All Of Our Actions...

I want to give large amounts again, but how do I put action to that faith to make it more than just an idle wish? To make it more difficult, I read a novel by a woman who lived a rather interesting life. Born a Jew, she became a Catholic. The Bolsheviks stole her family fortune in the Soviet Union, but she fled to France. She married and became a successful novelist and the mother of two children, but then the Nazis stole her life in Auschwitz. Her writing is engaging, yet the letters her husband wrote to friends and officials in an effort to gain her release from the concentration camps engage the emotions on a deeper level. Her story does not end in Auschwitz because seventy years later, I can read her work and wonder: Will all of our actions done in faith come to nothing?

Why does God allow the powers of the world to overcome those who believe in His Son? I do not know the answer to that, but I have faith that this life we see is not the end of the story. Revelation does not end with the Antichrist, and Genesis is but the beginning of the Christ story. The description of Eden, paradise on Earth if you will, is only a tiny part of the first book of 66 found in the Bible. After that, everyone suffers and dies while their actions come to nothing. Wow, if that's all I can see in the Bible, I probably should just give it up right now.

The problem is in thinking that my actions have to mean something or last for posterity or somehow change the world for the better. If we could ask David, Abraham, Paul, Isaiah, John, and the many other heroes of the faith what their actions meant to history, one and all would correct us in thinking that the credit belongs to him. Each man offered his action to the Lord, often with reluctance, and God did the big, wonderful works that we read of in the old stories. All of our actions are but offerings to God that He can use for great works. God writes the end of this story, and our respective parts in it may seem to have accomplished little or nothing. As the boy brought his small offering to the Lord, the disciples asked "What is that among so many?" That is the question we might ask as we struggle through each day, but the answer is the same: Watch Jesus and you will see!

Bucky