America has had too much violence and hatred spread during this past year. It has stretched our ability to handle everything that has happened in this past year and some of us have snapped! COVID, politics, the election…the list could go on and on but there is one person who is actually in control of it all whether you believe in Him or not and that is God. He has always been the One Who placed kings and Presidents in their offices and He has been behind the scenes giving them a nudge here or a suggestion where it was needed. There is also another ruler who has done these things behind the scenes and that is Satan. He has been there to counteract anything that God has tried to get done since before the flood that Noah saved his family from.

All of the things that we have had to deal with in this past year were foretold by prophets and by Jesus Himself. Maybe not word for word prophecy but in Matthew 24 Jesus said that there would be those who called evil good and good evil. There would be rumors of wars and wars and all sorts of diseases (pestilence) and quakes and other things happening in various places. Our world, not just America, has been experiencing these things for years but they seem to be growing in number and intensity just like labor pains for a woman.

What does that mean exactly? Well, when the number of labor pains begins to increase and their intensity increases it usually is a sign that the baby will be born soon. In Jesus’ prophecy it simply means that the day of His return for His Bride, the church, is getting closer to fruition. When I wrote “the church” I am not speaking of a specific church, I am speaking as Jesus did in general terms. The church in this scenario is made up of those who are watching for His return and who believe in Him for their salvation. Satan and his demons believe in the existence of Jesus and God as well, but they determined not to serve them long, long ago.

That is one of the unique qualities that all of creation doesn’t have but the angels and humanity do…we can choose to serve God and Jesus Christ the Son of God or we can choose to follow some other “path”. The problem with choosing another path is that it doesn’t lead to an eternity with God in heaven. The only pathway which allows us to walk through the gates of Heaven is by following Jesus as our Lord and Savior.

We place too much faith in our politicians and our “heroes” in sports and the movies in our society today. We follow people on Facebook and Instagram that we idolize and we have no clue who they are or anything substantial about them. We like the clothes they wear or who they are married to or even the movies that they are in and yet the people that we idolize would not be able to truly live up to their “fans” expectation or ideal of them. Just as the “ideal” husband or wife doesn’t really exist, the people that we want to dress like or even be like…don’t exist either. An ideal is just an idea with an -l attached to it.

God know you intimately because He is the One that brought your parents together so that you would be the result of their union. He knit your DNA together so He knew your personality and your abilities even before you were born and it is because of this that we can fulfill our lives in so many more ways by accepting Jesus as our Savior and work for Him in this life and into eternity. Seek Him out because if you have ever felt a tug on your heart during a sermon, He is searching for you as well.