It's Hard to Hear with all the Shouting

   So I am the Pastor at New Holland United Methodist Church and also at Honey Brook United Methodist Church.   While we are meeting again for Sunday worship at both services, quite a few of the members of our church families are reluctant to attend (understandably) so we are also attempting to have more of on online ministry. (our worship services and Vacation Bible School are all available at the church Facebook pages).  I hope and pray that somebody finds this humble blog to be helpful too as we wonder in the wilderness.

    I was watching the news the other day (I tend to go back and forth between CNN and Fox news...that way, I know what everyone does not like)...someone was saying that the problem is that the national news organizations are not reporting the "good news" regarding the Covid-19 situation in our country.  Now I am not trying to start an argument here...I imagine we all have our own ideas about how "good" the news actually is but that got me thinking...how do even know when something is "good news?"  

   Well the gist, the whole point, of the Bible...God's Word to us....is that it is "Good news."  God has real good news for us.  In fact, it is incredibly amazing good news.  Goes something like this......

-God knows you.  This might not sound like much but think about it.  How many people are alive today?  I do not know but in the billions right.  How many people have lived prior to today?  Again, plenty.  How many will live at some point in the future?  The number keeps increasing.  And God knows each of us by name!  In fact, God knows everything about us...all that we have ever done or said or thought.  All of our dreams and fears.  Our triumphs and failures.  Our secrets and our hiding places.

-Maybe that does not sound so good yet...sounds like God is some type of cosmic stalker.  Well there is more.  God knows you and He Loves You!  In fact, we could say in spite of the fact that He knows everything about you..God still loves you.  I watched a tv show...the guy is going on a first date and he is nervous about it and his friends are giving him advice on how he should act in order to convince the girl to like him.  Maybe he did like him but he was hoping she would like him like him.  He asks his friends, "should I just be myself?"  Of course they all say, "NO!!!  That is the worst thing you could do"  It was meant to be funny and it did make me laugh but back to the good news...with God, we already ARE ourselves even if we try not to be but guess what.  he still loves us. 

-In fact, God loves us so much, He reaches out to us so that we can have a relationship with Him, hoping that we will respond.  

Here's the thing though.  God generally does not shout.  Now and again, the Bible tells us about times when God "thundered" to get everyone's attention and we also read about a time that is coming when God will be impossible to ignore but generally He speaks softly.  He calls us but then waits for our response.  It is easy for the voice of God, or the call of God or even the love of God to be drowned out by all of the noise and distraction of our lives and the world around us.

I'll be posting again but for now the prayer is simple....listen for the One who knows you better and loves you more than any other.  Do not settle for less