While reading yesterday I came across a verse in Numbers that stopped me in my tracks.  Ch 23 vs 19 says:

 “God is not a man, that he should lie,
       nor a son of man, that he should change his mind.
       Does he speak and then not act?
       Does he promise and not fulfill?”

This isn’t a new idea; I know God can’t lie, and I know He is never-changing.  As a matter of fact, I have said both of those statements many, many times before.  However, this verse rested a bit uneasy at first.  As I read it again and again and allowed it to sink further and further into my heart, I realized that although I may have said these very words before, my actions and prayers don’t really line up with these words.  How many times God has spoken a word to my heart or given me clear direction yet I’ve questioned Him again and again.  Not that I have ever thought He lied, but I have doubted my ability to hear correctly.  When will I ever get it through this thick head of mine that God is God, He has a plan, and everything works according to that plan.  He doesn’t waste His words, nor the gifts He disperses among His people.  May we take Him at His word more consistently from this day forward, beginning with me.

I know we’ve all seen in the news about the tragic earthquake that hit China last week.  I just read an article that states the number of dead and missing is 70,000 now.  Seventy thousand people…SEVENTY THOUSAND SOULS!  Seventy thousand – that’s hard for my mind to comprehend.  North Charleston estimated population is 87,000.  That would be like losing almost all of North Charleston.  And it doesn’t even come close to the COUNTLESS others who are displaced without homes or families or the widespread destruction.  When disasters strike, we hear (or may even ask) lots of questions like: Why did God do this?  How can He be such a loving God, yet bring this on His creation?  If God desires for no man to perish, then why would He do this to a region where people predominantly do not know Him?

Good questions I think.  How would you answer them? 

The answers I’ve typically given in the past have been “God’s ways are higher than ours” or “we live in a fallen world where bad things happen” or “Satan is only out to steal, kill, and destroy.  All of which are true!  But what do they say about God?  To those who don’t know Him, these responses may make God appear distant and uninvolved.  In order for any lasting good to come out of tragic disasters like this one is for God’s love and glory to be made known.  The truth is He does desire for no one to perish.  That is precisely why He sent Christ Jesus to the cross, to provide the Way back to a right relationship with Himself, God the Father. 

So how do we explain the reason for disasters?  After the flood (the most widespread destruction this planet has ever seen), God makes a covenant promise with Noah to never again bring destruction like this on the planet or mankind.  I’ve read this story many times, but this time Genesis 8:22 jumped off the page.  God is talking and He says “As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.”  “As long as the earth endures….”  Natural disasters aren’t God’s fault.  And as much as I hate to admit it, they aren’t Satan’s fault either.  Sometimes we pin things on Satan that make him seem bigger, uglier, and so much worse than what he really is, but I believe it’s much healthier for us to not give credit to him where credit isn’t due.  When sin entered the world with Adam and Eve back in the Garden of Eden, the deterioration of the world began.  Mankind sinned, bringing imperfection into God’s perfect creation.  The world will one day come to the end of its downward spiral of destruction, but that doesn’t leave us without a hope.  Going along with what I said earlier, God did not, has not, and will not abandon His people.  He’s provided the Source of hope, the Source of life that will never end.  Look for Him in the midst of disasters.  Let Him be your comfort, your protection, your understanding, your provision.

This is the third and final post in my comparison between the Marine Corps and the Body of Christ.

• Marines are like minded; they are all headed toward the same mission.

Being a Marine isn’t just a job, nor is it just serving our country, albeit that is an honorable thing.  Being a Marine is so much more; it is a way of life.  Those of us who are Marines can usually spot one another a mile away.  We have a certain ‘air’ about us.  We walk with purpose, fully understanding our mission as Marines – “[…]to support and defend the Constitution of the United States[…].”  The Corps Values (Honor, Courage, and Commitment) become our core values for life, not just during our active service.

The body of Christ also has one mission.  Of course, each member of the body of Christ goes about achieving this mission in a unique way using the gifts he or she has been given, but the end goal should be the same mission.  The mission is what we call as The Great Commission.  If everyone within the body of Christ took up the Great Commission as the foundation for their mission in life, then the entire body would be like minded, heading for the same goal.  To tie into the previous post, we all would be fighting together if we were all headed toward the same goal.  Much can be said for like-mindedness.

Matthew 28:18-20 (The Great Commission)

“Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

I long so deeply to see the body of Christ restored to a position of power, of love, of fellowship, of PURPOSE.  By the grace of God may we get there…

So how is it that the Marine Corps, not founded on Biblical principles (actually founded in a BAR), has more unity and camaraderie than the body of Christ?  I believe there are two basic answers to this question, the first of which I will discuss in this post.

• Marines go to battle together.  You will never find a Marine in a fight by him/herself, either on or off the battlefield.  NEVER! 

 In comparison with the body of Christ, this idea really troubles me.  Too many Christians are fighting spiritual battles alone.  Why is that?  Could it be because we’re too concerned with the details of our own lives that the problems of others don’t concern us?  Maybe we think our problems are bigger and/or more important than our brother’s or sister’s? How selfish can we be!  Last I checked we were all human with sinful natures and live in a fallen world where bad things happen.  We should be praying for one another as God tells us to do.

James 5:16 (The Message) says “Make this your common practice: …pray for each other so that you can live together whole and healed.”

Or is it because we are too critical against one another, thinking “I wonder what you did in order for God to punish you like this”?  Oh hogwash!  Our bad situations are more often than not the results of living in a fallen world where bad stuff happens, not because God is punishing us.  However, we must remember that when we do wrong, we have to pay the consequences.  And we all do wrong, but that doesn’t make the consequences any easier to work through.  James 5:9 says “don’t grumble against each other…”  Such wasted effort is exerted on talking about each other when we could be praying for one another and really helping each other.

< to be continued >