Date posted: 04-02-2021
Estimated Reading Time : 8:00
Since the 2020 elections, the most common question I receive from viewers during the weekly Truth & Liberty livecast is, if the election system of our country has actually been hijacked, “what can we possibly do?”
The circumstances of the last twelve months have left many Christians feeling that there is no hope for rescuing this nation. Beginning with the shocking tyranny of the government’s COVID regime, through the presidential and Senate runoff election losses (despite record conservative voter turnout), to the intensified cancel-culture assault by the media and Big Tech elite and governmental endorsement of damnable immorality, it looks like America is headed off a cliff.
If they were honest, I believe millions of Americans would say they now believe the demise of our free republic has become all but certain.
Today, however, is Good Friday.
And this Sunday is Easter.
These days, above all days, are God’s call to hope and to believe.
Seeing Light Through the Darkness
The suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ has redeemed the world from sin and opened to all people everywhere God’s gift of righteousness and eternal life by faith (Rom. 3:22-26). How else can we respond to this glorious, almost-too-good-to-be-true news except with exuberant rejoicing, thanks, praise of God, and celebration?
And, to the point, this most wonderful Gospel story teaches us that, no situation, no matter how dark and hopeless it may appear, is too far gone for our God.
I do not deny that America and the world have entered very dark days. But God’s people have been through dark days many times before and He has always been faithful to deliver us.
Indeed, Good Friday is a remembrance of the darkest day in the history of the world. On that day of days, the hopes, desires, and dreams of God’s servants were dashed to pieces as they saw the one whom they believed was the promised Redeemer – the promised King of Israel – arrested, abused, humiliated, and murdered. To their shock and utter dismay, the one who had walked on water and defied the powers of hell, was now defeated in a rigged trial, nailed to a cross, and buried. They had done everything they had been asked to do, but the expected victory of God’s kingdom vanished before their eyes.
Like so many in America today, Jesus’s disciples could not see what was on the horizon.
Looking Past Moments of Despair
Despite the promises in Scripture and Jesus’s own predictions of his death and resurrection, the disciples were despondent (Mark 16:11). After Christ died, the disciples huddled in secret, vulnerable, with seemingly the whole world against them. Their Protector – Master, Teacher, Healer, and Provider – was gone, and they lost hope.
Their grief and disappointment was so intense that they refused to believe, even when Mary returned from the tomb with the news of Jesus’s victory. Thomas famously declared, “Unless I see the nail marks in His hands, and put my finger where the nails have been, and put my hand into His side, I will never believe” (John 20:25).
The disciples problem, just like ours today, is that they failed to realize that it is never too late for God to turn things around!
Easter – Resurrection Sunday – holds the eternal promise of new beginnings. It is proof that life is greater than death, hope is more powerful than despair, Light is greater than darkness and God is bigger than the devil! With God, all things truly are possible (Mark 10:27)!
God Fights for Us
The Bible is full of examples where God came through for his people in dire circumstances. In fact, it seems that more often than not, we have to get to a place where we have no choice but to stop relying on our own strength before God will “show up.”
At the Red Sea, with miles of water in front of them and the Egyptian army behind them, Moses and the children of Israel were in an impossible situation. After walking freely out of captivity, it now appeared they faced certain death.
The multitude turned on Moses, saying he should have left them alone to live as slaves rather than leading them to die in the desert. Moses responded, “Fear ye not,” because “the Lord shall fight for you” (Exod. 14:13-14). At God’s command, Moses stretched forth his rod, the waters split, the people walked through to safety on dry land, and Pharoah and his army were drowned in the sea!
With Judah surrounded by the Moabites and Ammonites, Jehoshaphat called the people to fast and said to the Lord, “In Thine hand is there not power and might, so that none is able to withstand Thee?” (2 Chr. 20:6). In that moment, the Spirit of the Lord came on Jahaziel and he spoke, “Be not afraid nor dismayed by reason of this great multitude; for the battle is not yours, but God’s” (2 Chr. 20:15).
Following the Lord’s instructions, Judah’s army went out the next day, placing singers before them who praised God. God made the enemy forces turn on themselves, and Judah won the battle.
When King Hezekiah and Judah faced destruction at the hands of the Assyrians and Jerusalem was under siege, a messenger was sent by the enemy to demoralize the people. The prophet Isaiah told the king:
Thus saith the Lord, Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me. Behold, I will send a blast upon him, and he shall hear a rumour, and shall return to his own land; and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land (2 Kgs. 19:6-7).
Later that night, an angel of the Lord went to the Assyrians’ camp and killed 185,000 people, freeing Jerusalem from the siege.
From the Red Sea to the Resurrection, when God’s people face impossible odds, if they turn to him with all their hearts, He is faithful to deliver them.
The promise of God to king Solomon remains true for us today:
If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land (2 Chr. 7:14).
The Lord knows our needs, and He is able to respond. But it’s up to us to rely on God as our source and turn to Him in our time of need. When we call out to God and seek His face, He will respond, and we will have the victory.
Jesus’s Victory
Early Sunday morning, the two Marys went to Joseph’s tomb, expecting to find Jesus dead. Instead, they found an empty tomb and heard the angel declare, “He is not here: for he is risen” (Matt. 28:6). As they ran to tell the others the good news, Jesus met them, saying:
Be not afraid: go tell my brethren that they go into Galilee, and there shall they see me (Matt. 28:10).
Later, on a mountain in Galilee, Jesus commissioned His disciples with words of power and hope:
All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world (Matt. 28:18-20).
Now, the God who fights for us is always with us. Jesus is “the brightness of His glory,” “the express image of His person,” and upholds “all things by the word of His power” (Heb. 1:3).
When trouble comes, when things look dark, and when it looks like time has run out, we should rejoice! It’s in those time when God loves to show up! Just as Jesus told His disciples, before His death:
Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me. These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world (John 16:32-33).
Today, in Christ, we have overcome the world. America has hope and we rejoice because Christ is risen!
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