War and What Follows

Matthew 24:4-8 (NRSV)

Jesus answered them, “Beware that no one leads you astray. For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Messiah!’ and they will lead many astray. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not alarmed; for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places: all this is but the beginning of the birth pangs.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Someone told me love would all save us
But how can that be, look what love gave us
A world full of killing, and blood-spilling
that world never came

And they say that a hero can save us
I’m not gonna stand here and wait
I'll hold on to the wings of the eagles
Watch as we all fly away, Hi-ii-igh!

"Hero" performed by Chad Kroeger and Josey Scott from the "Spiderman" soundtrack and released on Nickleback's "Silver Side Up" (2001)

"A hard rain's gonna fall." Who talks like that anyway? I heard that expression somewhere in my youth. I took it to mean that the day will come when all that we know and do, especially the wicked, will be swept away like the flood. "A hard rain's gonna fall." You better believe it!

There will be wars, and rumors of wars. This comes from scripture, and I know there are statistics somewhere that tell us how many armed conflicts are being fought everyday. I wonder when the last day was that there was no declared war anywhere on earth. I'm not even counting random violence, I mean good old fashioned wars and rumors of wars.

"Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places." I can think of fewer things that sound appealing to me. Now not only will there be nation against nation and kingdom against kingdom--not only will the political strife get nasty--so will hunger and natural disasters. Sure, much hunger in this world is caused directly or indirectly by political strife, but natural disasters are a completely different ballgame.

So this must take place, but it's only the beginning. It's birth pangs as when labor has just begun, not contractions at three-minutes apart. This is the beginning, not the end. But as with birth pangs, something new will come from the pain and sorrow, new life.

The world is killed with killing and blood spilling and we need a hero. Fortunately, the world has a hero. Our Lord comes not as a king who will subdue his enemies by his might, but as a babe born in a stable. He comes as a man who dies as a criminal nailed to the cross.

He is the hero who can save us. The song talks about not waiting for someone to come. The song talks about taking charge and taking hold of the wings of eagles and soar beyond this world. So to must we, we must be careful of the wings we take though. Let us hold to the Lord. By His life and death and resurrection we can soar like on wings of eagles.