Times of Difficulty

Luke 12:57-59

If we are living in a culture and time as the apostle Paul is addressing in his letter to Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:1-5, (“But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people.”)  What would be a common thing among such people; pride and where will pride take you, and the answer is into conflict. 

As a follower of Christ, what two groups seem to get a lot of Jesus’ attention, was it not the religious leaders and the lawyers?  So maybe it’s not all that bad when I confess lawyers get to me when they come on television and tell us they are the answer to all of our problems.  To have a war, you must have someone who feels strongly that they deserve what the person has or that the person has taken something of theirs.  This is the world we live in, we have conflicts and we or the other party becomes the accuser.

These are the words of Jesus to anyone intelligent enough to follow Him, and we know one does not have to believe in Jesus to be His follower, for the twelve gave us a great example of men who lived with Jesus for three years and only believed after His resurrection.  So ponder on these words: “And why do you not judge for yourselves what is right? As you go with your accuser before the magistrate, make an effort to settle with him on the way, lest he drag you to the judge, and the judge hand you over to the officer, and the officer put you in prison. I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the very last penny.” (Luke 12:57-59 ESV)

Being a person of faith in Jesus Christ does not have a guarantee of no disagreements, in fact it may make you a target of those who hate whom you follow.  A wise person will look at the Scripture and get council from faithful men and women.  It is always good to understand who is behind the struggle, look at Ephesians 6:12, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”  It is also of great value to understand 2 Corinthians 10:3-5, “For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ.”

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice