12.31.20 Embrace the Struggle of 2021
If you look through the Scriptures you see the drama of story after story after story. Nobody lives easy lives. The Israelites are put into slavery. When they escape, they have to live in the desert for 40 years. When they get into the Promised Land, they have to battle against the Canaanites and the temptation to worship their gods. You’ve got the Assyrian Captivity from which they never return, and then the Babylonian Captivity of 70 years. Daniel is thrown in the Lion’s Den. The three men are put in the fiery furnace.
Just look at the Christmas story. Joseph and Mary end up traveling down to Bethlehem when Mary is about ready to burst. Jesus is born - but they have nowhere to stay but in a cattle stall. The Wise Men come to worship him and give him gifts! But then they have to flee in the middle of the night to Egypt! It is full of struggle!
So it is with us. Psalm 23 doesn’t talk about a valley of lollipops. It’s a valley of death. Paul was blunt with the believers in Acts 14 when he said, “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God.”
That being said, isn’t there something a little bit romantic about a struggle? My mother had a very difficult childhood of divorce and poverty and having to eat oatmeal day in and day out while living with a foster family for a while. When we moved to Michigan it was a trial for us. We didn’t know anyone here. Some of our children were very sad and even angry about it. Some of the most vivid memories we have are the struggles that we go through. If we get through them and come out stronger, at least in our faith, we look back having some sense of honor that we stuck with it through the trial. It’s not that we INVITE the struggle WANT the struggle or even ENJOY it, but nonetheless we get through it. We refer to these struggles as tests.
2020 was a difficult test. Dealing with a scary disease, with a loss of a job, the isolation of a lockdown. I have to witness some very difficult struggles with depression and desertion in some of our own members. Struggles with sickness and death in the ones they love. My heart aches for what some of you have been through.
Did you pass or fail 2020’s tests? How can you tell? A lot of people like to use Job as an example of passing a test. He praised God even after his children were all put to death. What we don’t read is that things got worse with boils on his skin and his friends turning against him. Job ends up questioning God’s justice. He has fits of anger. He claims God doesn’t care. But in the end, as bad as it gets, Job is the one who comes out vindicated over his friends. Job is told to make sacrifices for the forgiveness of his friends. That’s what makes the story of Job so intriguing. It shows how life can sometimes work throughout the struggle.
I think of Paul’s words, where he talked about having a thorn in his side, a messenger of Satan. Some think it was bad eyesight or perhaps a stutter. God wouldn’t take it away even though he begged God to do so. But in the end, he rejoiced over his weakness because it made him rely on God’s grace all the more. This is what tests are supposed to do: to make us stronger in the faith.
Not everyone passes the test. One of the saddest stories in the Bible is the story of King Asa. 2 Chronicles 14:2–4 says,
2 Asa did what was good and right in the eyes of the LORD his God. 3 He removed the foreign altars and the high places. He demolished the sacred memorial stones and chopped down the Asherah poles. 4 He told Judah to seek the LORD, the God of their fathers, and to obey his law and command.
It goes on to say,
16 Asa even removed his grandmother Ma’akah from her position as queen mother, because she had made an obscene image for Asherah. Asa cut down her image and crushed it and burned it in the Kidron Valley. . . . Asa’s heart was completely committed throughout all his days.
He had a long and successful career as king of Judah for 35 years. However, in his 36th year, he was attacked by the king of Israel and locked up in a fortified town. Instead of relying on the LORD, he decided to make a treaty with the king of Aram to turn against the northern tribes of Israel. As a result, God sent the prophet Hanani to condemn his actions. Instead of repenting, King Asa threw the prophet in prison. 2 Chronicles 16:12 goes on to say, Asa’s feet became diseased in the thirty-ninth year of his reign. His disease was very serious, but even when he was sick, he did not seek the LORD, but only his physicians. I find this so very sad. Here this leader seemed so faithful to the LORD, but he failed the one test he had after 35 years of peace. And then when he was confronted by a prophet and even struck with a disease he still didn’t turn back to the LORD. Not everyone passes the tests they are sent. They are sometimes the last people you would expect to fail.
How did you do in 2020? Did you lose hope? Want to give up? Get angry at God? If you think you passed every test, you’re a liar. Nobody does. Do you think you’ll do any better in 2021? Who knows that some other disease won’t come up or our economy will collapse? Will you meet some great temptation that you have to fight against? Some sickness? Will you pass or fail? Will you live or die? Will you grow in the faith or give up your faith?
Most of us are familiar with 1 Corinthians 10:13, “No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.” But right prior to this Paul also references the many times in the Old Testament that people fell from faith. He then says, These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the fulfillment of the ages has come. 12 So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall! Yes, it’s true that God knows your limits and He has control of circumstances. But that doesn’t mean you couldn’t fall even when you don’t meet your limit.
It also doesn’t mean that you won’t be put in circumstances that are far beyond your ability to control or handle. God’s Word uses extreme terms when it comes to our spiritual welfare. He speaks of putting to death and bringing to life. This incurs violence. It isn’t just a flesh wound. It’s death. Death is painful. So we shouldn’t expect these tests to be easy. They are impossible sometimes, FAR BEYOND us. Paul said that as well.
It’s not a matter of you being strong enough to handle them. It’s not a matter of you praying more. It’s not a matter of you putting on a happy face or gritting your teeth through difficult circumstances. It’s a matter of you being put to death with them. You have to be helpless. God has to kill your sense of self sufficiency and pride, so that you realize that you need God to give you life outside of yourself, in someone else’s work, in His mercy, in His forgiveness. It’s not a matter of you trying harder. It’s a matter of you stopping to try and starting to die. Nobody is strong enough to “handle” death. God has to bring life in the midst of it all.
Isn’t it beautiful then to stay focused on Jesus throughout it all? We see Him, right after His baptism, be led out into the desert to be TEMPTED for 40 days. Not once does He fall. At the end of it all, even He is strengthened by an angel. We see Him in the Garden. He’s struggling over the task at hand, to be damned for the sins of the world. In weakness, He prays. Again, an angel strengthens Him to do what? To die! And what help are the disciples? They fall asleep. They try to talk Him out of going to the cross: to stop Him from doing the one thing necessary to save them. Peter denies Him in the courtyard. They all desert Him from the cross. He hangs there alone, with no one to turn to, no angels to rescue Him, and even the Father leaves Him hanging. Yet after all is said and done, He still commits His spirit into the Father’s hands, in an act of trust. He passes the test. He rises from the dead. Here’s the ONE who passes the test - FOR US - as our SUBSTITUTE. He goes through it to conquer Satan and conquer death and bury sin in the grave - for us.
It is this gracious God who says to you in 2021, “I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Psalm 121 is a beautiful Psalm. One of my first shut ins said she would recite this Psalm to herself and replace “your” with “my.”
1 I lift up my eyes to the hills— where does my help come from? 2 My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. 3 He will not let your foot slip— he who watches over you will not slumber; 4 indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. 5 The LORD watches over you— the LORD is your shade at your right hand; 6 the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. 7 The LORD will keep you from all harm— he will watch over your life; 8 the LORD will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.
Does this mean that we can never suffer harm? Does it mean we will never die? Of course not. Everyone suffers and dies in this world. But what it does mean is that the LORD is watching over you no matter what happens to you. And we can’t forget - in a world of evil - where demons dwell - how often we travel - isn’t a miracle that there aren’t more accidents? More death? When God lifted the hedge of protection from Job for a minute, look at what havoc Satan had planned. How much worse would life be WITHOUT God’s protection and WITHOUT God’s angels. How many more people would have died from war, famine, and sickness WITHOUT God’s protection in 2020?
This same God still rules over 2021. His protection still is promised for those who believe in Jesus and who are baptized. Think of what Jesus said in His Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 6:25–34.
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? 28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Think also of God’s words of promise to the Israelites. Don’t they apply to His believers, the New Testament Israel as well? Isaiah 41:10 says, So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. It has nothing to do with how strong you are or how strong you can be. It has everything to do with how strong and merciful God is. Think also of the confident words of the Psalmist in Psalm 91.
4 He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. 5 You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, 6 nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday. 7 A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you.
In the Old Testament God sent a plague on the Israelites as a result of their rebellion, and they were dropping like flies from one person to the next. Aaron ran out into the midst of Israel as a plague was dropping everyone in sight. He took fire from the midst of the altar. He stood between life and death. Fearlessly he ran. The fire stopped the plague from spreading any further. (Numbers 16) God can do this for us as well, if He wills. He has done it with Jesus on the cross. He has done it for you in your baptism. He will do it for you when you die, through faith in Jesus.
What are you afraid of in 2021? What could it bring that God hasn’t dealt with? Isn’t it time to let God be God? Think of your favorite stories in the Bible were not of men who ran in fear, but those who stood in faith. Yes, sometimes God’s people had to flee. Joseph had to flee to Egypt. The Israelites had to flee from Egypt. God worked through their flight. But God also worked through those who stood their ground and stood strong in their faith. If God could keep three men alive while walking in the middle of a fiery furnace, then God can keep you alive too. Or if God says it’s time for you to go be with Jesus, then let that be His will too.
Jesus didn’t foolishly jump from the temple to test God with a foolish stunt. Yet He didn’t cower in fear of the devil either. He didn’t run from death either. He faced it and won the victory. He rose from the dead victorious. So do not give up hope, for God is not dead. His angels are still hard at work. He is alive. He is in control.
If you thought 2020 was bad, I have bad news for you. 2021 will probably be just as difficult, if not more difficult than 2020. You can’t hide from it. God never said that things would get easier. He actually said they would go from bad to worse, like a woman’s birth pains become more and more frequent and more and more painful. But at the end of the pain, the woman gives birth. At the end of our struggle, the earth will give birth to her dead. We will rise victorious when we believe in Jesus. Expect there to be struggle. It is what life is like in a sinful world and a sinful body. Instead of complaining about it, embrace the struggle, and more importantly, watch God embrace you with His love and strength. God is with you. In the end, God wins. Look forward to the victory, in Christ alone. Amen.
