It was nine days ago....Monday the 21st....and The Weather Channel's tropical weather expert Rick Knabb....at the end of a segment on a topic that I cannot even remember.....matter of factly mentioned that there was some cloud rotation in the southern Gulf that he was concerned with. He pointed to the area but there was nothing really there to see.....not to the untrained eye anyway. I purposely kept that comment in mind just to see if his inclination came true. Days passed and there was nothing....and then all of a sudden they were talking about the beginnings of a tropical depression at the same spot that Dr. Knabb was pointing to....which today is Hurricane Idalia! Knabb was correct.
I have watched....for forty years or so....various Christian ministers and teachers....from local pastors to prophecy teachers....all the way up to Billy Graham....warn of a storm that was coming....this is where the term....'a storm of biblical proportions'....comes from. Meteorologists like Rick Knabb usually deal with time periods of weeks....but those who read their Bible as meteorologists can follow a storm for decades. That is just about what I have been doing.
It was August of 2011 when I posted this....A recent entry into our expanding collection of American phrases and idioms is "the perfect storm," alluding to a storm so complete, so surrounding, whose potential is so devastating that the worst possible scenario has to be considered. America is in the path of that "perfect storm." Since then I've used the word 'storm' literally dozens of times....recently in a post that I titled...."This Storm Cannot Be Outrun!"
If I might use some of the weather terminology here....we have both winds and storm surge with which to contend. The winds would be anything from violence to war to pandemics to societal and cultural collapse to artificial intelligence to false prophets and impeachments and insurrections....the list could go on. It's the storm surge that I want to address here.
I tried to describe this many times before in the context of a contrast in evangelicalism....that of the 1980s to today. It actually goes further back but I can comment best on the 80s because I was part of that. So If I'm addressing in this post either young people.....college students for example....or just younger generations that did not experience the church before this storm surge began....please try to grapple with this....there is a fundamental change that has taken place that you in no way could have experienced first hand!
It may be technology.....the ever-expanding information age....that blinded us and literally destroyed our discernement. To someone my age....the ubiquitous cell phone up to the ear or someone walking and pecking on it....is a new world. I don't think you can imagine the impact this must have had on our discernment. I can't emphasize the loss of Christian bookstores too much....the loss of which cut our supply lines. I meandered into just such a bookstore in 1982 and came out with Josh McDowell's Evidence That Demands A Verdict. We had Billy Graham crusades fairly often on one of four available stations. Now we have four or five nonsense Christian channels in among hundreds of other channels. These things are a big deal. We are effectively without sound biblical information concerning the age we live in....in an exploding information age!
It is no longer evangelization....it is now recruitment that builds the church. No one has to be born again anymore. What is that anyway? It's the opposite of edification that Fox cable and talk radio has done to us. We have become hardened and insensitive....and extremely tribal....with little compassion for anyone. Our lives revolve around warnings of the wind gusts....personal freedoms and liberties....but we are unaware that the storm surge had totally engulfed us.....and isolated us from God's warnings!
This storm surge covered the pulpits also. They have been as affected as we have been. So to the college student....you are still smart....with knowledge on technology that I could never keep up with....but discernment on things spiritual is practically gone....and there is no way that you could know this! You have no idea what is lacking in the preaching.....because you have never experienced it to know that it is missing!
The warnings back then were consistent and strong....God was going to judge us. Those judgments have begun....both the wind and the surge! We simply have no interest in these things today. Ask yourself....do you have any interest in God's judgments upon us?
I want to recommend a book to you. It is extraordinarily easy to read....but it would take work to get through it because it's a commentary. These things happen on occasion and they are always a pleasant surprise. I visited a small Christian bookstore a little while back....just thrilled to see such a thing.....and I was determined to buy something to support the store. I related this in a post a few weeks ago. I saw John Guest's name as the author....and the book was a commentary on Jeremiah....and it was published in 1988....OK....I might get a thing or two out of it.....so I bought it. Well....it's rather extraordinary rather than just good! I'm recommending it not only because it is excellent....and very readable....but because we need more than a primer on Jeremiah today.....because he as much as or more than any of the prophets is speaking directly to us! You wouldn't be reading this book as much to find out what happened to Judah and Jerusalem....but to find out what happened to us....how we forgot God....and how we now depend upon ourselves for protection.....and what is ahead for us! This book is not still in print but it's on Amazon for $12.99....The Preacher's Commentary....Jeremiah/Lamentations....John Guest.
Addendum: So maybe your classes are done for the day....and there are a couple of hours until dinner is served.....well here's another class if you are up for it. Do you know who Martyn Lloyd Jones was. Why don't you gather up a few friends and Google....Alistair Begg, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, the Preacher. You will be glad that you did this! It might even introduce you to Alistair Begg....if you are not already familiar with him....whose ministry is at truthforlife.org.
