Day 352

Ezra 2:68-4:5, Revelation 9:13-10:11, Proverbs 30:24-33

One thing that I have become sure of quite recently is that when good things happen for God, there is opposition round the corner. The people rebuilding the temple found the same thing happened to them. It must have been a momentous occasion when Cyrus told them they could go and work on the temple, the spiritual home of the Jewish people. In destruction the temple was a source of pain, and then they are told they can go back. A time of utter joy.

Half way through though and the dissension begins, there is trouble in the ranks. The church today is not immune to this, there are regularly disagreements over sometimes the pettiest things, and you often find that the disagreements seem worse when there is good Kingdom activity on the go. The devil really does like to stick his oar in when he can.

As an aside to this Proverbs tells us of some things that are very small and yet very wise, affirming the adage that the best things come in small packages. When we remember how small we are, when we consider God and the realms of heaven and earth and see our place in that. When we see how small the church (globally) is in comparison to the whole of heaven and earth and we see how small our church and what we do in the church is compared to all of that, we remember that we are not that big. And yet sometimes the best things come in small packages.

When things don’t seem to be going that great, when there appears to be opposition and we are losing our way a bit, it does no harm to remember our place. Remember how small we are and yet how big God is. And when things are back in the perspective of a big God, we can perhaps continue in his strength, because it is his strength that can overcome all challenges.