Hello friends, welcome to Embolden. I'm Chris Shatter, an ordinary Christian living with and learning about an extraordinary God. Hello friends, welcome to day four of 30 Days of Giving Glory to God. Today's podcast is inspired by Luke 2, 14.
Glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth, peace to those on whom his favor rests. And please join me in this prayer today. Glory to you, O God, for through you I have hope and peace. The world cannot give me peace, but only unfulfilled desires and longings.
The world relies on the scene and external for their hope, but faith is through the unseen and eternal. Today, as this world spins out of control, I place my peace and hope in you, God, amen. I promise myself each day that I won't check in with the chaos of the world, and yet time again I find my fingers creeping over my keyboard to read the latest news. As a Christian and a citizen of this world, it's been difficult to find the balance of my responsibility as a quote, not yet.
By that I mean I've been saved, but not yet home with God. I long for the day to see Jesus' face and be free of this chaos, but Jesus clearly wants us doing God's good works while here on earth. John 1412 says, very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these because I'm going to the Father. So that means we have a responsibility to be good citizens of our communities, spreading God's word through deeds and words.
It means we need to know what stresses and pains our world is experiencing so we can be God's message of hope and then glorify Him. In the book of Jude, he admonishes us to take steps to help those who are new believers and not yet believers. And it's important to note the danger he warns of by getting too close to the fiery chaos of the world. In Jude 23, which says, save others by snatching them from the fire to others show mercy mixed with fear, hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh.
Did you hear that word fear? Mixed with fear? I think sometimes we Christians like to dabble in the world of chaos, thinking a little bit is okay, but each time we turn on the news or start discussing politics we should first give thanks to God for where our eternal hope lies and then proceed with a bit of Jesus' tough-long surrounding us. He let the Pharisees ignorance at times evil ways bounce off him because he knew who he belonged to and he consistently gave glory to God when speaking back into that chaos.
Friends, it's not wrong to be actively informed or involved with the goings on of this world. Jesus and the apostles jumped in with both feet to tell the world about the Father. They didn't turn away from the troubles of the world. They came to spread hope and to glorify God, but we must always remember the kingdom that's awaiting us.
I hope you enjoyed this episode of The Abolden Podcast. Be sure to follow along so you don't miss any episode and check out my blog at embolden.net.