Pre-Existing Conditions

Pre-existing conditions. 

I’ve just renewed my annual travel insurance policy. Because I have a pre-existing medical condition, I spent a half hour on the phone with Anna, answering set questions concerning the condition. At the end of the questionnaire I was given the additional cost of cover for this condition. It nearly doubled the base quotation. 

Humanity has inherited a pre-existing spiritual condition: a sinful nature. We are prone to making unhealthy decisions which sicken our souls. Yet even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. Christ paid the additional cost for our spiritual condition, so that we can be in Him, holy and without fault in his eyes. It cost Jesus his life.

I’m grateful that I can get, and can afford to pay for, the insurance cover so that I can visit my family regularly. I am bowled over, eternally grateful, that Jesus has paid the price so I can live with my heavenly father ... heavenly family ... forever.

That sets my heart singing praises forever. What a Saviour!

The Wild Wind

Gales buffet the house, bending trees and branches and carrying small birds off course. The sun is shining but with that wild wind – I wouldn’t call it a beautiful day.

But my husband just did, and he pointed out that the wind is drying the garage and fields, melting the snow and ice, and restoring a balance to the earth. So, I guess I shouldn’t complain.

Of course I shouldn’t complain. This is the day that the Lord has made, and he knows why we need winds like this to preserve the eco-system. 

I have heard sad news over these last few days. News of a young woman, studying to be a doctor, stricken with cancer for the second time in a few years, this one triggered by the chemo she received to kill the first cancer attack. News of another young woman, age 27, killed in a car accident. One of my cousins, aged 57, is on his deathbed with cancer he’s fought for a couple of decades. 

I don’t understand why such terrible things happen. Why God doesn’t intervene in every pending tragedy and prevent it. It’s not the same as the winds and the eco-system, which is part of God’s design, though perhaps there is a possible parallel. Natural disasters are occurring more frequently now, as pollution perverts and changes the way it was meant to be. 

Sin has perverted the way God intended humanity to live, and we live with the consequences. We live in a fallen world, and in that fallen world, bad things happen, things that God never intended to happen.

Wild winds blow in every life. We don’t understand. We do know that God stands beside us, weeps with us, comforts us by the power of his Holy Spirit, and strengthens us.

We do have a hope which is sure, that one day God will wipe away every tear, and that he will re-create the earth so that it is exactly as he intended it to be. Thanks to the price Jesus paid on the cross.

All creation groans in anticipation of that glorious day. Come, Lord Jesus.