God Judges

If you're paying attention to the news, you know about Israel and Gaza and you know about Russia and Ukraine. If you've got a little bit wider spread, you might be aware of what's happening to Christians in many parts of Africa. A little bit closer to home, you probably have a keen awareness of how your brother has always gotten away with everything or how your one toxic coworker seems to continue to have a stranglehold on the whole workplace. 

Face it - the world is full of broken things. Upside-down things. Things that make us wonder if God is really good, if He's really in control, and if He's ever going to do anything about the things that are so wrong in our world. 

Rest assured, friends. 

He is. 

As I think about what it means to be a person of faith trying to live in this space, in this already-but-not-yet of brokenness that hasn't been redeemed, restored, or even revenged (wouldn't that be nice?), it's easy for me to be asking the same questions as everyone else. What is God waiting on? 

I'm learning the patience. I'm learning the prayerfulness. I'm learning to wait and to try to live my own life and mind my own business and worry about me. I'm doing the things that I'm told, or that I believe, are the right things to do - trying to be faithful and figure out what faith looks like in this space and take responsibility for what it looks like to be a Christian here and now, but if I'm honest, it feels like that always falls on me. Like I'm always trying to turn these opportunities into ones for personal reflection and growth. Like I'm always putting the burden of "better" on my own shoulders as I try to just keep being faithful. 

And I wonder why it is that the burden has to be so heavy for those of us who most expectantly wait for God to step in.

Then, another verse, this one out of the New Testament, straight out of the mouth of Jesus Himself, comes to mind. "Take care of the plank in your own eye before you try to remove the speck from your brother's." 

In other words, a reminder that God has always had a higher standard for His people than He has for everyone else. A higher expectation of believers than of the non-believing world. 

We're supposed to love each other first, then worry about all the rest of the stuff that's out there. 

And when it looks like the broken world is winning, like things are falling apart and will never come back together, like hate is greater than love, like we'll never find common ground to stand on, like God isn't coming to fix things, remember that we were called to be His people first. 

So yes, what's happening in the world is tragic. It's heartbreaking. It makes us question what God is doing in the world. But perhaps the most troublesome things of all aren't the ones in the headlines; they're the ones in our heart. They're not the ones happening half a world away, but just down the street. Or maybe even in our own homes. 

As Obadiah says, the day is coming. God's judging is coming to the nations (Obadiah 1:15). 

It just starts with us.