Weathering the Storm with a Smile: Be of Good Cheer

For the past week or so, during my daily Bible reading, I’ve been studying the Book of Acts.  I have long loved reading the Acts of the Apostles, because in my mind, it reads like a novel.  It is the story of the birth of the church, and it is packed with drama, and intrigue, near-misses and miraculous escapes.  I’ve read the 28-chapter account from beginning to end many times, and I never fail to be amazed at the courage and determination of the early church, despite their many obstacles, and in spite of those who were not content to simply let them live in peace.  On the contrary, there were those who made it their mission to discredit and destroy any hope of the gospel message to prosper.

 

My husband and I have been truly aghast of late at the blatant lies told in the media, which are utterly designed to corrupt the opinions of the masses against those who would try to do RIGHT.  The vicious attacks and outright falsehoods that are invented are done so with the intention of weaponization. In my whole lifetime, I’ve never seen such arrogance, disdain, hatred and maliciousness wielded with the intent to wholesale destroy the lives of others, without any thought to collateral damage.  In fact, there are those who think that whatever havoc their attacks might cause against anyone or their immediate family are not only deserved, but somehow, JUST.

 

It takes my breath away.

 

More than once, in my reading of Acts, I noticed that this EXACT SAME TACTIC was employed against the members of the early church.  Those who sought to silence the early church had no compunction whatsoever to invent charges, and lie freely.  They unashamedly started riots, and enflamed the emotions of the masses.  And more than once, their motivations were NOT trying to protect people from certain teachings, AS MUCH as they feared losing the cash cow of their income.  They saw that, if those they held under their influence of idolatry, or servitude, or WHATEVER were somehow loosed from their dependence upon them, their income stream would DRY UP.  Their INFLUENCE and SOURCE OF POWER would disappear.

 

They resented the deliverance of anyone whose spiritual enslavement kept them in the lifestyle to which they had gladly become accustomed.

 

Read that again.

 

This is an aside, but before you wholesale believe and accept a soundbyte, or you hear some “journalist” (and I use the term oh-so-loosely) quote another human being and you take it into your spirit as the gospel truth, you may wish to find the original video/audio recording of said quotation, and hear it in CONTEXT.  And if you consider yourself a believer, I suggest you PRAY for God to reveal Truth to you.  He absolutely can.  One of His Names is the Spirit of Truth, after all.

 

At any rate, whatever you choose to believe is between you and the Almighty.  According to the Word, we will ALL stand before Him one day, and we will understand everything.  We will know the many times we chose to believe a lie, and all of our self-justification and self-righteous indignation will matter for SQUAT.

 

But here is the real thing that I noticed this morning, and if you’ve read this far, you deserve a MEDAL.  I don’t have one to give you, but we live in a practically “virtual” society right now, so imagine me giving you your award.  During my study this morning, God laid this thought on my heart, and I want to share a word of encouragement with the Church.

 

In Acts 27, Paul is being transferred from being in the custody of the regional government to Rome, as he has appealed the circumstances of his situation to Caesar.  The trip from Caeserea to Rome was quite an undertaking, and involved a voyage by ship on the Mediterranean sea.  At the beginning of the voyage, Paul felt impressed in his spirit that the trip would be a dangerous one, and counseled the captain and his Roman centurion escort to delay the trip for a few months.  They ignored his advice, and relied on their own counsel.

 

Spoiler alert: Paul was right.  They ended up smack-dab in the middle of a storm that raged on for TWO WEEKS. 

 

What really amazed me when I re-read the story this morning was how, after Paul was promised by the angel that God saw them, and that NO ONE would perish, despite the intensity of the tempest that raged all around them—he offered them HOPE.  He encouraged them all, and got them to eat their first meal in two weeks.  But here was the part of the passage that really touched me:

 

Acts 27:33-36, NLT

Just as day was dawning, Paul urged everyone to eat. “You have been so worried that you haven’t touched food for two weeks,” he said. “Please eat something now for your own good. For not a hair of your heads will perish.” Then he took some bread, gave thanks to God before them all, and broke off a piece and ate it.  Then EVERYONE WAS ENCOURAGED and began to eat—ALL 276 OF US who were on board.

 

In the King James Version, it actually reads, “then they were ALL of GOOD CHEER.’  Can you imagine?

 

This is what hit me this morning like a ton of bricks:  THEY were ALL of GOOD CHEER—and the STORM WAS STILL RAGING!  It didn’t say that the winds subsided, or that they all made it to the relative safety of the shore, and THEN they were encouraged.  They were given—and chose to embrace—hope.  Right there, with the winds howling and the whitecaps cresting the sides of the boat, with the front of the ship run aground, and the back of the ship breaking into pieces from the violence of the waves.  They were OF GOOD CHEER.

 

Church, could we do the same?  Could we be in the center of all of this chaos and uncertainty in our society—which is as real as the waves that battered that ship—and have a lightness of spirit, and even JOY?

 

We CAN…if we keep our eyes fixed on the One who controls the wind and the waves.  The Peace Speaker, the God who is not only NOT intimidated by the surrounding hurricane swirling madly—He alone holds this in His Hands.  He’s not surprised, He’s not unsure of the next step.  HE IS ALREADY IN TOMORROW, and HE CALLS THE SHOTS. 

Romans 8:28 KJV

And we know that ALL THINGS WORK TOGETHER FOR GOOD to them that LOVE GOD, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

 

C’mon, church.  Either we believe it, or we don’t.  All means ALL.

 

I know it is uncomfortable, and even scary.  But if you fix your eyes on HIM, you really can be of GOOD CHEER.  Even now.  As crazy as that seems, in the middle of the lies, the accusations, the blatant falsehoods, and the unrest.  Be ENCOURAGED.

 

He knows exactly where we are.