Well, the schools have started and so it's time to start the eDevs again! To those I haven't seen yet: Blessings for 2010!
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21 Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:
22 Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
23 They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
24 I say to myself, "The LORD is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him." Lamentations3:21-24
I hope you will pardon the pun for this series title. We often say that "reality bites" and most people mean is that there comes a moment when our rose-coloured spectacles of our wishful thinking, sentimental perspectives and idealised hopes crack and the harsh light of the so-called "real world" _bites_ us.
But there is another reality that we often discount. A reality where Jesus enters into our world and even though He assures us that "in this world you will have trouble," He is also quick to remind us to take heart for He has overcome this world and He will never leave us or forsake us.
And so in the midst of a present reality that bites us, there is another greater Truth unfolding. We need to be reminded of it.
In computer-speak a "byte" is cluster of ones and zeroes and is what is usually needed to transmit one alphabet character of information. Over the next couple of days I will be sending you some "Reality-Bytes": A reminder of God's greater truth in the midst of our lives.
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If anyone in the OT experienced a Reality-Bite it would have been Jeremiah sitting the smoking ruins of Jerusalem that the Babylonians had decimated after an 18 month siege.
If anyone should have and could have doubted God's love and care - it would've and should've been Jeremiah. In the midst of tragedy and heartache and pain, Jeremiah chose to reach out to a God whose love for us is as certain as the sunrise tomorrow morning.
2010 already has 18 days spent and gone and we are busy with the 19th day. Resolution and Optimism have faded in the hurly burly of tightening our belts after too much eating and spending and as the pace accelerates to a frenzy, many of us are wondering whether we have the strength for it all.
Jeremiah's certainty is our ultimate reality: The night will not last. The failure of others does not have to destroy us. Our own sin-brokenness will not have the last word. There is a cross and a Saviour who gives us a bridge between our dark reality and the dawning of real reality: God's unconquerable love for you and me.
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Theo Groeneveld theo@emmanuel.org.za
