Well next week is the start of my vacation.  And for those of you who go on vacation, especially camping, it takes about a week of planning; making sure all that you need to take with you is gathered, the menu planned, the gear loaded.  It again reminds me of the message from Sunday.  We need to make sure we have given God a place in our lives.  Not just lip-serve, but a real, tangible, and first place in our life.  God will not be happy in second place or given the hand-outs left over.  Make sure God is at the center of all you do.

I was talking with some pastors this morning.  And the topic we were discussing was weariness, both in ourselves and in our churches.  And to tell you the truth, I have been getting more and more weary these last few weeks.  I even put on our church’s marquee the verse from Matthew 11:28, Come you who are weary – find rest.  And I think the specific area where I personally feel the most weary is finding the right words to say.  Many times people look to me to find answers.  And to tell you the truth, I do not have all the answers.  I don’t always know what to say.  I do not know many times how to express my feelings without wondering if I will offend somebody.  Everyone has an opinion out there and in today’s culture often people have turned their opinion into facts.  And if you say anything that is different than their opinion, they are offended or put off.  We as a culture are starting to discount other people’s opinions if they are contrary to our own.  Not too long ago, differences in opinions were a good thing and by debating and considering each other’s opinions we grew in our understanding of each other without conflict or dismissal.  We allowed differences of opinions without malice or ill will toward the other person.  Now people are so polarized this does not happen often.  And yet it is so important to see where people are coming from.  See things from another perspective or viewpoint.  Otherwise we will remain in conflict with little hope in sight.

I hope you all had a wonderful Father’s day yesterday.  I just want to thank all the father figures in my life.  My two wonderful grandfathers who are now in heaven.  Dr. Biberstein, one of my professors in college who really helped guide my life during that stage.  And most importantly to my father, who has shown me love, encouragement, guidance, strength, and wisdom.  He has been there for me my whole life and I am grateful God blessed me so much by giving me such a good father.  If I give my sons half of what he gave me, they will be beyond blessed.  Thank you dad for showing me a bit of what my heavenly Father is like.

Like I said in my message, Habakkuk 3:17-18 has become one of my favorite verses down through the years.  It is ultimate trust.  It is like a wedding vow to remain faithful in sickness and in health.  It is very easy to follow God when things are going well.  When you are not struggling financially and hardships are few, blessing and praises easily flow from our lips.  But when things are tough, when we worry where our next paycheck is coming from, when bills pile up and we wonder how we can make it through, joy is not often to emotion we experience.  I have experienced several times in my life when I was unemployed and looking for jobs to support my family and I.  Those were dark times; times of crying out to God; times when I had more questions than answers.  But they need not be that way.  “Through the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, thought there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, YET I WILL REJOICE IN THE LORD, I WILL BE JOYFUL IN GOD MY SAVIOR.”  How could Habakkuk say this?  Re-read his entire book and you will find out.  And then read the last verse once more.  Habakkuk had such confidence because he followed a confident God who will take care of EVERYTHING in our lives.

Today is “Star Wars day” because of a slightly twisted line from the movie, “May the force be with you” changed to May the fourth be with you.  May 4th.  And the idea of the the line in the first place was a reliance on a mystic cosmic force that controls your destiny.  It is the same kind of thinking today.  I am not sure if any of you saw this commercial on TV yet, but it is a total pro-science/anti-God commercial about saving the world from this pandemic.  Watch it and see you if had the same reaction I had.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xl0tEfLve1U.  After watching this commercial myself, I looked over at my wife and gasped.  Science will win? Trust in science and it will succeed?  Stop putting your trust on other things (like God) because science is better?  Do not get me wrong in saying that God does not work through science.  I know many people who God has gifted with insights and wisdom in scientific ideas.  But science will not save us.  God is just as capable of confusing the research of scientists as He is of giving wisdom to cure it.  We should not think that a cosmic force or science will save us.  Only God can do that.  May the Lord be with you.

One of the key messages in Joel that I was not able to bring out in my sermon is the phrase “Day of the Lord”.  Normally when we think of the day of the Lord we think about the end time prophesies of Jesus’ return to earth and the final battle between good and evil.  But if you look carefully, Joel uses the phrase to refer to events in his own day.  So in essence we are all living in the day of the Lord.  God’s timing and order of events both now and in the future are known only to him.  We may get hints and minor details here in Joel.  But just as this swarm of locust time is unknown, sometimes we have to understand that the time of the end events are unknown.  We need to be ready.  I am sure when the end time events start to play out, we will understand more about what the Bible predicts about and every thing the Bible says will happen will happen.

Again, the week has gotten away from me.  Sorry.  We looked this week at the first of the minor prophets: Hosea.  And the message we learned from this book is that God loves us.  His love will not let us go.  However his love does not exclude punishment for sins or consequences.  The kindness of his wrath is to bring repentance and a return to his loving arms.  His true wrath will only be felt by those who refuse to return or trust in God.  We all have been given opportunities to confess our sins and we will continue to have them until we die or Jesus comes to take his children home.  Since we have no idea when either of those events will happen, do not put off this choice.  Please see the love that God has for you before that day comes when you will not be able to change your mind and you will experience what God’s wrath really is all about.