If I go up to the heavens, You are there; if I make my bed in the depths, You are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there Your hand will guide me, Your right hand will hold me fast. Psalm 139:8-10.

“…in much patience, in tribulations, in needs, in distresses.” 2 Corinthians 6:4.

He is our God forever and ever, and He will guide us until we die. Psalm 48:14.

In our Friday Zoom Retreat we did an Audio Divina, where we listened to a song while reading the words written by the musician Sting after the death of his father called “All This Time”. Songwriters wrestle with emotions and events that impact them greatly, and as they wrestle to understand the meaning of this life, it flows in lyrics and melodies we can all relate to and feel deeply. I shared with our group that watching the movie I Can Only Imagine 2 showed that very struggle shaped by those also struggling that flowed into a song so poignant our hearts cry out for God…”Even If”. This life is a river unceasing and always moving forward and sometimes is joined by silent tears flowing. And I say that because our chapter, 2 Peter 2, is hard! Peter talks about judgment and hell and I grapple with trying to understand both, because I don’t ever want to presume I have all the answers and I trust Creator God – Father, Son, Spirit who does, and who knows so much more than any of us just how awful are the suffering sins we are shaped by in this fallen world and in ourselves. But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who brought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter; and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires and despise authority. Daring, self-willed, they do not tremble when they revile angelic majesties, whereas angels who are greater in might and power do not bring a reviling judgment against them before the Lord. But these, like unreasoning animals, born as creatures of instinct to be captured and killed, reviling where they have no knowledge, will in the destruction of those creatures also be destroyed, suffering wrong as the wages of doing wrong. They count it a pleasure to revel in the daytime. They are stains and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions, as they carouse with you, having eyes full of adultery that never cease from sin, enticing unstable souls, having a heart trained in greed, accursed children; forsaking the right way, they have gone astray, having followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness; but he received a rebuke for his own transgression, for a mute donkey, speaking with a voice of a man, restrained the madness of the prophet. These are springs without water and mists driven by a storm, for whom the black darkness has been reserved. For speaking out arrogant words of vanity they entice by fleshly desires, by sensuality, those who barely escape from the ones who live in error, promising them freedom while they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved. For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them. It has happened to them according to the proverb, “A dog returns to its own vomit,” and, “A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire.”

Sometimes we need to be confronted by the truth of the sins of this fallen world and the suffering it brings. Why didn’t Lot move? Where can we go to escape the wrong being done in our world today? The lyrics from the song Sting wrote? “What good is a used up world and how could it be worth having? All this time the river flowed endlessly like a silent tear.” And the lyrics from MercyMe? “They say sometimes you win some, sometimes you lose some, and right now, right now, I’m losing bad. I’ve stood on this stage night after night reminding the broken it’ll be alright, but right now, right now, I just can’t. I know You’re able and I know You can save through the fire with Your mighty hand, but even if You don’t, my hope is You alone.” Scripture doesn’t lie and shows the awful in all its awfulness. And we grapple and struggle to understand why and how long. Pain hurts. And the amazing thing is that God knows. He knows all that led to all the pain in every single one of His children. We judge harshly as though we have never sinned. Jesus bent down and gave hope to all. Compassion. Understanding. Grace. Forgiveness. Restoration. Healing. Love. Rejoicing. Songwriters can feel deeply and write beautifully, but they can’t fix what is broken. But never forget there is One who can! I know You’re able and I know You can save through the fire with Your mighty hand…but even if You don’t…my hope is You alone! My hope is in Creator God who does not sin and in Whom is no darkness at all. Even if He doesn’t stop the suffering right now, I know it is He who will. And I also know that His comfort and His truth are what is holding me safe in Him and His love. He gives clarity and understanding. And when we go to Him and ask, He gives Himself. The greatest gift we will ever receive! I pray that for each one of us!