THAT BELIEVING .....
Posted by: henkf <henkf@...>
THAT BELIEVING YE MIGHT HAVE LIFE
John 20:19-31
In 1974 a young scientist named Stephen Hawking made a dramatic presentation to a group of elite physicists at Oxford University in England. When he finished, the moderator of the session blurted out, "Oh, this is rubbish."
Physicists `prove' the size, shape, and workings of the universe by mathematics. Everybody has heard about Albert Einstein and his theory of General Relativity which attempts to prove that light travelling through a field of gravitation is slightly distorted. Einstein knew from his equations that there was another force somewhere in the universe which had to be identified before we could completely understand the wonderful and vast arena of space in which we live. He laboured for the last 30 years of his life trying to link his General Relativity and this unknown force into a new theory, which he called Unified Field Theory. He never succeeded.
This is where Stephen Hawking comes into the picture. Through a long and complicated series of equations, he suggested that Black Holes, which are burned out hulks of dead and collapsed stars, were Einstein's unknown and mysterious force. Hawking was only 32 years old when he gave his presentation at Oxford. It was necessary to make slides of Hawking's equations and project them on a screen because his speech was unintelligible. It was necessary for an assistant to stand by the screen with a pointer to direct the audience to key points because Hawking could neither stand nor walk. Answers to questions had to be written out by an interpreter because he could not write himself.
Hawking has been rendered almost totally helpless by a neurological disease called ALS, which is better known as "Lou Gehrig's disease." And yet Stephen Hawking is considered by many of his peers to be the most brilliant physicist since Einstein.
His early academic career was undistinguished, to say the least. He loafed through college and failed the entrance test to graduate school. Given a second chance through an oral exam, one of his professors remembers that "The examiners were intelligent enough to realize that they were talking to someone more intelligent than they were--he was admitted to graduate school."
The rest of the story is history. Hawking could have quit because the going was too tough--but he didn't. He could have left the months and years of mental drudgery to others--but he didn't. He could have wallowed in self-pity--but he didn't.
Today Stephen Hawking's work isn't considered rubbish. His brave presentation to a skeptical body of physicists thirty years ago was the beginning of a new understanding of our vast and majestic universe. (Bill McCartey in THE KNOXVILLE JOURNAL. )
Unable to stand or walk, or speak except through a computerized translator, Stephen Hawking is still alive today, intellectually and emotionally. What a grand example of the power of the human spirit to be victorious over the weakness of frail flesh. Add the right attitude to the right aptitude and you have a winner. But where do you get the right attitude? As John writes in the last verse of the 20th chapter of his Gospel: ". . . these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God; and that believing ye might have life through His name."
There is the secret of life--believing that Jesus is the Christ. Believing that He is Lord of this world. Believing that He can give you victory over every circumstance. How does faith in Christ give us such victories?
FIRST OF ALL, HE CAN TURN OUR PAIN INTO A PEARL.
There's an old legend out of the Middle East in which a Sultan had his Grand Scribe compile a history of the human race. The scribe toiled for ten years, and when the task was finally accomplished he went to the Sultan with 100 donkeys loaded down with 500 volumes of historic lore. When the Sultan saw this mountain of material, he was very displeased: he wanted something more accessible. So he told the historian to reduce the amount of material. So the scholar went back to work, and in a year he came back to the sultan with ten volumes of revised history. It was still too much for the sultan to read. He told the historian that he wanted to be able to read the work in one afternoon. The scholar then went off into a corner of the throne room and scribbled something onto a sheet of paper. Then he returned and handed it to the sultan, who read these words: `They were born; they suffered; they died.' (Louis H. Valbracht, MATTERS OF LIFE AND DEATH, (Lima, Ohio: C.S.S. Publishing Co. Inc. 1973), p. 47. )
They were born; they suffered; and they died. Is that the whole story? I would think not. Remember how Peter Marshall put it many years ago in MR. JONES, MEET THE MASTER? He said: "I think the Christian treatment of trouble is splendidly illustrated by the oyster, into whose shell one day there comes a tiny grain of sand. By some strange circumstance, this tiny piece of quartz has entered into the shell of the oyster and there, like an alien thing, an intruder, a cruel, unfeeling catastrophe, imposes pain, distress, and presents a very real problem. What shall the oyster do? There is no point in trying to deny the reality that tortures every nerve, so the oyster doesn't try. In spite of all the denial, nothing can change the fact that the grain of sand is there. Nor would grumbling or rebelling do any good, for after all the protests and complaints, the grain of sand would still be there. No, the oyster recognizes the presence of the grim intruder, and right away begins to do something. Slowly and patiently, with infinite care, the oyster builds upon the grain of sand--layer upon layer of a plastic, milky substance that covers each sharp corner and coats every cutting edge . . . and gradually . . . slowly . . . by and by a pearl is made . . . a thing of wondrous beauty wrapped around trouble. The oyster has learned--by the will of God--to turn grains of sand into pearls, cruel misfortunes into blessings . . . pain and distress into beauty." (Peter Marshall, MR. JONES, MEET THE MASTER, (New York: Fleming H. Revell, Co. 1949), pp. 172-174. )
Yes, Christ can help you turn your pain into a pearl. But that's not all.
HE CAN HELP YOU TURN YOUR PROBLEMS INTO POSSIBILITIES.
Do you remember, in the book of Numbers, when the children of Israel had finally made it to the Land of Promise? God had delivered them from slavery, destroyed the armies of Pharaoh and opened the Red Sea before them. He brought them across the wilderness and made sure they were fed and had plenty to drink. He led them with a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. He led them all the way to the edge Promised Land and said, "There. Go take it for yourselves. It is yours!"
But first they sent a dozen spies in to check out the land. Ten of them came back and said, "They are giants! And we are so small! We are like grasshoppers compared to them." They caused all the people to tremble in fear. And because of their fear they went back into the wilderness for 38 years. They had to wander there until every last one of the original group had died before returning to claim the Promised Land.
Far too often we look only at the problems--and not to the great Problem-Solver who stands there with us! Nothing is beyond him, and yet we focus on the problem. We focus on the giants infesting the land, and fear takes over. We forget this great God who has helped us through the desert; this God who stands with us as a pillar of fire; this God who says you can do it. He will give us the victory!
Sir Alexander Fleming won the Nobel Prize for medicine when he discovered penicillin. But his discovery was an accident. He was a very positive, forward-looking person who one day happened to notice that the fungus on a certain glass plate had died when it came into contact with some mold that was on the same plate. Out of curiosity, he took a bit of the mold and cultured it for further study. Now most people would just wash off mold. We usually don't see much good coming from mold that we find. But not Fleming! One observer commented that what impressed him about Fleming was that he immediately acted on his observation. Most of us, when we see something unusual, merely say `that's interesting' and do nothing about it. We need to let God show us how to see the world's difficulties, so that we might know what we can do about them. Yes, He can help us turn our pain into a pearl. He can help us turn our problems into possibilities.
HE CAN TAKE OUR FAILURES AND TURN THEM INTO STEPPING STONES TOWARDS A GLORIOUS FUTURE.
That is what the cross and the empty tomb are all about. The early disciples knew that the resurrection that really mattered took place not only in the garden that first Easter morning, but in their own dejected hearts in the days that followed. There we see Thomas with his doubt and Peter with his denial. They had failed. They had been afraid. They had forsaken Christ when He needed them most. But God will not allow His people to be failures. Christ came to them, and he began a reconstruction project in their minds and souls. And out of the ashes of their failures would come the most dynamic company of men and women the world has ever known.
My friends, God can do that with your life as well. Sure, you've had your failures. Everybody who has ever accomplished anything knows what it is to fail. As Josiah G. Holland has written:
Heaven is not reached at a single bound;
But we build the ladder by which we rise
From the lowly earth to the vaulted skies,
And we mount to its summit round by round.
When Nathaniel Hawthorne lost his position at the Customs House at Salem, Massachusetts, he came home completely dejected. He told his wife that he was a complete failure, and wasn't good for anything. But his wife astonished him by being delighted with the news. She told him that it was a perfect opportunity to work on the book he had wanted to write. So that's what he did. He wrote THE SCARLET LETTER, which is still considered to be one of the greatest novels ever written. Similarly, Whistler failed at West Point. And after he was dropped there, he half-heartedly tried his hand at engineering. And then, finally, he tried painting, with the success that is well known. And then there's Phillips Brooks, the noted Episcopal minister who died in the 1890's. He had wanted to be a teacher and had prepared himself for that profession extensively. However, he was so consistent in his failures in that field that he became despondent. Finally he gave up and he prepared himself for the ministry, and that's where he made his success. (Ilion T. Jones, GOD’S EVERLASTING "YES", (Waco: Word Books, 1969, p. 103.)
No one can promise us that we will one day win the world's acclaim, but deep in our hearts there can be a source of calm and well-spring of joy and peace, if we give ourselves to God.
He can turn our pain into a pearl.
He can turn our problems into possibilities.
He can turn our failures into stepping stones to a glorious future.
"But these are written, that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through His name."
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