1 Peter 4:19 “So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.”
The Battle of France in WWII had been lost. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill knew England would be the next target in Hitler’s relentless pursuit. The stakes couldn’t have been higher. Churchill believed if England failed, the whole world would enter into a sinister era of darkness. So he called upon his fellow citizens to stand firm in duty. Anticipating the inevitable bombs that would explode in London streets, Churchill forewarned the people to brace themselves so that in years to come, men would look back at England in this time of turmoil and mayhem and say, “This was their finest hour.”
I’ve been thinking lately about the “bombs” that burst in our emotional landscape. Clear out your desk by noon. I’m leaving you. Your teenage daughter is pregnant. You have stage-four cancer. The most insidious bombs seem to be the ones we’re not expecting. One minute life feels safe, secure. The next minute we find ourselves desperately aching to turn back the hands of time. We weren’t prepared to have our faith torpedoed in an instant.
Perhaps we could face the “bombs” more bravely if we weren’t caught off guard, if we remembered we live in a fallen world—a world as it were, under siege. We face a foe who thrives on using our weak flesh against us and against each other to wreak as much destruction as he possibly can.
Perhaps we could face the “bombs” more bravely if we remembered who and Whose we are. We belong to One who is stronger and greater than any of the enemy’s schemes, a Redeemer who is able to turn all things into good. One writer has remarked that God “never wastes his children’s pain.” Embedded in our troubles we find the call to something higher, something bigger, something like Him.
So remember that the bombs exploding in your life today—or tomorrow— don’t signify the end. How you respond will be recorded in eternity. I pray that it will be said of you and of me, “This was their finest hour.”