By Donna Crowe
This morning as I sat in my lazy-girl-recliner, the sun shined through the little prism on the window behind me and created rainbows on the floor and across the book in my lap. I thought then about the rainbow God brought about after the flood had destroyed almost all the life on earth (Genesis 9:13).
This evening as I sat in my lazy-girl-recliner, I watched a show about the creation of some major American food products. One of these products is breakfast cereal. I’m sure you’ve heard of Kellogg’s. And how about Post? Both of these are main cereal companies in the United States. The show told about Dr. John Kellogg’s sanitarium, where he served his patients a cereal he called granola.
One day, a man named C.W. Post came to his sanitarium as a patient. Post had experienced one failure after another and as a result, he had a nervous breakdown. He was assigned a job in the kitchen, so he learned about cereals. Ultimately, he started his own cereal company.
What strikes me about these stories is how bad can be followed by good. Romans 8:28, in fact, assures us Christians that that will be the case. It reads: “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”
Nothing can hurt God’s people so badly that He can’t turn it around for the good.
Sometimes we have to look hard to see what good comes out of something bad that’s happened to us. I think sometimes of how when I was in my 40s, I was diagnosed with a chronic health condition. The medicines I have to take are so strong that they affect my energy and memory. As a result, I had to give up my teaching career.
Yet, I have found a new ministry in helping people who suffer from my or similar conditions. And I have had more time to travel and to write. Thanks be to God!
How about waking the dead?
I ordered some mint plants off the internet, scared to get out to Lowe’s with the virus still lurking around. When I received them, they were droopy and almost dead. After all, they’d gone for days while in the mail without sunshine and water.
Hopeful, I planted them in pots and drenched them with H2O. They still look peaked, but I am wishing they will recover and provide leaves for my tea and coffee.
As I think about waking the dead, I recall that this feat is a frequent theme in the Bible. For example, chapter 35:37 of the book of Ezekiel says: “Thus says the Lord God to these bones, ‘Behold, I will cause breath to enter you that you may come to life. I will put sinews on you, make flesh grow back to you, cover you with skin and put breath in you that you may come alive.’”
Similarly, Isaiah 26:19 says, “Your dead will live; Their corpses will rise. You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy.”
And in the New Testament, scriptures about the dead being raised abound. Jesus directly raised people who were dead, such as Lazarus (John 11: 38-44). Part of it states: “(Jesus) cried with a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, come forth!’ And he who had died came out bound head and foot with graveclothes” (verses 43-44).
The gospels are filled with scriptures about our being raised from the dead. One instance is Luke 20:37: “But that the dead are raised, even as Moses showed, where calls the Lord the Lord of Abraham, and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.”
Moses didn’t say God was the Lord of these men, but indicated that they still were.
And then we have all the scriptures about Jesus’ dying on the cross, so that we might have eternal life. We don’t just conk out, never to be born again.
My mint plants might not be revived, but we can rest assured that we will. Praise the Lord!
Donna Crowe is a minister’s wife. Her devotional column could not be printed last week due to space limitations, so last week’s installment appears here beneath this week’s column.
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July 08, 2020 at 10:00AM
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Can good things really follow bad times? - Spring Hope Enterprise
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