Covid-19: What In Heaven Is God Doing?

COVID-19, What in Heaven Is God Doing?

What may be happening now, all around the world.

2 Chronicles 7:11-15

Other various passages

“If my people…”

• The Corona Virus 19 had rocked our world.

• Has it not shown us that we cannot control our lives?

• For control freaks, this has been emotional death.

• For those who are germaphobes, this is a nightmare.

• For the social butterflies, this is lasting forever.

• For school children, it’s like a huge “timeout box”.

• For the elderly, this is a lonely period.

• If you are in a nursing home, you cannot see your family, and you fear someone will unintentionally bring death to work.

• If you are a small business owner, you are wondering what your business will look like in 2021, if you even have a business.

• To the furloughed employee, you wonder if your job, or any job, will be there for you.

• Too many fears to mention.

• You may be going through a fear that no one else realizes.

• I’m not here to remind you of your fears or give you new ones.

• I am here to give you hope.

• Not just, “Hang in there. We are going to get through this together.”

• I have heard this thousands of times,

• the actors aren’t saying they were going to send me a check from their personal account.

• And that is fine. Want to know the truth?

• My hope is not in a wealthy rescuer.

• It’s not in money.

• It’s not in me being able to control my circumstances.

• It’s not from me being able to isolate myself from germs.

• Nor, any other comfort that I would naturally hope for.

• I want us to pray now……..

• I want to share something with you from God’s message of hope.

• In 1 Chronicles 6, when Solomon was blessing the temple, he said,…

“2Ch 6:16 Now therefore, O LORD, God of Israel, keep for your servant David my father what you have promised him, saying, ‘You shall not lack a man to sit before me on the throne of Israel, if only your sons pay close attention to their way, to walk in my law as you have walked before me.’

• David was, by no means, perfect.

• His sins are often taught, more than any other topic, except about Goliath,

• because it comforts us to hear about a sinner reaching God.

• David slothed in the palace, looked at a naked bather, Lusted, called her to himself…

• Committed adultery, lied, murdered, and ignored what he did for nearly 9 months.

• And yet, God said David was a man after His own heart.

• David had the vision of building God a temple in Jerusalem.

• Here is how that happened, found in 2 Samuel 5-7 and 1 Kings 5.,

• The King of Tyre, Hiram, was an ally of David.

• He sent lots of cedar lumber, carpenters, and engineers to give David a gift.

• Not just any gift. He built him palace.

• When David moved in, I am fairly sure he responded like many of us did when we get a new house.

• When Laura and I bought our first house together, I had taken a load to move in while Laura remained at the rent house we were in to pack up more boxes.

• When I walk into the house, I cried. (I cry easily).

• I walked from room to room with my hands stretched towards heaven, tear running down my face, and praised and thanked God.

• I praised Him for doing, at that time, what seemed to us, the impossible.

• David had been a tent-dwelling shepherd as a boy.

• As a soldier, he lived in a tent.

• When he ran from King Saul, he was a nomad, living in a tent.

• As king, he lived in a tent.

• Hiram said, “I want to build my buddy a house.”

• As David inspected the house, and no doubt, thanked God in every room, a thought occurred to him.

• “Now I live in a palace, and yet the Ark of the Covenant dwells in a tent (tabernacle).

• “I want to build God a Temple in Jerusalem.”

• God corrected David and told him he was too much of a warrior,

• with blood on his hands, to build a holy temple.

• But he was to raise the money and material

• He would have a son, the next king, who would build it.

• So, decades later, Solomon did.

• Now is the time for the dedication.

• The Ark of the Covenant was moved to the Temple.