A REAL LIFE LOVE STORY
Living Stones Series: First Published in All Around Old Bridge Publication – February 2020, Pastor Lloyd Pulley
Heart shaped boxes of candy line the shelves of local drugstores. Commercials promise that a "diamond is forever." Magazines proclaim the mantra of a "me" generation in, "Love Yourself." Valentine's Day is this month and you probably expect me to write about love and I will, but it may not be what you are expecting.
When you google "great love stories" you get: Romeo & Juliet, Helen of Troy and her lover Paris, Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn (a love that ended with a beheading) and other tales of love and loss. I won't bore you with a story of lovers reconnecting and living happily ever after. These offerings from Hollywood tug at the the heart strings, but can't capture the depth of real love that this pastor feels compelled to address from the pages of the Bible.
The greatest love story ever told is found in the Bible. Man and woman created in perfection and placed in a garden of exquisite beauty to enjoy their creator God; but enticed by a clever lie they broke the connection to the creator of life and were expelled from His presence unto millenniums of pain and sorrow. With love so profound and sacrificial, the very Son of God offered himself to death for the hateful, murderous and selfish descendants of this couple. This true love story of Jesus and what He did for us two thousand years ago doesn't end there. That's a new beginning and I want to tell you how this story ends.
Almost a third of the Bible is prophecy and this unique signature verifies the message has come from the creator, who dwells outside of time and space. He can describe future events as easily as He can record the past. And He has shown us a picture of what it will be like as we get close to the end of the story. In fact, many wonder how close we may be to this love story's climax.
Have you noticed that just a few weeks into 2020 there have been earthquakes in Puerto Rico, Mexico and Indonesia, historic fires decimating Australia, volcanic eruptions in Peru, Mexico, Ecuador, Guatemala and the Philippines. There is intense political angst in the Middle East and the political climate of the world has deteriorated into near revolution, even in our nation. You may think it's not unusual or that we've always experienced these things. But why is everything happening so frequently and intensely?
The Bible predicts the story will end with a cleansing of this old earth, before a glorious and joyous new world comes. In the book of Matthew, Jesus tells his disciples what's to come: "Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows." The word for sorrows is labor pangs, as a pregnant woman experiences as the birth of her child nears. Many who read the Bible wonder if we're seeing these "birth pangs" as we observe global intensity of geopolitical tensions, chaos and catastrophes.
Some feel it's too vague to tell for certain, but one clear geopolitical item many have observed is the return of the Jewish people to a reestablished nation of Israel; and the transformation of a once deserted, swamp-filled wasteland into a productive and beautiful land. This biblical prophecy was ignored and mocked for centuries until actualized in our generation, even as predicted among the hatred of nations. Many betting the Bible is just a collection of stories should know that it's predicted that in the latter days, Jerusalem would rise to be a huge concern for the whole world and as unbelievable as this 2400-year-old prophecy was, here we are.
No one knows how long it will take, but we know there is new birth coming. If you think talk of our nation or the world ending is exaggeration consider former world empires such as Babylon, Egypt, Greece, Rome? Where are they now? They are ruins we visit on vacation.
As frightening as it seems, this love story ends with ultimate joy. Jesus first came sacrificially and will return with authority to judge this world and create what was meant to be. And God has shown incredible patience, sending out ambassadors with terms of peace offering the gospel to this rebellious world for two thousand years. But time will come when He'll call his ambassadors home and those who've rejected the gospel (his gracious offer of life through his Son's sacrifice) will be punished and removed. Then the wonderful love story will continue forever.
If you wish you could foresee the future, pick up the Bible and read what it says. There's not some esoteric coded language to figure out. God says it happened and it happened. Bible prophecy is being fulfilled in our generation. And the way to be on the right side of history is to trust in Him.
“I am the way the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:16