Come Into Your Life, Rejoice in it!
By Rebekah Johnston
By Rebekah Johnston
"We must pay more close attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away" (Hebrews 2:1 NIV)
The "rainstorms" of life can be beneficial. We can scream and holler through the rainy seasons of our life, or we can determine to gain benefit from them.
I recently reviewed a book by Gordon MacDonald, "The Life God Blesses: Weathering the Storms of Life that Threaten the Soul" (1997). In his book he writes with great meaning about the things God uses to bring blessing into the lives of His servants and to make them a life that God can bless. In one chapter he coins a term to describe one of God's most often used and least understood tools in this process. He calls this tool a "disruptive moment."
According to MacDonald,” disruptive moments" are those unanticipated events, most of which, one would have easily chosen to avoid had it been possible. As humans we don't like "disruptive moments". They are too often associated with pain and inconvenience and with failure and humiliation. "Disruptive moments" are like bends in the road that we cannot see beyond or around and we don't know what to do with.
Malcolm Muggeridge in a conversation with William Buckley said, "as an old man, Bill, looking back on ones life, one of the things that strikes you most forcibly is that the only thing that has taught one anything is 'suffering and affliction', not success, not happiness, not anything like that. The only thing that really teaches one what life is all about, the joy of understanding, the joy of coming into contact with what life really signifies, the only thing, says Muggeridge is 'suffering and affliction'." This is exactly what being diagnosed with Stage 4 Breast cancer represented for me, "suffering and affliction".
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn also knew something of "disruptive moments" when he wrote about the time he spent in the Gulag in prison. He said, "It was only when I lay there on the rotting prison straw that I sensed within myself the first stirrings of good. Gradually, it was disclosed to me that the lines separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either, but right through every human heart and through all human hearts. " And he wrote, "so bless you prison, bless you for having been in my life."
Corrie ten Boom experienced a similar "disruptive moment" in her life. I would have to say it was more like a "pot hole" than a bend in the road. She suffered pain and affliction, degradation and humiliation, starvation and disease, etc. But even so, these circumstances became God's refining fire that later molded her into the powerful woman of genuine character, compassion and faith who reached millions with God's message of hope, purpose, provision, faithfulness and salvation (1 Peter 1:6,7; Romans 5: 1-5).
"Disruptive moments." I am sure many of you are aware that I experienced a "disruptive moment" in my life a year ago. It was definitely more than a "bend in the road." It was more like a "dead mans curve." It was more than a "bump in the road". It was more like a "pot hole". It was not a "rainstorm" either, but more like a "tidal wave." And in this time of my "disruptive moment" I was drawn again to the scripture that I have been studying and proclaiming for years. I would like to open up my heart to all of you during this retreat weekend. I will share some of the things God has taught me and still continues to teach me. Things which I probably wouldn't have studied or even been motivated to learn about had I not hit a "bend in the road" and had a "disruptive moment" in my life.
Two of the passages God has impressed upon my heart are easy to remember because they are both twelfth chapters, the twelfth chapter of 2 Corinthians and the twelfth chapter of Hebrews. We will begin with the twelfth chapter of 2 Corinthians. I am going to read verses 7-10. If you will follow along in your Bibles I am going to read this passage from "The Message" by Eugene Peterson. As you follow in your Bibles and listen to "The Message" that is a paraphrase of this passage you will hear what God is saying to us by His spirit (2 Corinthians 12:7-10).
In 2 Corinthians chapter twelve there is a pattern that is exactly the same in Hebrews chapter twelve. I am going to give you five points that are exactly alike in both passages and then make some practical application to our hearts and lives. So follow along. I will start with verse seven.
"Because of the extravagance of those revelations, and so I wouldn't get a big head, I was given the gift of a handicap to keep me in constant touch with my limitations. Satan's angel did his best to get me down; what he in fact did was push me to my knees. No danger then of me walking around high and mighty! At first I didn't think of it as a gift, and begged God to remove it. Three times I did that, and then he told me, ' My grace is enough; it's all you need. My strength comes into its own in your weakness'."
"Once I heard that, I was glad to let it happen. I quit focusing on the handicap and began appreciating the gift. It was a case of Christ's strength moving in on my weakness. Now I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size---abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks, yes even CANCER. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become."
The first thing you will notice as you begin to study 2 Corinthians chapter twelve is the "purpose" of a "disruptive moment". Paul writes in verse seven, "lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations." This passage describes a moment in Paul's life when he had just had the opportunity of a heavenly experience. We have very little information about it. In fact, as Paul writes about it in the first six verses of 2 Corinthians chapter twelve, he seems rather reluctant even to put himself in the context of the experience. He says, "There was a man that I knew." He doesn't even want to say that it is he. He says, "Whether in the body or out of the body I can't say." He doesn't want to get too specific. But what Paul does know is this, that on a given occasion because of an appointment from God, he had been lifted up to see the glory of heaven as no man had ever seen before (e.g., the overdose experience of my first chemotherapy treatment).
Can you imagine what it would have been like if Paul had lived in our day, what his press agent would have been saying about him and what his meetings would have been like after he came back from that experience? Here is the only man who has been to heaven and back and lived to tell about it. Come and hear him this Sunday night in the Town Square.
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Copyright 1998-2001 by Rebekah Johnston