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Through the FloodChaplain Ron Suarez, CTCA/Southwestern Regional Medical Center
Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built. Luke 6:47-48 I had a strange dream last night. I dreamt I was on call and was repeatedly receiving pages from someone whose life was in danger. The strange thing was that the person still wasn’t sure that he wanted me to visit him. When I finally decided to take it upon myself to go see him, I discovered a flood had come up outside, and I was unable to go and help. That was an interesting dream, because, every day, we get paged to help people who are overcome by life’s struggles. It may come in the form of a bad report; it may be in the form of financial struggles; or it may come as complications in family life. The saddest circumstances we attend are those where people have no foundation. In many of these situations, the patient is totally unprepared to engage in the current battle. We see people every day who profess Christ, yet receive no regular nourishment of the Word through sound preaching and doctrine. They don’t have the spiritual support that comes from being active in a local church; they haven’t acquired the habit of renewing their minds daily in the Bible, and don’t have a time of quiet prayer. Consequently, they’re swept away by emotion, tossed about by their circumstance, and scoured by the howling winds of despair. They are helpless, because they have no anchor or foundation to sustain them. Gen 7:5 And Noah did all that the LORD had commanded him. Now I don’t say any of this from a condemning or arrogant spirit. My desire is that people who profess Christ do the things necessary in the good times, so they’ll have what they need when things go south. Having a firm foundation, however, doesn’t just come to us without any planning or effort on our behalf. The fact is that God has ordained means as the power to sustain us: hearing the Word preached, fellowshipping with other Christians, prayer, Scripture reading and memorization, and many others. As one of my professors stated, “You can’t expect to get hit by a truck while you’re sitting in a classroom, you have to get out in traffic if you want to be hit by a truck.” The fact is that no one can help you, if you don’t take advantage of the means God gives you for salvation. Noah prepared the ark as the means of salvation for the people in his day. He built the ark and preached the impending destruction as the means of salvation for himself, his family, and his neighbors. Noah couldn’t help those who rejected his help. That is what I saw in my dream. Chaplains can’t help those who refuse to take hold of means that God has given people for salvation. The problem is it takes ten times more energy to build these foundations when someone finally takes hold of them in the midst of the storm. If you find yourself in this situation, however, don’t give up. Do what you can. Be obedient to what God places on your heart. Have a friend read Scripture to you if you’re not able to read; even if you can’t concentrate on the words. Find someone to pray for you and with you. And then seek out those foundations, those “Means of Grace” when you are able. Gen 7:7 And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons' wives with him went into the ark to escape the waters of the flood. The ark, rather then Noah’s obedience, is what ultimately saved Noah and his family. Noah’s obedience didn’t carry him above the wave. His preaching did not float him across the angry waves. Looking back, we can see that that ark was Jesus. Jesus is the ark of our salvation. He is the one who carries us above the flood. Jesus is the foundation that keeps our house from destruction. Isa 43:2 When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. When I read this passage my mind cannot help but think of Christian in John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress. Christian had left the City of Destruction to follow the pilgrim’s path. God had sustained Christian when he had been held captive at the Giant Despair’s castle, traversed the Valley of Humiliation, fought with Apollyon. Now he stood at the Jordan and across the way stood the Celestial City. On each of its gleaming white parapets flew the standard of the King. As he waded into the flood, the water rose higher and higher. Christian began to despair that he would be overtaken by the waves and, at the last moment, loose entrance to that great City on a Hill. But, alas, the river bottom, his foundation, stayed, and he waded to the other side. So it will be with us if we, like Christian, hold an invitation to hold court with the King. The flood may buffet us, but, in life and in death, it won’t overtake us. Christ will be the foundation as we cross over the Jordan. Rev 21:1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. John records in this passage that “the sea was no more” yet he said earlier, in Rev. 4:6 that he saw a sea of glass. I believe that Revelation 21.1 points to a day when suffering, pain, and evil will done away with. We will not longer have to busy ourselves preparing for the storms of life. The wind will no longer buffet us, and the rain will no longer pelt our skin. Christ, our foundation, our ark, will eternally shelter us from the flood. All o'er those wide extended plains No chilling wind nor poisonous breath When shall I see that happy place I am bound, I am bound, I am bound for the Promised Land On Jordan’s Stormy Banks I Stand |
