This week our hearts are heavy as leaders as we pray for those who are experiencing loss, disruption, and grief in the face of the wildfires that have ravaged our beautiful province.
In my household, we have run the full gamut of feelings. We have felt the anxiety of the alerts issued because of the Paddy’s Pond fire, concern and compassion for our friends and neighbours who are evacuating or ready to evacuate. We have felt shared grief for those who have lost property and a sense of security and home. We have also felt a deep sense of healthy pride in our spiritual and physical communities. Every pastor I have connected with in the affected regions (and beyond) has been hard at work with their church families and community partners raising resources and support to be the gospel embodied for their towns.
It was my son who got me thinking about the title question. The day after the alert was issued for our region, we sat in the living room for a time of processing our shared questions and prayerfully reading the Bible together. We were in the story of Joseph, discussing how, even though he was faithful to God throughout the story, bad things persistently happened to him. Carter expressed that he was afraid that, even though we are believers, we could experience the loss of our security, place, and possessions on a moment’s notice. He was right, of course.
The story of Joseph is the story of Israel is the story of all of us, especially at times like these. Trust in God is no guarantee of safety or security, much less prosperity. Those with an abundance (or even a sufficiency) of material possessions can easily be lulled into the subtle heresy that our trust in God entitles us to perpetual happiness and abundance. When health issues hit, or wildfires happen, relational breakdowns, or simply the everyday challenge of finding meaning in our daily routines, it exposes the reality that we all struggle with attachments.
John Mark Comer, in his “Practicing the Way” course on Rightnowmedia (which I highly recommend), says that an attachment is, “anything in addition to God that we need to be happy.” If we were to be honest, for many of us, that list could get quite long. Though undoubtedly for the Christians reading, God is the foundation of our happiness, unless we have reached an uncommon degree of sanctification, he is probably not the root of all of our happiness.
Paradoxically, our reliance on the things that we have, enjoy, or love for our happiness actually diminishes our ability to truly, selflessly, appreciate, love, and enjoy them. Please don’t hear me saying that for a Christian, processing grief over loss is not natural, beautiful, and healthy. My friend Pastor Shawn Bowers helps me at times with spiritual direction (listening to the Holy Spirit together in a focused time), and he often reminds me that it is healthy and necessary to accept and process grief. The lesson in Joseph’s story is that at the center of our being, we need to know that Christ is actually enough for us.
The Lord blessed him as a boy with favour in his family, a robe and a dream, but when those things were stripped away, God was still with him.
The Lord blessed him in captivity with favour in his master’s house, authority, prosperity, power, and a measure of freedom. When he was offered (without seeking it) what should not have been his, he rejected it. When those other things were unjustly taken from him, it was revealed that his happiness was not in them. God was still with him.
In prison, when he again was granted power, authority and freedom, though he welcomed the opportunity to bid for his freedom, he did not stake his happiness on the human influence of the cupbearer or baker. God was still with him.
When brought before Pharaoh with an interpretation for his dreams, he again insisted that the power to interpret did not reside with him – he was simply stewarding God’s gift. Even when granted power to take revenge on those who enslaved him, he instead allowed himself to be used as an instrument for their redemption. His happiness was God.
Jesus says in John 15:5, “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” Let’s find our source in the vine, Jesus, and not mistake our life in Him with the abundant gifts that often accompany our life in Him. For those who are experiencing loss at this time, let’s embody the theme of Reunion and, like Joseph, share generously from the gifts we are blessed to steward.
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