Imagine, if you will, that you find yourself in the midst of the greatest storm ever to hit the world. The wind is blowing at gale force. The ground is trembling, splitting at the seams. Lightning crashes and lights up a sky overflowing with the blackest of clouds. Rain is falling all around you in drops the size of swimming pools, while geysers erupt in every direction. You hear the screams of your terror-stricken neighbors above the thunder. Imagine you are on a boat being tossed this way and that. Imagine the screeches, the howls and brays of a menagerie of animals threatening a stampede.
There are eight people who have no need to imagine such a circumstance. Instead, they remember it. Noah and his family survived that storm. They didn’t, however, survive by their wits. They didn’t survive by their wills. They didn’t even survive by their faith. They survived by the grace of the same God who created the storm in the first place. Which means they didn’t merely survive, but were absolutely and utterly safe for every moment of their journey. Their emotional experience matched, no doubt, their physical experience. Neither, however, matched the true reality.
While it is a good thing to always give thanks, the thing we should be thankful for in light of this true account, of Noah and the flood, isn’t that we personally haven’t been called to live through what Noah and his family did. Rather we should give thanks that we are living through the exact same true reality. We too are absolutely and utterly safe in the midst of whatever storms the One who keeps us safe sends our way.
One of the many evangelical errors that has infected the church is the notion that eternal torment is separation from God. No. There is no separation from God. Where, after all, would we go to hide from Him (Psalm 139:8)? God is not only present in hell but His presence is hell. The very fire that burns is the fire of His glory. Which is the very light that lights up heaven. The redeemed and those in their own sins both will for eternity experience the presence of God. The redeemed will experience that presence in the context of blessing, those in their own sins in a context of cursing. Just as He was in the storm and in the ark, so will it be forever.
We who are in Christ are safe. He is our treasure and is beyond the possibility of loss or harm. We are His treasure and one with Him, and therefore just as secure as He is. He calls us, just as He did Noah and His family, just as He did the disciples on the boat in the Sea of Galilee, to trust Him, to faith, to rest. Let the thunder thunder. Let the tempest toss. Let us rest on the Rock, knowing that He protects us so well that apart from His will not a hair can fall from our heads.
It seems that we need constant reminders to trust God in unknown or threatening circumstances. Is that because our faith is so small? We always seem to be in need of reviewing such Scriptures as you reminded us of. When I was younger, these passages had a freshness about them that seemed to draw me more continually into trusting God. Wasn’t this path of loving and following our Savior supposed to mature our faith so that a surgery scheduled for next week was not so troubling? Or, so that the 7 of 8 children who express no faith in Jesus does not so often depress and discourage me, even as I pray for them? Nevertheless, I am helped by the Scriptures and your reflections on them. Thank you.
Great post. I love your description of the flood and its effects upon the people and animals as they were washed away by the waters of judgment.
A very interesting take on hell. Never thought about it this way. Just like vampires, the sunlight burns and destroys them, but is beneficial and needed by all others.
And no matter what happens on our journey of life, at the end of our voyage, Christians will enter into the joys of our Lord.
Thank you, and great analogy with vampires.