Meeting Crises 10/8/44
Scripture: Matthew 25: 1-13
Text: II Peter 3: 8; “But forget not the one thing, beloved, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.”
Fifteen or twenty years ago, there was a theory abroad that we human beings, and especially we of this country, had discovered how to keep permanent prosperity. Existence henceforth was to be progressively rosier, more secure and more comfortable. Man’s painful trial and error, and trouble, and trial again was safely passed. All we had to do was to apply an even effort and happiness and success were bound to be ours! We, in this country, had seen what seemed to our short-memoried minds, as gradual, steady improvement in living conditions and we looked for that to continue indefinitely. We forgot the long view of history. We were so preoccupied with material comfort that we forgot the moral order.
We placed our faith in statistical sheets which showed rising curves. We began to be doubtful if God had anything to do with it after all - it was so simple once man had learned to understand it! With an abundance of smart leaders we could run our own world, for we were all smart enough to get along.
And after all, religion and character and reverence and faith and perhaps even honor were not to be demonstrated by scientific measurement. Who was to know whether they were realities of existence or mere human states of mind? Get into the swim of living and grab your share of prosperity and pleasure as it goes by. Such was a popular attitude.
So we saw a great increase in the philosophy (or lack of philosophy) which we call materialism; an increase in agnosticism. We were not certain where we were going, but we were confidently and merrily on our way.
Then came the economic depression; the financial world reeled and staggered, business and industry whistled to keep up courage, then became alarmed, and we all hunted for the storm cellar. The whole country, as one year of depression was followed by another, began to look down the grade, first with irritation, then with alarm, and finally with some determination to do something about what threatened to be ruin.
There was the disillusioned feeling that we were after all on the wrong trail! We were not going to make this world over into a careless man’s heaven! Perhaps life’s issues were still in the hands of a Power greater than man’s. Perhaps faith and courage and honor and the sweat of the brow and even prayer were necessary after all.
We had thought we knew all about evolution. Yes, our destiny was evolving just like the steady sure growth of a tree! But we found out that our evolution, like all evolution, is full of crises, and that life now as throughout all of our evolution, is determined by what we do in a crisis. Even a healthy, growing tree can be attacked by disease, and by storm against which it can only struggle.
The very history of evolution is full of these two things: (1) the failure and extinction of those organisms that could not adjust themselves to changed conditions of living, and (2) the survival and success of those forms of life which could and did adapt themselves to different surroundings.
Real life has seldom been like a steadily growing garden tree, an even, smooth-flowing stream, or a straight road with no sharp corners. Real life is full of winds, of rapids, of corners. And he who survives and grows is he who is so prepared that he has the stuff to meet the crises.
Birth is a crisis. Death is a crisis. And in all of life between these two, we constantly meet moments when our decisions will determine the whole direction of our lives - and perhaps the lives of others!
In the Book of Second Peter, in the New Testament, are these words: “But forget not this one thing, beloved, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” You see it is stated both ways. We have been accustomed to the latter way of phrasing it - a thousand years as one day. And we say, “God has plenty of time; so have I.” But we forget that “one day may be as a thousand years.” The days of a man’s life are not all equal; the decisions and events of one day may remake history for a thousand years!
(1) Of course this is true in individual lives. There are critical opportunities, decisions, troubles that come upon us when we do not expect them. And the way we meet them matters greatly!
Dr. Frederick Norwood, some years ago minister at the City Temple in London, is known as an important man all over the world. But some years ago he was known only to a little group of Australian friends. His chance for broad service came suddenly, and unexpectedly, during the first world war, when he was given an opportunity to make a certain brief address. He told Dr. Fosdick that he put his whole soul into that address.
There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.” [Shakespeare]
For some time it was argued that the day of examinations should be over in schools. Well, from the standpoint of just giving grades as measurements, perhaps. But I am not so sure about it from the standpoint of the student’s development. A person is going to face examinations and tests all his life. The only difference is that you know when many of the tests will come in school, and you seldom know just when they will come the rest of your life! In all of life, opportunity suddenly steps to your door with a test and leaves you passed or flunked! And I’m not sure that life passes one on a grade of 70!
(2) Again, personal life is full not only of critical opportunities but of critical decisions. A man named Saul had held the coats and watched the garments of those who stoned to death another man named Stephen. Apparently the incident didn’t phase him. [Acts 7: 56-60]. In fact he approved it. [Acts 8: 1]. But the accumulated doubt as to the rightness of this persecution finally forced him to decide what he would do about it one day while he was on the road to Damascus. And he became a Christian, changed his name to Paul, and spread the gospel in organized fashion all over the Roman world.
[Acts 9: 3-9]. There are people here, now, whose whole life during the coming years depends on whether or not something happens in them!
A man said, “Why doesn’t so-and-so rise higher in our company? He seems faithful, dependable, and clean cut in his work.” Came the manager’s reply: “He is a good man, and I can depend on him to do what he is told to do. But he had never learned to make an important decision. As long as I can tell him what to do he gets along fine. But I can’t entrust any heavy responsibility to him in his department while I attend to other matters.”
Can’t make decisions! So opportunity passes him by! One day as a thousand years!
(3) Again, personal living is filled with critical temptations. And here the only motto is “be prepared!” One of the most tragic things in the world is to see a man or woman who has been overcome by some sudden and unexpected temptation. He never meant to do that! He never supposed he could do that. He can hardly believe now that he has done it. One day, as his life ran along smoothly and serenely, a sudden and unforeseen temptation knocked at his door and he let it in! He will always be scarred by the consequence. One day as a thousand years!
During the years when he should have prepared himself and guarded himself against unforeseen corruption, he had neglected to build his foundations and had become “like unto a foolish man, who built his house upon the sand; and the rain descended and the floods came and the winds blew and smote upon that house and it fell and great was the fall thereof.” [Matthew 7: 26-27]. [value of church attendance.]
Alas for the man who runs his moral life without taking the unexpected into account! This is also true when trouble comes. Yesterday all went well, but today troubles came with no announcement of their coming.
Jesus and Judas went together to the tremendous strain of the last week in Jerusalem. Jesus was ready. Judas was not, and he did a thing which so stunned and amazed himself that he went out in despair and hanged himself.
Here is a call for preparedness. “Take up the whole armor of God that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and, having done all, to stand.”
You see this is a world where crises walk up to every man’s door. We are intended to deal with crises, to sharpen our faith on them, to make good use of them. A great crisis is a great opportunity, but it takes faith and character to meet the challenge.
Now perhaps we are a little confused, even panic-stricken, as to how to meet the important, unexpected incidents which come our way. How shall we prepare for any eventuality?
Well, preparedness is a long-continued process of intelligent self-discipline. But I think that all life takes on poise, meaning and direction as it is tied with God. When you become conscious of God and begin to grasp something of Him in your life, when you know that you may have to alter your course to go along with Him, but know that He will support and strengthen you in doing so, then you proceed with confidence. Imagine, for instance, one dear to you about to undergo a surgical operation following some painful accident. It is perhaps a first experience with the hospital surgery and the patient dreads the event. Suppose that, later, the doctor and nurses can say, as they did about one I know, that she was an ideal patient; that she did not scream not moan under the ether, but kept repeating over and over again, as long as she spoke, “In quietness and confidence shall be thy strength; in quietness and confidence shall be thy strength.” [Isaiah 30: 15].
Begun with God years ago, there is a life of sane, happy, wholesome Christian service with God, in the face of dangers of many sorts. The lives of so many people who have begun, and continued, with God, are like the house which a man built on something far more solid than shifting sand. “The rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not, for it was founded upon the rock.” [Matthew 7: 25].
--------------
Dates and places delivered:
Kahului Union Church, January 28, 1934
Puunene Hawaiian Church, February 25, 1934
Puunene Japanese Church, April 8, 1934
Wailuku Union Church, April 22, 1934
Wananalua Church, Hana, July 15, 1934
Pilgrim Church, Honolulu, November 12, 1936 AM
Wisconsin Rapids, October 8, 1944