Tag Archives: distress

Sunday – June 25, 2017 Genesis 42:1-36 “The Proper Use of Power”

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Sunday – June 25, 2017 – Read the Word on Worship

Sunday – June 25, 2017 Genesis 42:1-38 “The Proper Use of Power” from Sunrise Community Church on Vimeo.

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Genesis 42:21-22
Then they said to one another, “Truly we are guilty concerning our brother, because we saw the distress of his soul when he pleaded with us, yet we would not listen; therefore this distress has come upon us.“

Have you ever heard of a berkutchi? A berkutchi is an Asian man who trains eagles for hunting. The capture, taming, training, and keeping of eagles is highly ritualized. Once captured, the eagle is hooded and placed in a cage with a perch that sways constantly so it cannot rest or sleep. For two or three days it is also deprived of food. During this time the berkutchi talks, sings, and chants to the eagle for hours on end. Finally, he begins to feed and stroke it. Slowly the weakened creature comes to rely on its master. When the berkutchi decides that their relationship has become strong enough, the training begins. Not all eagles can be trained, but those who take to life with a master display intense loyalty. While the training and breaking of the eagle may seem harsh, it is a picture of how over time God breaks our independent spirit to draw us close to Him.

It is important to see what God is doing. God uses broken things: broken soil to produce a crop, broken clouds to give rain, broken grain to give bread, and broken bread to give strength. God is going to break Joseph’s brothers by awakening their sleeping consciences. For years, Jacob and the boys lived life without having to think about God. Life went on as normal. They got up, did their work, came home, and the next day started all over again. Their needs were met; life went on as it always had. But with this famine God gets their attention. It is easy to avoid God when we feel self-sufficient. It is easy to feel that you have no need of God’s touch when everything is running smoothly. These men were comfortable in their denial and their deceptions. As long as the status quo remained they would never change. So God provokes a crisis. This crisis would either harden them further or wake them up.

God could have simply washed His hands of these brothers. But that’s not what He did with the Israelites and that’s not what He does with you and me. God loves us too much to let us go without a fight. So, at times He exercises “tough love.” He brings a crisis into our life that forces us to address ultimate issues. It may be an unexpected diagnosis, a financial emergency, an overwhelming situation, or a family crisis. In these situations God is often seeking to awaken us out of our spiritual lethargy. God lovingly put Jacob and his family in the midst of a famine in order to draw them to Him.

Are you going through a tough time? Is life a struggle right now? Could it be that God is trying to get your attention? Could it be that He is trying to awaken you out of your spiritual slumber? Is it possible that God loves you so much and that He wants you to be His with such intensity that He will stop at nothing to turn your heart to Him?

Sunday – November 29, 2015 Revelation 7:1-17 “Saints on Earth & in Heaven”

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Sunday – November 29, 2015November 29, 2015 – Read the Word on Worship

Sunday – November 29, 2015 Revelation 7:1-17 “Saints on Earth & in Heaven” from Sunrise Community Church on Vimeo.

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Word On Worship – Sunday – November 29, 2015 Download / Print

Revelation 7:13-14
“Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, “These who are clothed in the white robes, who are they, and where have they come from?” I said to him, “My lord, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”

The word “tribulation” comes from the Greek word meaning “affliction/distress.” It is used in general about any kind of testing, affliction or distress which people experience throughout life, and especially about the church and her problems in this world (Acts 7:10-11). But Bible students have also used the term, “the Tribulation,” to refer to a specific eschatological time of trouble, a special time of judgment from God that will come upon the entire world, that will be unprecedented in its affliction, and will be culminated by the personal return of Jesus Christ to earth. There are many passages that anticipate this time of trouble under a variety of names (see below), but two very special passages are Matthew 24:4-21 and Revelation chapters 6 to 19.

It should be noted that the word tribulation is used prophetically Lord only in Matthew 24 and Revelation 7 to describe the distress that will occur in this specific future time of trouble preceding the return of the Lord. Each of these passages is dealing with the time of Daniel’s seventieth week, also called the “time of Jacob’s distress” (Jer. 30:7). The word “tribulation” refers to conditions in the last half of this time period and is either described by some qualifying terms like “great” (Matt. 24:21; Rev. 7:14), by a clause describing the unprecedented nature of the distress in the last half of this short period of time.

These days are a time of unprecedented trouble. Everything about it will be unprecedented in terms of destruction and global catastrophe. It is a time of extreme deception and delusion as Paul discusses in 2 Thessalonians 2:6-12. This deception is caused by a number of factors but primarily from the removal of the Spirit indwelt church with its restraining influence and the increase of demonic activity. The result of this tribulation will be the martyrdom of believers in Jesus Christ, both Jew and Gentile.

But since this seven-year period is a time of trouble (distress) involving judgments that will be poured out as the Lamb consecutively opens the seven-sealed scroll, Bible students often referred to this entire period as “the Tribulation,” and rightly so. Since the judgments of the seals, the trumpets, and plagues grow in intensity, the last half is by far greater than the first half and for this reason and it is called in Scripture, “the Great Tribulation.”