Real Social Security Series

Just two summers ago (July, 2008), Newsweek magazine printed a story about the most amazing exploit of tight-rope walker, Philippe Petit. They titled the story Man on Wire¸ and it described Petit’s secret plan in 1974 to extend a steel wire between the two towers of the World Trade Center in New York. At the time, the towers were still under construction.

After much planning and practice, the day arrived. Petit and his fellow conspirators snuck to the top of the buildings, shot a wire across the vast, quarter-mile-high canyon that separated the North and South Towers, and Petit went to work. When all was said and done, Petit was on the wire for 45 minutes. Thousands gathered below to watch him. On each end of the wire, police waited for him to finish. Petit made eight passes before finally coming in. To this day he insists the stunt wasn’t for publicity or even to see if he could do it. “The path is as important as the result,” he told a Newsweek magazine reporter.

Petit now lives in New York’s Catskill Mountains. A wire stretches across his yard, and he still practices several hours a day. Petit told the same Newsweek reporter that it “never occurred to him to use a safety net” when walking the wire. Then he added something that really struck me funny. He said, “I never fall. But yes, I have landed on the earth many, many times.” (Jennie Yabroff, “He Had New York at His Feet,” Newsweek magazine, 7-28-08, pp. 50-51; www.PreachingToday.com)

I laughed at that, but then I thought, “How descriptive of my life in Jesus Christ.” There are many, many times I find myself in trouble; but even in those times, I never really fall so as to ultimately hurt myself. It’s the experience of every believer in Jesus Christ. We are not immune from trouble, but God is right there to “keep our feet from striking against a stone,” to use the language of Psalm 91 (vs.12). “I never fall, but I have landed on the earth many, many times.”

So what do we do, as believers, when we “have landed on the earth,” so to speak? How do we handle it when we find ourselves in trouble? What should be our response when difficult times come?

Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to Genesis 26, Genesis 26, where Isaac, an Old Testament Believer, found himself in a bit of trouble.

Genesis 26:1 Now there was a famine in the land—besides the earlier famine of Abraham’s time—and Isaac went to Abimelech king of the Philistines in Gerar. (NIV)

Isaac did exactly what his father, Abraham, had done 80 or 90 years previously. During a time of drought and famine, he went to Gerar on his way to Egypt in search of greener pastures, but God met him along the way!

Genesis 26:2-5 The LORD appeared to Isaac and said, “Do not go down to Egypt; live in the land where I tell you to live. Stay in this land for a while, and I will be with you and will bless you. For to you and your descendants I will give all these lands and will confirm the oath I swore to your father Abraham. I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and will give them all these lands, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because Abraham obeyed me and kept my requirements, my commands, my decrees and my laws.” (NIV)

This is the same promise God made to His father, Abraham, on Mount Moriah, the place where Isaac was nearly sacrificed to the Lord. It was a promise of land, seed, and blessing even in the place of famine and sacrifice. The question is: Would Isaac believe God, like his father did, despite his circumstances?

Genesis 26:6 So Isaac stayed in Gerar. (NIV)

Isaac did indeed believe God. That’s why he did exactly what God told him to do – Isaac stayed in Gerar. Isaac trusted in the Lord in his time of trouble, and that’s exactly what we need to do in our times of trouble, as well. We need to...

TRUST IN THE LORD.

Like Isaac, we need to rely on God’s promises. We need to depend on God’s Word, enough to do exactly what God tells us to do.

Van Morris, from Mount Washington, Kentucky, recalls a recent visit to the zoo with his daughter and grandchildren. They visited the orangutan exhibit, where the only thing separating them from the orangutans were thick panes of glass, each 20-feet tall. Those awesome creatures possess the strength of at least five men, and Morris’ 2-year-old grandson, Trevor, was amused at first by their antics. Then one of the hairy beasts suddenly began to beat on the glass. Trevor leapt into the arms of his mother, crying, “I scared! I scared!” His mother tenderly took him, placed his little hand on the glass, and showed him that the glass shielded him from the animal, so there was nothing to fear. Afterwards, any time Trevor seemed uncertain, his mom would simply say, “Remember the glass.” (Van Morris, Mount Washington, Kentucky; www.PreachingToday.com)