Every negative range of emotion, from frustration and anger, to sorrow and despair is coming your way, brought to you by sin, sponsored by Satan, he is a being filled with hatred, spite, and great fury and he is going to do all within his power to attempt to remove your joy. Happiness, contentment, rest, those are easy, current circumstances in the normal every day world can remove those, what he wants of you is to become completely devoid of hope.
Hope is one of the corner stones of the expression of our faith in Christ, hope gets us out of bed in the morning, hope allows for a restful night’s sleep, worry is not only a sin, (Matt. 16:25) but a sure way to remove confidence, and when confidence in the known wavers, the loss of hope is not far behind.
The things that we are seeing occurring across this planet, both the advent of our adversary’s roaring’s, and the sure signs of the Lord’s imminent return, will cause the loss of hope in many, more chaff to be blown away by the winds of circumstances. I pity those who will be left behind, I pity those who will be sent a strong delusion, I know in a way that I should not, for those that dishonor our Lord and what He did for us on the cross deserve what the Lord has in store for them, but I still feel sorrow knowing the end of most of them.
If you are observing only a tenth of what is occurring on a planetary scale, you understand sorrow, but one thing we must always remember is that the Almighty is in control, evil has never run rampant in its own free will, it has been and always will be, as it were, on a leash, only so far, no further.
I think that there are some believers who have decided to hide their head in the sand in much of the matters of our day. It is just too much for them, perhaps they have already suffered enough in their lives to want to experience the tribulations that this earth is going through at this present time, I will not judge them, every one has a breaking point, we are human, therefore feeble, and feeble things are easily broken. I do not see it as a lack of faith, many are in the battle who are not leading, many of the wounded need refreshing, many are willing to follow, but not in the front ranks. We can be both, and many times are.
David was an incredible warrior, but at times his only desire was to hide in the shadow of the wings of the Lord, (Psalm 17:8) every one of us, many times over, desire to run into the High Tower that is our Lord. (Prov. 18:10) I cannot say if this statement is true or not, but it seems appropriate, God has His warriors, and He has those reserved for other positions, not everyone’s name will be written in the Hall of Faith of Hebrews 11, those who the world was not worthy of, (Heb. 11:38) It matters only that our names are written in the Lambs Book of Life. (Rev. 21:27) I would ask this of you though, is there a bottle of tears with your name on it in heaven, (Psalm 56:8) and if so, how full is it?
Do you weep openly for those who are suffering, our brothers and sisters in Christ who are being persecuted for the name of the Most Holy One, do the visions on your television or cell phones cause tears to well up in your eyes, as the creation of God is slowly covered in sin, while animals of all sorts are dying by the thousands and hundreds of thousands each day. Are the beginnings of sorrows beginning to break your heart?
It is our hope Satan wants to take away, he cannot damage our salvation, but he can attempt to damage our hearts, our fortitude, our perseverance, our hope. I have found that one of the best ways to assuage this loss of hope in those moments is to help others who are experiencing the same emotions, to encourage them in the Lord encourages me, in this way we are all reminded of the eternal joy that awaits us, our hope is renewed, and we can arise in the morning, willing to face whatever the Lord has determined to place in our path with the confidence that someday soon, our joy will be full forever, and hope will be a distant memory, replaced with His continual presence.
