Very recently, I read a letter in a national newspaper which was in response to an earlier article that had been published, entitled “Why Do Older People Groan When They Get Up?” As an “older” person myself, I was somewhat amused by the following printed response:
“As a retiree, I can suggest some reasons. We have a government with no sense of purpose and a similar Opposition. Common sense views are dismissed as not ‘woke’ and those who express them risk being ‘cancelled’. Highly paid (health service) consultants endanger patients by going on strike. The Government has spent billions on a rail link from Birmingham to the middle of nowhere.
“Electric cars are the future, if you can find a charging point. The choice of candidates at the next U.S. election is between two old lunatics.
“Its creators have realised that AI is a threat to humanity but have no idea how to stop it. Shoplifting is increasing and no one can stop that, either.
“It’s not so much a case of groaning when we get up. Some of us wonder if it’s worth getting out of bed!”
And, although that letter was probably somewhat tongue in cheek, many may sympathise with the state of the nation and the world at large. Had we not been given a knowledge of the Truth through the Church of God, we may have felt the same.
Having just returned from the annual Feast of Tabernacles celebration, we will have heard messages about what is just ahead of us. Sermons will have been given about how things will change and the return of Jesus Christ ushering in an entirely different Way of Life for those who survive the horrors of the Great Tribulation. Things may be bad now, and they will get much worse, before mankind will, at long last, have decisive, honest, sympathetic and righteous rule over all the earth.
As a 12-year-old, Jesus was in Jerusalem for the annual Passover, and His parents were anxiously looking for Him. After 3 days, He was found in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them and asking them questions (compare Luke 2:46). In verses 48-49 of Luke 2, we read: “So when they saw Him, they were amazed; and His mother said to Him, ‘Son, why have You done this to us? Look, Your father and I have sought You anxiously.’ And He said to them, ‘Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?’”
In verse 50, we read that “…they did not understand the statement which He spoke to them.”
Nearly 2,000 years later and with all the information contained in God’s Word, we can understand what Jesus was referring to. It could be that some may wonder today if it really is worth getting out of bed. But that must not be our approach and our Way of Life, and, like Jesus, we must be about our Father’s business. Times may be difficult for many, but the recent Feast foreshadowed better times that are ahead of us, and we must get that message out to the world as much as possible.
And that will be achieved by getting out of bed and doing whatever we can to assist in proclaiming that message at this critical time in the history of man!
