I don’t often watch The 700 Club. It saddens me to admit that at times, Pat Robertson annoys me. I don’t always agree with what he says so I usually choose not to tune in.
But tonight, sitting in my hotel room in Maryland, I had the TV on and the show came on and I just left it since I was on-line talking and playing around on Facebook.
There was a story that they featured tonight that drew my attention almost immediately because of the “teaser”. You know, when they tease a story before going to commercial? It was about a man who had been shot point blank in the heart, and lived.
My immediate reaction to that was “wow!” and when it came back on and the story began, I was riveted. His story was good, and despite the obvious being shot in the heart and living thing, not really all that shocking in today’s day and age. But the story impacted me rather hard. God does that to me sometimes. He will show me something on purpose that gets my brain firing. So despite the fact I was sitting here falling asleep, I felt like I had taken a snack upside my “badly in need of a haircut” head. Once that happened, writing about it was a forgone conclusion.
Anyone who is a Christian will not deny God’s supernatural power. The Bible is, after all, full of stories of big time miracles that showcase just how powerful He can be. He created the heavens and the earth, He created man and all the creatures of the earth, He destroyed entire cities, He rescued people from impossible situations, He healed people from the impossible, just to name a few. At time He has been a jealous God, a loving God, but at all times He has been an All Powerful God.
Which brings me to the point of this entry. With all the miracles that God performed, all the Miracles that Jesus performed, some of us have gotten the impression that God isn’t in the Big Time Miracle business anymore. If you think that, then how wrong you are my friend!
First of all, we should never try to guess what God’s motives are. There simply is just no way a mere human can comprehend what He does. God isn’t human, and His ways aren’t human. He completely understands the human condition, since He created us after all, but human He is not. In today’s world, with all of it’s varying degrees of misery and pain, it’s easy to wonder where God is. To say, “how come God isn’t doing (this) and (that)?”
Well there is one man who didn’t have to ask that question. Meet Mr. Johnny Whittington and his story is one of faith and miracles.
Mr. Whittington was always drawn to instruments with strings. The son of a preacher, he began playing gospel music professionally at age 15. When he was 18, he joined a country band called Whiskey River that played venues he wasn’t used to. Sad to say, he got into drugs and alcohol then fell away from a Christian life. His father kept praying for him however, and told him “you can go as far as you want to and travel this earth, but you will never outrun my prayers”. Eventually, this man became a drug dealer. He was pretty far gone, as they say.
He got a gig to play at the Grand Ole Opry and he had hoped this was going to be a turning point for him. His marriage and recently failed and things were not as he had hoped. But a drug deal gone bad left him a victim.
He was shot at point blank range. The bullet went through his heart, then ricocheted to hit his lung, liver and spleen before exiting his body. Did you get that? THROUGH his heart. He did make it to the hospital and the Doctor’s basically gave him no chance to make it. However, after 8 hours in the OR and days in intensive care, he made it through.
There is more to this story, about how he felt God’s presence, how he fell in love with God and got back into the Bible. It’s a wonderful story. If you want to read it, click on the link:
But here is the problem. Like this man, most of us tend to live or life thinking that nothing bad is going to happen. A lot of us Christians tend to think we have a Golden Parachute. God. We want to believe that because we are Christians, we are protected from all things bad. But the truth is quite different. No one knows why, but bad things happen, and they happen to everyone, Christian or not. Jesus said it was a great mystery. How about Job? He was a man close to God, but a lot of bad things happened to him. I can assure you that Job didn’t believe in any Golden Parachute.
I guess that if we are right with God, and are lives are as close to being right as can be, and something bad happens, then we die, it’s ok. We would then be with the Lord. But truthfully, how many Christians are walking around slipping or backsliding and still hanging onto that Golden Parachute?
Don’t take chances. Make sure you life is right, make sure you are living like you’re supposed to be. Don’t be fake. Because honestly, you just never know what is going to happen in this life. It’s possible that if something bad does happen, God will take care of it, just like he did with Mr. Whittington, but why would you want to take that chance? Just because God really is still in the Big Time Miracle business, doesn’t mean you’re going to get that miracle. We don’t know God’s plans.
So take my advice, live your life to the fullest, but live it for God’s greater glory. Don’t think you have a Golden Parachute just because you are a Christian. Be careful in everything and pray without ceasing. God loves you, but his plans don’t always match ours.
Not Counting on a Golden Parachute – Kevin Riley
