Perspective

Perspective is everything, as we are told.  Depending upon where you are standing, that perspective can change dramatically!  "So what?", you say?  Well just follow along ...

I have through the years known some mighty godly (reason for the small "g") and pious elders through the years, here and abroad.  This abomination now called christianity has spread worldwide, pious people can be found everywhere.  They appear mighty Godly, but when the rubber hits the road, well then we get to see their real faith was not in Jesus at all but in their own willpower.

Thinking of one of them, staunch christian, standard family, he made it widely known his faith was everything to him ... until his teenage daughter's extracurricular activities caught up with her.  The suddenly prolife family is now sending her rapidly and quietly off for an abortion, selling their house at a loss and moving to points unknown.  Well, I knew, they moved to the other side of town, put their daughter into a different high school, change churches and it was now life as usual.  The past is after all the past ... right?

Really?

Sorry, God does not work that way.  If you advertise that you are called by HIS name and you pull a huge fubar like murder of the unborn, God will hold you accountable.  He will do whatever it takes, pull out the stops, to bring you back ... and we are not talking about kindness here.  He is God, He is Sovereign and you little backside is toast when you cross Him.  Bob moving his family, changing the daughter's school, changing churches is not going to hide anything - because our God, the REAL God, does not like secrets, does not like lies and really does not like murder!  Sure you can repent of any or all of it, and you will still pay a price - because you attempted to trash HIS name, HIS witness, making a mockery of HIS salvation only He can offer.  And yes, all of these changes are what precedes a full scale teenage melt down. 

Conversely, Bob may well have been a real Christian, whom set his sights on the world and its standards.  His reaction was therefore the same as the world's.  He allowed himself to play in Satan's domain, his daughter was therefore misled, attacked, failed and got to pay a price for his either being weak or ineffectual in her life (yeah, four fingers pointing back here!).  But, you know, Satan likes it when you destroy your Christian witness!  One highly visible failure by us as a Christian and multiples now will never listen to anything concerning God - he is a fake right?  Just like Bob or anyone of us.

And Satan will reward you handsomely for furthering its goals of leading the world away from God, away from Jesus, away from truth, away from salvation.  So all is well with Bob, life is even better than before.  Well, in the short run anyway ...

But, God does not work that way and will make Bob quite miserable in His attempts to call Bob back onto his knees before Him ...

To make a horrible story short - by the end of the year: Bob had lost his $200k job, when that was quite a piece of change!, his wife had left him, his daughter was gang raped in French class, when the teacher had to run to the office .....

Well, you can recover from a job loss, you can recover from losing your loved ones, you can destroy another unborn life in the attempt to keep things secret, but it is a bit harder to recover from having your daughter's mind snap from the violence she was exposed to.  At their trial, the six young men involved testified that they heard from their friends, at her old school, she was "easy" - so what the heck, she wouldn't mind after all.  (They were sentenced as adults and with no time off for good behavior, they still have 5 more years to go ... )

It is now 20 years later.  Bob never did recover.  He did come to understand that his failures as a man opened the doors through which his family was attacked.  Yes, his daughter and his wife had to make their own choices and pay their own price for playing Satan's games, but the thought remains for him and for us whom watched and tried to intervene unsuccessfully: was any of this avoidable?  His wife contracted HPV and died rapidly.  His daughter moved in with other family and eventually fell into drugs, alcohol, prostitution and suicide.

You say, where is the perspective here?!?!?!?!

Oh it is there:

Proverbs 16:25 - There is a way which seems right to a man, But its end is the way of death. 

Perhaps just like Bob, you are living the perfect life.  Health and Wealth were his because he claimed them!  Too bad for fools like me whom do not understand that this is exactly what God wants for each of us!  He got his, he enjoyed his, he lusted after more.  And Satan had him.

So many  of my friends are trapped in this religion of superstition and occultism!  And randomly, God calls them to account, but they do not understand this - no, their faith must be slipping, other people in their family are the weak ones, God does not work this way ... 

It is all a question of perspective after all.