Mar 30, 2020
FROM YOUR PASTOR’S DESK:
THE DISCIPLINE IN DARKNESS & TRIAL BRINGS OUT THE BEST IN BIRDS.
“Even the stork in the heavens knows her appointed times; and the turtle dove, the swift, and the swallow observe the time of their coming. But My people do not know the judgment of the Lord.” Her. 8:7, NKJV.
God’s ways are not our ways (Isa. 55:8). There were more birds, both clean and unclean, that entered the typical ark of safety and were saved then there were of the long-lived yet wicked antediluvians. Yes indeed! More dumb animals saved that those made in the image and likeness of the Creator! Truth, most of the time really stranger than fiction, i.e., to those who believe fiction not the truth. We cannot love and serve both and be saved like the dumb birds. It is either or the other, God or the mammon of fear, unbelief, doubt and love of the world and the things of the world.
Now, read what Jesus said regarding the birds in contrast to His anxious, fearful and worrying disciples in Mathew 6:20 and the whole chapter. Note the following if the “darkness” of this Corona virus is enveloping you within and without because the discipline of trial can bring out the best in us, if we choose to believe and trust God.
“In the full light of day,and in hearing the music of other voices, the caged [quarantined, isolated] bird will not sing the song that his master seeks to teach him. He learns a snatch of this, a trill of that, but never a separate and entire melody. But the master covers the cage, and places it where the bird will listen to the ONE SONG he is to sing. In the DARK, he tries and tries again to sing that song until it is learned, and breaks forth in perfect melody. Then the bird is brought forth, and ever after he can sing that song IN THE LIGHT.
Thus God deals with His children. HE HAS A SONG TO TEACH US, and when we have learned it AMID THE SHADOWS of afflictions we can sing it afterward.” (Ministry of Healing, 472). Spiritual things are spiritually discerned. This is what makes the difference between the same crisis or anything we are looking at and part of. One sees darkness and despair, the other the Master’s hand at work to bring out the best in us, for His real glory.
Sometimes we do not even really understand that this “glory” really means and the method by which it is accomplished and brought to the gaze of “men, angels and the world.” Let us learn Master bird-Trainer is trying to teach us in the darkness of this COVID-19 Crisis. If we do, we can sing in perfect tune and harmony the song of victory that He is teaching us. Have a happy second working day of the week. NMF