How to Escape the Drama and the Tension
Our Mission
To present Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord to business and professional men and to develop Christian business and professional men to carry out the Great Commission.
Nehemiah 9.33 proclaims, You are righteous with regard to all that has happened to us, for You have acted faithfully. It is we who have been in the wrong!
When things go badly for us our propensity is to blame God. Our thinking goes something like, ‘if He loved me He would do good to me.’ “Since He is all powerful He can keep the bad from happening.” “Since I am a good person God should want good for me.” “Since bad is happening to me anyway either God is not good or God is not all powerful.”
The assumption underlying these thoughts is that God is supposed to keep bad things from happening to me because I am a good person. I don’t measure my behavior by God’s commands, I measure God’s behavior by my expectations for Him. In this way we are like little children. They view the world from their self interest having little regard for the welfare of others.
At the extreme, this is why we kill and steal. We take revenge because people have not treated us as we think they should. Our default thinking is not what am I doing to obey God but rather what are people doing that makes me unhappy. My irritation comes from people, God and things in the world not working according to my predetermined will. Who is God in this scenario? Me! I realize I am not really God but I certainly want to be.
Evil in the world is the result of each of us living as god instead of each of us living for God. Yet in spite of our disregard for the good ways of God that if lived would make all of our lives easier, He remains patient and faithful showering us with goodness despite ourselves. Again, like the little child who has a tantrum, we still feed them and clothe them though they have been little terrors all day. We treat our children well despite their behavior because we love them.
So too God loves us and treats us well despite our behavior. Yes He allows us to hurt ourselves and one another because He has given us free will so that we could freely love Him. Our struggle is not really with God. He is good, loving and wonderful.
Our struggle is with ourselves and one another who are really not good but perpetually selfish which results in hardships for ourselves and one another.
His Opportunities
2017’s first special luncheon is scheduled for February 9th. Mark your calendars and register HERE. Our speaker will be Hope College football coach and 9 year veteran of the Detroit Lions Tony Semple. Our venue will be new: Eagle Eye Golf Course.
Mark your calendar now and begin praying for men you will bring to this strategic event.
- February 8th Ask Anything with special guests Ravi Zacharias and Abdu Murray as they discuss A Post-Mortem On Post-Truth Culture, followed by Q & A. The event is free and is open to the public. No registration is necessary. The Breslin Center Doors open at 6:30pm, the event begins 7:30pm. Hope to see you February 8th with an unchurched friend.
Mark your calendar now and begin praying for men you will bring to this strategic event.
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January 23, 2016
How to Escape the Drama and the Tension
by Ken Korkow
Everywhere we look, we see drama, tension, fear, and a new crisis seemingly every minute. Forced to live and work in this oppressive environment, we can either become overwhelmed with anxiety, or take proactive steps to minimize external influences on us. I have chosen the latter. Here is what I am doing:
First of all, I have determined not to waste energy on things I cannot influence. Feeling helpless can be a very debilitating emotion, so whenever I realize things are beyond my control, I choose not to spend time agonizing over them.
My second step is actually the flip side of the first. I endeavor to exert influence in areas where I can make a difference, especially when I can see the possibility of an eternal impact.
Like you, I find myself inundated with information overload – from TV, radio, the Internet, emails, texts, billboards and other sources. It is impossible to process it all. At the same time, we all get many requests for help, many of them very worthwhile. There are lots of valid concerns, as well as countless good and noble causes. But like you, my resources are limited; I cannot do everything, even if I wanted to. So I have applied the two principles above as a way of determining my priorities – what is the best investment of my time, talent, and treasure. As a result, here are some of the decisions I have made:
For 40 years I have subscribed to the respected business periodical, the Wall Street Journal, but this year stopped. For 30 years we have received the Omaha World Herald every day, but this year we stopped. And a long time ago I stopped watching national television news.
Please do not get me wrong. I am not an isolationist or a head-in-the-sand person. I have simply come to realize that the “news” is slanted entertainment with a desire for higher viewer ratings so they can sell more advertising – and I no longer want to get sucked into the drama.
God wants us to be like the “men of Issachar” described in 1 Chronicles 12:32, because they “understood the times and knew what their nation needed to do.”
So how can I do that? First, I make the effort to spend time in the Bible (I also read several devotionals) each day because, as King Solomon wrote, “there is nothing new under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 1:9). In the process, God through His Spirit guides, protects, and provides for me.
Next, I check a few Internet news sources twice a day and read periodicals I have found useful for international, national and local news coverage. Very sporadically my wife and I will watch the first 10 minutes of the evening TV news, but again limit that because we do not wish to get caught up in the drama of managed news coverage.
Throughout each day I strive to remind myself that the Lord is completely in control of everything, so the issue is not “What is happening?” but rather, “How will I respond to what is happening?” I have found that only then, when I am being filled with God’s truth, His Spirit and His love, does the overflow of my life reflect His character.
Ken Korkow lives in Omaha, Nebraska, U.S.A., where he serves as an area director for CBMC. This is adapted from his “Fax of Life” column. Used with permission.
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