wisdom

Answers

/ sweetpeacardco

Despite living in an age that says there are no ultimate answers (i.e. truth), still people yearn for answers, they long for truth. People have all kinds of questions. Since they are taught there is no truth, they look for answers to their questions in themselves, in others, in other teachings or religions. In a word they are lost.

I recently had the opportunity to lead an event with small children. As a prayer they were invited to ask one BIG QUESTION of God and write it on a slip of cardboard. The questions were profound and honest. Yet, I was saddened that for the majority of their questions there is an answer in the Bible. We need not look any farther; it’s already there for us.

How sad this is, because we have a God who speaks, and has spoken in His Word! We need not be lost. And because He is truth and cannot lie, everything He says is real and can be trusted! (Prov 30:5). Isaiah 45:19 says, “I the LORD speak the truth; I declare what is right.” Though there are mysteries our finite and small minds may not be able to fathom and must be left in faith with an infinite and wise God, still we will find answers that satisfy our deepest questions when we look for answers in God’s Word.

The Lord’s Sweetest Blessings,

Pastor Chris

Wisdom for Politics

/ sweetpeacardco

My default Bible translation is the English Standard Version (ESV). However, as I read the Bible to my 6 month old son I am reading from the International Children’s Bible (ICB) at his bedtime readings. At the moment I am reading to him the wisdom of Proverbs. This book has a lot to say about leadership and politics, from a spiritual perspective. One proverb that had never registered with me before, and perhaps did so because I re-encountered it in a children’s translation, is Proverbs 28:2a. This is what says in the ICB:

When a country is disobedient, it has one ruler after another.

[The ESV renders this verse: When a land transgresses, it has many rulers.]

Another way of putting this would be:

“When a country so blatantly sins against the Lord, its politics will be unstable.”

A child is wiser than a godless leader. Such is the case we find our Parliament in at this juncture in history—political deadlock, little faith in its leaders, instability, little seeking of the King of kings. How much good it would be for each Parliamentarian to have a Bible, read Proverbs, believe what it says and in faith put it into practice.

Years ago I read in Keeping Faith: Memoirs of a President how former President Jimmy Carter (1977–81) read the book of Proverbs each month (that’s a chapter a day), every year for the four years that he was in office (He also wrote: Through the Year with Jimmy Carter: 366 Daily Meditations from the 39th President, which though it has been some time since I read both books, I did generally profit from reading them).

The pursuit of the wisdom of this world has clearly proven how inferior it is to the wisdom that is from above.

The verse, however, not only speaks to leaders who’ve enacted a string of godless legislation in recent years but also the wicked populace who’ve elected them. Saving faith in Jesus is at, arguably, an historic low. We have the Parliament that we deserved. I expect that the last time an official national day of prayer was called was probably during WWII. When will we cease to seek the face of our rulers and know that justice comes from the Lord? (Prov 29:26).

Yet despite all this, as Christians, even though we be in the minority as Abraham and Lot were in Sodom, may we call out to the Lord to have mercy on our land for the sake of His faithful remnant. May the Lord raise up strong and godly leadership (read the second half of our verse).

The Lord’s Sweetest Blessings,

Pastor Chris