An interestingly unique and timely “attention getter” is produced by the Ray Comfort Ministries, unique as to its content and timely as to the topic of this article.
The phrase, printed on a small card, has all the words run together without spaces, as this:
“Godisnowhere.”
If your first glance saw this, “God is nowhere,” you are perhaps among those who most often see it that way at first. And, it announces a division of thought and action that is more and more prevalent in the world today—“God is nowhere.”
However, if you read it like this, “God is now here,” you have identified the opposing side of such thinking today. By ridicule and hatred, many are demanding that believers in God and the Christ reject outright that reality, “God is now here.”
For nearly twelve years, including the decade of the 1960’s, I was a member of the headquarters staff of The Navigators at Glen Eyrie in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Recently at an “old-timers,” conference we toured the Glen Eyrie estate and were told of the miracle that happened during the recent forest fire that engulfed the northwest part of the city next to the mountains.
The flames were approaching the grounds north of the Garden of the Gods Park and were expected to enter that pristine estate created by the founder of Colorado Springs, General William Jackson Palmer, for his British wife in the late 1800’s.
That morning, the fire trucks were on hand and ready to do what they could, and the General Manager of the property was there, too, with his grounds manager. Only the Manager could not locate his grounds man. No response on the cell phone, no appearance at such a crucial time, either. Then, out of the smoke and falling embers, he showed up with the explanation that he had been up on the ridge at Dawson Trotman’s gravesite, praying. He was reminding God that when Dawson had arranged the purchase of the estate in 1953, he had dedicated it to the glory of God, and that perhaps a fire would not fit into that commitment—or something of that nature.
The fire approached as predicted, but then miraculously went around the total property and destroyed a ranch and some 300-plus homes farther north.
Was God “now here,” for the two managers as they saw God’s handiwork displayed before their eyes? Certainly, without a doubt!
The Psalmist declares, in Psalm 46:1, “God is my refuge, a very present help in time of trouble.”
Most recently, then, we have a similar report from Hawaii where that hurricane called Olivia was headed straight for the big island and with great intensity, a level five storm. One pastor and his congregation were praying specifically that the Lord would reduce the strength of the storm and turn it aside from its course. He tweeted about their determining prayers for two days; and the negative, hateful and blasphemous retorts that came back were many, as the “nay-sayers” who would read that “attention getter” as “God is nowhere” vented their rejection of God as a viable entity in their world today.
When the storm declined in its power and turned aside from the island, the twitter account was glaringly silent at the pastor’s desk!
God is now here!
These examples of God’s very present reality also tell us a truth that the “God is nowhere” people would rather not be mentioned. Climate change is again on the front pages of newspapers as the United Nations agencies claim that mankind has only eight to ten years before total disaster wipes out the world’s population.
Now that Kavanaugh’s appointment to the Supreme Court has been concluded, the destiny of the earth and its inhabitants dangles in dire distress. It is the fault of mankind, and we must return to the days of our great-grandfathers’ lifestyles, they say, and even then we are not told of any means of salvation from that pending destiny.
The truth is, however, that “God is now here,” and He is the Creator who, by His spoken Word, put all these things together. He can change the power of a storm and turn aside its course.
What is really happening, as the Scriptures tell us, and it seems to me, the world is being prepared for the coming judgment of God upon a sinful world which has intentionally turned away from God. The summation of God’s characterization of those who have made that defining move is that they “have no fear of God before their eyes” (Romans 3:18).
The exponential increasing of the intensity of storms, earthquakes, floods and erupting volcanoes are pictured in the prophecies of Jesus in Luke 21:25-26:
“And there will be signs in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars; and on the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring; men’s hearts failing them from fear and the expectation of those things which are coming on the earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.”
Other passages in Scripture expand on the implications of those words, and He follows them in verse 28, saying, “Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near.”
So what does all of this mean? It means that God is winding down this age of the Gentiles, closing it with judgment on those who have rejected Him and redemption for those who belong to Him by having been born again by the Spirit of God. Now, today, is the day of salvation.
Contact email: andwegetmercy@gmail.com