Archive for category: LivingEd – Charlotte

Author: Thomas White | Editorial Staff, Living Church of God

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“Boy, things sure were better in the ’50s, weren’t they? People really took the Bible seriously back then, in the great Christian nations…

Sure, the Jim Crow stuff was a bit of a shame, and it was a pretty nightmarish time to be alive if you suffered from mental illness, I suppose—but seriously, weren’t the ’50s great?” 

“How ‘bout those 1700s? Those founding fathers, they knew what righteousness was. They went to church every Sunday, you know. Yes, yes, you might be hanged if you kept the Sabbath in New England, and you could usually get away with murdering someone as long as you called it a ‘duel,’ but hey—at least people didn’t watch TV so much! Weren’t the 1700s great?”

“Wow, do I ever miss Egypt. We had everything we needed—all we could eat, and since we worked it all off, we never got fat. Yeah, Pharaoh could be a bit of a hardcase, but at least the Egyptians were better than these horrible Canaanites we’re up against now. Weren’t the Egypt days great?” 

No. They weren’t.

Not from Wisdom

In his recent Assembly message, Mr. Mario Hernandez passionately warned against looking backward, longing for the way things used to be, because as soon as we do that, we’re no longer seeking first the Kingdom of God. We were created with eyes incapable of moving independently from each other, positioned at the front of our head—we can turn that head to look behind us, or we can keep it where it is and look ahead of us, but we can’t do both. Looking behind cancels out looking ahead.

Solomon had something to say about that: “Do not say, ‘Why were the earlier days better than these days?’ For it is not from wisdom that you inquire this” (Ecclesiastes 7:10, Modern English Version). I also like the simplicity in how the New Living Translation paraphrases it: “Don’t long for ‘the good old days.’ This is not wise.”

Of course, we’re all guilty of this on some level. Have you ever wished you were a blissfully ignorant ten-year-old again? I have. And it’s just as much of a mistake to think of the modern era as any better than “the earlier days,” since modern generations are definitely guilty of many atrocities that past generations were not—and Scripture is pretty clear that society is on a perpetually downward spiral (2 Timothy 3:1-5).

But do we ever catch ourselves comparing the Kingdom of God to some “enlightened” nation of history? Because that’s really quite insulting to the Kingdom, actually. Every single era of human history has belonged to Satan, and had his influence all over it—so when we look back fondly at any one of those eras, we’re essentially saying, “You know, I miss how Satan’s world used to be. His influence was once far more agreeable. It was still a world blinded by sin, but at least the sin didn’t offend me quite so much as it does now. Wasn’t spiritual Egypt great?”

Beyond All Comparison

We humans thrive on comparison. In many ways, it’s how we visualize reality, and that’s not a bad thing at all. I use analogies ad nauseam, so I certainly don’t consider myself exempt. 

But even when I’m tempted to think that the Kingdom will be “Like the garden of Eden,” I’m forgetting that “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). The “heart of man” includes the hearts of Adam and Eve. Even after experiencing harmony with God before human sin ever entered the world, they still could not even fathom the beauty of the coming Kingdom.

Tomorrow’s world is impossibly wonderful. Let’s not insult it by longing for yesterday’s.

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Thomas White was one of the onsite Living Education students for the 2018-2019 semesters. He also has a Bachelor’s Degree in English. Thomas currently works as an Editorial Assistant for the Living Church of God. According to his wife, he eats pizza in entirely the wrong way.

Author: Thomas White | Editorial Department, Living Church of God

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Raise your hand if your 2020 hasn’t gone exactly according to plan.

If typing with one hand weren’t really annoying, I’d be raising mine even as I write. Wherever we are in the world, we all had plans for this year—but thanks to humanity’s insane proclivity to eat everything it can fit in its mouth (from bats, to squirrels, to Tide Pods), the majority of those plans have now been flushed down the worldwide toilet that is COVID-19.

Mr. Rod McNair’s recent assembly, however, drew attention to the undeniable good that has come of this situation—more people seem to be taking the Scriptures seriously, for one thing, which is reason enough for just about any crisis to occur. Many are becoming more adaptable, too, and accounts of people being genuinely selfless toward one another in this time of nearly universal hardship prove that though this is definitely Satan’s world, “the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:5, The Scriptures 2009).

A Comforting Warning

And frankly, none of that good has been according to our shortsighted human plans either, which has me pondering the biblical truth that “A man’s heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps” (Proverbs 16:9). We usually read that as a warning: “Don’t treat your plans like sureties, because God’s in control, not you.” We can also read it as the humbling reminder that “You might make plans, but you’re never the one who accomplishes them—only God has that power.”

But as we know (though probably not deeply enough), “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked” (Jeremiah 17:9). So if our heart is what plans our way, what does that say about our plans?

Jeremiah 17:9 actually lends profound comfort to Proverbs 16:9. Since the heart, which we use to make our plans, is actually deceitful and wicked, this proverb ends up reassuring us, “Your plans are pretty terrible, but don’t worry—God is going to completely disrupt them. He’s the one actually directing your life.”

His Plans Are Better

In the midst of a disruption of life as hefty as what we’re all going through right now, it’s hard to imagine that our plans being so thoroughly upended is actually a good thing. But when we peruse our pasts, almost all of us can recognize times when God mercifully rescued us from our own plans. I am nowhere near where I thought I would be five years ago—and I need to thank God for that, because looking back, His blessing my life with disruption after disruption was keeping me from making a horrendous mess of it all.

Does that mean we should never make plans? Of course not. Frankly, we couldn’t stop making plans even if we tried—it’s our nature to try to manage our futures in some capacity, and if we didn’t, we’d all basically end up as human furniture. From a big-picture perspective, we all have to plan on being in God’s Kingdom, and from a little-picture perspective, we all have to plan on getting out of bed tomorrow.

But amidst of all that essential planning, let’s try to remember that for the most part, we humans aren’t very good at it—and we usually only recognize how bad our plans are in hindsight. That being so, we can take comfort in the midst of trials like this, knowing that when our plans grind to a halt, what we’re seeing is the hand of our loving Father, subtly blessing our lives with disruption.

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Thomas White was one of the onsite Living Education students for the 2018-2019 semesters. He also has a Bachelor’s Degree in English. Thomas currently works as an Editorial Assistant for the Living Church of God. According to his wife, he eats pizza in entirely the wrong way.

Author: Thomas White | Editorial Staff, Living Church of God

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We’re often told to think about the “big picture” of Christ’s return and the soon-coming eternal Kingdom of God. But when you’re young, even the small picture seems absolutely enormous.

Learning to drive a car is terrifying when you’ve previously only driven—and crashed—a Mario Kart. Getting married is unbelievably, mind-breakingly immense when the whole of your existence has been not married. Young adults doing their best to meaningfully visualize eternity will probably be about as successful as preschoolers trying to ponder the theory of relativity, and I say that as a young adult.

Mr. Phil Sena’s recent assembly—delivered via the internet, due to this virus you may have heard of—addressed how difficult it can be, as a teenager or young adult, to focus your life on the Kingdom of God while also… you know, managing all of the really important, earthly milestones young people naturally have to deal with. Because you have to finish school. You have to get a job. You’d really, really like to marry someone and have children, and then you have to make sure you don’t neglect that spouse or those children. And in the midst of all of this, you have to remember how temporary everything is—even though right now it’s legitimately quite important—so you have to keep talking to God. You have to keep pondering His ways and commands. You have to keep fasting, you have to keep spending time with the Bible, you have to keep examining yourself.

Your Part of the Picture

That really is a big picture, and it’s legitimately difficult to keep up with everything. But it’s also a tiny picture—because it’s only about you. When you’re trying really hard not to make a physical mess of your life, and doing your best not to make a spiritual mess of it, either, it can be all too easy to miss the fact that you’re just one person. Yes, God cares so very deeply about you, and you should never, ever forget that, but even your eternity is just one eternity. 

You know what’s bigger than an eternity? Read the title again.

According to that nifty little internet we’re all using to maintain some semblance of normality these days, it’s estimated that around 100 billion people have lived on Earth up to this point. And hey, you’re one of them! Congratulations. That means the Kingdom of God is 0.000000001 percent about you. That’s how big a part of the picture your one eternity is.

Their Part

As Mr. Sena profoundly emphasized, the world needs God’s Kingdom. It’s about so much more than your personal salvation or mine, and it’s even about so much more than the collective saints of God being transformed in the first resurrection. It’s about rescuing everyone in the entire history of the world. It’s about redeeming not just our time, but the whole of time itself. It’s about one hundred billion eternities.

That’s a big picture. And if our first thought of the Kingdom is usually, “Oh boy, I sure hope I make it there,” we’re forgetting 99.999999999 percent of that picture. We should never stop striving to enter God’s Family, because that’s literally the entire point of human existence (Ecclesiastes 12:13), but when we’re trying to think of the big picture, let’s at least remind ourselves that the vast majority of that picture isn’t about us—and let’s thank God for the fact that regardless of any one of us, the Kingdom will come, creating an unfathomably joyful universe of one hundred billion eternities. 

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Thomas White was one of the onsite Living Education students for the 2018-2019 semesters. He also has a Bachelor’s Degree in English. Thomas currently works as an Editorial Assistant for the Living Church of God. According to his wife, he eats pizza in entirely the wrong way.