He is the Final Authority
We are all going through the COVID-19 crisis right now. The W.H.O. calls it a pandemic. What’s a pandemic? A pandemic is a global outbreak of disease. Pandemics happen when a new virus emerges to infect people and can spread between people sustainably. Because there is little to no pre-existing immunity against the new virus, it spreads worldwide.
The virus that causes COVID-19 is infecting people and spreading easily from person-to-person. Cases have been detected in most countries worldwide and community spread is being detected in a growing number of countries. On March 11, the COVID-19 outbreak was characterized as a pandemic by the W.H.O.
This is a crisis different from what we have experienced as Americans. There are three important principles we can learn in John 11 about how to hold on in times of crisis. Yeshua gets word that his friend Lazarus is critically ill.
Much to his disciple's astonishment, Yeshua doesn't run to heal him, but stays for two days before leaving. When Yeshua arrived in Bethany, the home of Lazarus and his two sisters, He learns that Lazarus died four days earlier.
Principle 1: God's timing is perfect.
God's never early, never late, but always on time. Our timing isn't God's timing. For us, God's timing often feels like a long, desperate delay.
God's perfect timing does two things: It grows our faith as we are forced to wait and trust in God and it makes certain that He, and He alone, gets the glory and praise for pulling us through. "
My times are in Your hands ..." Psalm 31:15.[1]
At the right time, God will provide your need. At the right time, God will deliver you. At the right time, God will rescue you.
At the RIGHT time. His time!
Principle 2: God's ways are not our ways.
"For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways," says the Lord. "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts." Isaiah 55:8-9. [2]
God has eternal perspective! God is the great "I AM" who knows the past, present and future. And what do we know? Nothing really. Nothing compared to God. In our minds, Yeshua could have healed Lazarus right away. But HE wanted to stretch the faith of His disciples who after His death would be the catalysts to taking the message of Messiah to the world. They knew Yeshua had the power to heal people — but to raise a four day old corpse? Come on, that's taking faith to a whole new level. Knowing that God's ways aren't my ways means I have to put all my faith and trust in His ways. This disagrees with our natural minds. This is what we need today, right now.
Principle 3: God is always the final authority.
No matter how terrible and impossible the situation appears, how awful you feel, or how there appears to be no answer, no help, no hope, God will see you through because He and He alone is the final authority.
We put periods in our lives where God puts commas. We think it's over, period: Our marriages, our families, our jobs, our health, our futures. But God puts a comma in those places because it's not over until He says it's over.
Lazarus was dead and decaying for four days in that tomb. That's more than a period, that's an exclamation mark! But it wasn't over. God put a comma in that place. And Yeshua raises Lazarus from the dead, his organs functioning, the rotting skin is made new again.
And Yeshua will take what has died in you and me and raise it from the dead! He will see us through the crisis, not just barely surviving, but victorious. Victors, not victims. Champions, not chumps. Winners, not whiners. Stop putting periods where God puts commas!
The world may have put a period after Yeshua’s death. But God always has the last say. On the third day, sometime after midnight Saturday, God raised Yeshua from the dead and He's alive!
"O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? ... But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Yeshua the Messiah" 1 Corinthians 15:55-57 [3]
Because of Yeshua, death and the grave no longer have the last say in our lives. Yeshua has the last say. And because He lives, if we trust in Him and put our lives in His hands, we are going to live too (virus free).
Be blessed… love and hugs!
[1] Psalm 31:15, New King James Version (NKJV)
[2] Isaiah 55:8-9, New King James Version (NKJV)
[3] 1 Corinthians 15:55-57, New Living Translation (NLT)