What We’re Waiting For

What We’re Waiting For
by Pastor Dan Palomino

Hope and Peace go hand in hand. That’s what Advent is all about. And oh, how we need both as we wait on the Lord! Two other elements that fit right in here are Faith and Love. Jesus came into this world to bring us hope and peace, and that we might know his love through faith in him.

Luke announces the peace that Jesus brings by quoting the messenger, the angel of the Lord: “‘For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord’…And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!’” (Luke 2:11-14)

But how can we have hope when things don’t go the way we had thought they would? How can we have hope when we are disappointed in God, when we feel like he has let us down, or when things happen in life that we don’t understand?

Jesus himself answers these questions by telling us that our ultimate hope does not come in this lifetime but in what is to come. “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” (John 14:33)

He came that we might have peace. How can we have peace in the midst of the tribulation? The same way Jesus could sleep soundly in the back of the boat while the storm raged on. Because Jesus is still with us, God is with us. That’s what we read in scripture and sing about, especially at Christmastime. Maybe that’s a problem. We tend to reflect upon the name, Emmanuel (which is a promise that means “God is with us”), mainly at this time of year. Yes, the promise is there that God is with us in the Christ child, but we have to remember that God is always with us. That’s why Jesus gave us his Holy Spirit. “Very God of very God” dwells within every person who puts their trust in him.

That’s how we can face tribulation, that’s how we can endure the storm. This is how we can have hope when we’re faced with illness, joblessness, injustice, oppression, broken relationships, hatred, loss, or even death. Peace gives us hope. Hope enables us to be at peace. God is ALWAYS with us and not just when he was here physically roaming the earth as a carpenter’s son. The very name given to him was a sign to us that God IS (not was) with us!

Jesus tells his disciples (and us), “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” (John 14:27) He tells us this right after he promises the Holy Spirit to each and every believer.

This is how we know that he loves us and how we can know his love for us. “For God so loved the world” —that is, God loved the world in such a way— “that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.” For Jesus did not come into the world to condemn the world but to save it. (John 3:16-17)

We can experience the “Peace that surpasses all understanding” (Philippians 4:7) in the midst of life’s difficulties because of the hope we have in what is to come, eternal life, when we will no longer have to face any kind of tribulation. Faith and hope go hand in hand, as well. (See Hebrews 11:1.)

The peace that Jesus promised us so long ago is not a peace that is to come, it is for now, in the midst of the tribulation that he told us we will face in this world, in this life. But there will come a time when we will no longer need faith and hope because we will be right there with the LORD, face to face, gazing upon him in all his fullness. For now, though, we need faith, hope and peace because we can only see God as in a dimly lit mirror. (1 Corinthians 13:12)

For now, we have faith, hope (peace) and love because of the birth of Jesus into the human family and the work he accomplished on the cross for which he was born. That waiting is over. The waiting we endure now is for his return. The greatest of these three (faith, hope and love) is love. Why?

Because love lasts forever, it goes on into eternity. (1 Corinthians 13:8) In the eternal realm, we will no longer need faith and hope (or peace) because our faith and hope will have come to fruition. We will revel in the glory of the perfect and everlasting love of God!

It’s worth the wait.

Links from Digital Discipleship 4/1

Pastor John mentioned several links and action items tonight (4/1/20) during Digital Discipleship.

  • Wednesday Witness, 4/6/20 Training: If you would like to take part in the 4/6/20 training, sign up here: bit.ly/FOLWedWitness
  • FOL Fight Club: If you would like to join the FOL Fight Club to help you find a partner to help you in the fight against unbelief, click here to sign up: bit.ly/FightUnbelief
  • Fighting Unbelief Resource: If you would like to read the Fighting Unbelief Resource, click here: bit.ly/FOL_FightUnbelief

Loss in the Time of Coronavirus

Loss in the Time of Coronavirus
by Matt Jenson

I’m getting married to Sarah Brown on July 24. A few weeks ago we sent out save the dates. We’re midway through the planning, with a venue locked in, Chef Mike slated to make some Korean BBQ-style street tacos and churros and ice cream. We’ve got a band and a really fun plan for the dancing. My spiritual director of ten years enthusiastically agreed to officiate. Sarah’s got a dress, too. It’s stunning, I hear—she keeps showing pictures to everyone but me.

That was our February and early March. Now, later in the month, it looks increasingly likely that large gatherings will be out-of-bounds, in late July.

We missed each other recently. Sarah was sad about what seemed to her a waste of money. I rushed in to tell her it wasn’t a waste, totally missing the point—that she was sad. She was rightly feeling the loss of this beautiful day, one that we have been moving towards for four years and, in another sense, our entire lives. “It’s not about the wedding; it’s about the marriage,” you might say. And of course, that’s true. But still… I think you get it: some events, some days, some seasons—well, they just matter.

By the mercy and power of God, ours will be a life-giving, sanctifying marriage, big wedding or no big wedding. We’ll look back on the strange, world-upsetting days of the coronavirus and tell stories of what it was like to begin our life together in the midst of a pandemic. But I bet we will still carry some sadness over the loss of that big wedding. It may not be all about the wedding, but a wedding’s not nothing.

I don’t share all of this to elicit pity. We’re already brainstorming creative alternatives. We are doing well. To be perfectly honest, I’m enjoying a slower pace, the absence of bureaucracy in my life, and an empty social calendar. Instead, I share this because I bet, in fact I know, that many of you are mourning the loss of things right now, too. Seniors, in high school or college, have suddenly had their last days of school and are robbed of a chance to say good-bye, to savor the final days together, to have parties and look ahead and look back and, maybe, just maybe, finally shoot their shot.

Or you have vacation plans, plans you’ve had in place for a long time. It was the first family vacation where everyone was old enough to enjoy one another; or it was the first vacation, just the two of you, where you could leave the kids with their grandparents.

Or you had just begun forming some new friendships. You live alone. You are introverted, slow to come out of your shell; but there are these women you have started getting together with that feel like close friends, the first close friends in a long time. Now, all you can do is video chat —which is nice, but not the same. And you wonder if they’ll be too busy to remember you.

But maybe that feels like chump change from where you’re sitting today. You’ve been laid off, without notice, without two weeks of pay, without prospects of employment. You have bills due, mouths that are complaining and hungry. Your losses are tangible—money in the bank, regular work—and they affect more than just you. They affect your kids, your partner, your extended family.

Brothers and sisters, this is us in the days of coronavirus. We are losing so much. We are understandably, therefore, at a loss ourselves. Everything in me wants to add right at this point that we are not without hope—and, dear ones, we are not without hope! But sometimes we need to say one thing instead of two. Today, let that one thing be that each of us has lost something and will lose something. Too many of us will even lose someone. And the first and best response to that is not to say that everything will be fine but, like Sarah did as she considered the wedding that might not be, to be sad.

I love you, dear family. I am so sorry for your losses. Let’s look for ways to mourn our losses together, and as we do, let us live in the strange beatitude of Jesus: “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted” (Matt. 5:4).

Matt Jenson is a member of Fountain of Life Covenant Church and teaches great books in the Torrey Honors Institute at Biola University.

Encountering the Storm with Jesus

by Pastor Dan Palomino

As I was out driving around town (something I do every day to visit hospice patients in their homes or in care facilities), I was thinking about what is on everyone’s minds right now — COVID-19. I was struck by how light traffic is and began to think about those who are out and about, those who are creating long lines and emptying shelves at the grocery stores, as well as those who remain at home because their workplaces are shut down, or they’re just fearful. Regardless of what group we may fall into, there is likely some level of anxiety in most people.

The thought that came to mind and that I have been reminding myself of here and there is, “We’re all in the same boat.” I’m not sure that’s very comforting, though. Yes, I’m not alone in this and you’re not alone in this, but being in this particular “same boat” is the reason WHY our sense of normalcy has been abandoned in an effort to slow this thing down.

What IS comforting to know is that, while we are in the same boat together, Jesus is in the boat with us. This brings to mind the story in Mark 4 when the disciples are crossing the Sea of Galilee at the behest of Jesus and a terrible storm arises in which waves are crashing into the boat and the wind and waves are rocking them to and fro (vv. 35-41). Where was Jesus during all this? In the back of the boat, sound asleep. The disciples were scared to death, or rather, afraid of losing their lives, and there was Jesus, fast asleep! “Teacher, we’re all gonna die! Don’t you even care?!” Jesus awakes and tells the storm to chill: “Peace! Be still!” And there was a great calm. You can almost feel their sense of relief.

Of course, it’s amazing that Jesus tells the storm to stop storming…and it does! But I wonder, how would the story have played out if the disciples let Jesus remain asleep? What would have happened? Would they have all died in the storm? Would Jesus have awakened on his own to quell the storm? Would they have ridden out the storm and be safely delivered to the other side of the sea?

It seems that Jesus would have wanted them to tell themselves, “All will be well. We’re safe because the Lord is with us, right here in the boat. He’s so calm that he’s able to sleep through this. We’re good.” After Jesus calms the storm, he asks them, “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?” Their fear shifted from the storm to the One who calmed the storm with a word: “Peace!”

As we go through life and encounter storms, may you and I go to the Lord in prayer and be comforted and strengthened with the peace of God that surpasses all understanding (Philippians 4:4-7), knowing that, regardless of what happens, Jesus is in our boat. The God of the universe is always with us in every storm we encounter and will, one way or another, carry us safely home.