Salvation Comes Through Broken Pieces

SALVATION COMES FROM BROKEN PIECES

By Pastor Jim May

How many of you know that life is not fair? Around every corner and at every crossroads in life there are dangers, disappointments, troubles, trials, sicknesses and even death awaiting those who are traveling. We are often caught unaware as a bird is caught in a snare or as a rabbit in a trap. We are just going along, doing fine, when everything suddenly changes. One minute we are enjoying life to the fullest and the next minute we are trampled by the stampede of a thousand problems that try to crush us and threaten to destroy us at any moment.

I don’t think that anyone can say that they have never felt, at some point in their life, the crushing weight of the world upon their shoulders.

-the mother or dad who is left with the full responsibility of training up the children through the loss of a spouse

-the laborer on a job who is suddenly left unemployed with no prospects for work or an income waiting in the wings

-that one who is taken in an illness that changes their whole quality of life

-those who have lost a close loved one to a tragic accident

-On & On it can go. There are as many stories of the crushing weight of the world upon us as there are people in the world.

As a result of sin that has entered into the heart of every man through Adam’s fall and through our own rebellion against God’s Law, all of us are susceptible to being shipwrecked on life’s troubled seas. Whether we serve the Lord, or we serve the Devil, those troubled times will come. None of us like those times to come. None of us want to face the storms of life, but we all know that there is no escaping reality.

In Job 14:1-2 we see that Job has arrived, through all of his suffering at one immutable conclusion when he says, "Man that is born of a woman is of few days, and full of trouble. He cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down: he fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth not."

I wish I could tell you that you will not have to face any more of life’s storms and that from the moment you receive Jesus into your heart, that life will be nothing but smooth sailing until, one day, you will just simple sail into the sunset on a tranquil sea in this life and right into Heaven’s harbor without pain, suffering, worry, fear or doubt. I wish I could tell you that, but I can’t. What I can tell you is that, even though the storms will surely come, there is still reason to rejoice. In the midst of the storm your heart can be made to sing for joy. In the midst of trouble you can sleep in perfect peace. In the midst of trials you can lift up your head in hope. In the midst of suffering you can rest in confidence that everything is going to be all right.

How can that be? What power can give that kind of peace, joy, confidence and hope?

There is only once source for that kind of power. It’s found in serving the Lord Jesus Christ and allowing Him to be the captain of your soul, guiding you through life’s stormy seas.

To begin with, we can’t even receive Christ into our hearts without coming to a place of brokenness before Him.

David knew the pain of suffering in the stormy seas of life. Many of the storms that beset him were self-induced through his own acts of sin against God. But David also knew where to go, and whom to go to, in order to find peace when the storms began to overwhelm him.

Psalms 34:15-19, "The eyes of the LORD are upon the righteous, and his ears are open unto their cry. The face of the LORD is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth. The righteous cry, and the LORD heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles. The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the LORD delivereth him out of them"

David always had to come to a place of brokenness before God before he could find the answers he needed to badly. Sometimes God had to almost let him drown in his sin before David would finally lift up his eyes toward Heaven and cry out for the mercies of God.

The same is still true today for all of us. How far down into the depths of sin must we often go before we finally realize that there is really only one answer, only one source of real help and only one person who can deliver us from the evil that tries to destroy us. That person, of course, is our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. There is no hope outside of His sacrifice upon the cross for our sin. His precious blood, washing away our sin, lifting us out of the pit where we have placed ourselves, is our only hope. Thank God there is hope through the Son of God, who through His mercy and grace, can me rise above the storms.