Challenges by Susan L.

  Last night we began a new study on the book of Revelation. It's the third week but we've been trying a couple of different studies until we found one that helps make the book connect to our present circumstances. I confess it's a struggle for me. The biggest challenge is becoming excited about Christ's return. It's a future thing and my life is such a moment to moment embracing of the now that it's hard to imagine a tomorrow.
  That, and it's like speaking a foreign language; talking or imagining what the future might hold.
  Is my reluctance to think about the future because I am afraid? Afraid of what?
  Rug pulling. Forgive me Lord but I live with an expectancy of disappointment. It's easier not to get my hopes up. It's more than having been let down by others, it's that I've let myself down, too. We do live in a broken world with broken people. May God's grace save us from ourselves.
  I think I also need to stop thinking of goals as ghouls.
  There is one future tense passage in the scriptures, not sure exactly where it is, that has helped me get through some really tough days. The one where, one day, God will wipe away every tear from our eyes. There will be no more pain, nor sorrow, and the former things will pass away. There will be a time when the Lord holds me close and everything, mind and body, will be healed.
  Anxiety will vanish like the mist.
  If that's all I can hope for at the moment, I think that's a pretty good place to start.
  "Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom, thanksgiving and honour and power and might, be to our God forever and ever, Amen." Rev 7:12