Birth Pains

Birth Pains

By

Bishop Melvin L. Maughmer, Jr.

OPENING:- The other day a fellow Bishop and I were communicating and expressing our concerns about what is going on in the world. Both of us have 2 sons, neither of our sons have ever been in any trouble with the law or anything like that. As a matter of fact, the 4 young men are either in the military, college, or holding down very respectable careers and at least 1 of them is married and starting their own family. We were stating how we are FAITHFUL yet FEARFUL. FAITHFUL in that we believe and trust God and know that He holds the world in the palm of His hands, yet FEARFUL because as Black American men we know the trials and perception persecutions and heartaches that they as well as every of man of color must face.

We can try to be politically correct and try to avoid speaking such truths in our churches all we want to. We can try to put our heads in the sand and hope that it will all settle down or go away. We can try to push it off and say as long as it doesn’t happen to me or mine then it is not an issue, but the act of the matter is it is part of life and needs to be dealt with and publicized as much as possible. We need to preach it from the pulpits, from the street corners, in our homes, our schools, our churches, our places of business and continue to preach it until Shiloh comes.

Racial profiling, modern day lynching’s, blatant police corruption, social, political, and economical injustices are NOT the accepted way of life. The death of George Floyd, the death of Breonna Taylor, the death of Ahmaud Arberry, the arrest of CNN reporter Jimenez and his entire camera production team while covering the protest, and the audacity of the President of the United States to say “these THUGS are dishonoring the memory of George Floyd, and I won't let that happen. Just spoke to Governor Tim Walz and told him that the Military is with him all the way. Any difficulty and we will assume control but, when the looting starts, the shooting starts. Thank you!" instead of enforcing the arrest, and trial of the corrupt police officers, is a clear indication that something is going on. We can call it prejudice, racial unrest, hatred, profiling or any other name we want to call it, but Bible calls it “The beginning of sorrows” “Labor Pains” or “Birth Pains”

SCRIPTURE:- Matthew 24:1-8 “And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple: and his disciples came to him for to shew him the buildings of the temple And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world? And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows”.

John 16:21 “A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world”.

The Greek word for, “birth pangs and sorrows,” is odin. (Pronounced oh-deen) It means – the pain of childbirth, travail pain, birth pangs, intolerable anguish, sorrow.

One of the saddest consequences of sin is that one of God’s greatest blessings is accompanied by some of the greatest pain a person can endure and that is the birth of a child. Contrary to some, life begins at conception. But in order to birth a child requires the process of a delivery to take place. This process of delivery starts with something called contractions or Birth Pains or Labor Pains. Now I do not claim to be an expert on Birth Pains and would never want to be but as I have stated I have seen it happen a couple of times. Birth Pains starts out rather small and spaced apart by a matter of time; however, as time passes the birth pains get closer and become more and more intense and more frequent.