figure out a way through another day walking through this downfall.

But sadly that’s exactly the outlook that many have settled for accepting for themselves. It’s this mindset that has many relentlessly hoping for the best but fully unwilling to even contemplate the worst. And as the winds of chaos pick up and start breaking down all these better assumptions, many will lose their minds. They’ll lose their patience. They’ll fall to pieces as their peace lies in pieces.

And the lawlessness which ensues inside the aftermath will inspire many to fall away from this faith and give up on following Jesus just to avoid the added measure of hatred poured onto the misery of watching the world melt. It’s going to get really weird, probably pretty soon. And since we know this, since we can see this, since we have the preambles scrambling across the nightly news, if we stay unready that’s entirely our fault.

It’s easy to walk a road, even one as narrow at the one which leads to life, when the light is shining and birds are singing and everyone else is equally happy and content with life being lived. But that’s not what we’re promised. Light will grow dim, love will grow cold, the very acceptance of others continuing to live will be called into question inside stone-like hearts that are just filled with hate.

But as this all gets harder and hairier, we need to remember that we have Jesus right there ready to lead us. So let us stand in Christ, as that's the only ground that will stand when everything else inevitably falls apart.

#LeaveNoSoulUntold