Picture a scene where a lady is kneeling before an elderly couple, obviously her parents.
“You’re such a disappointment!”
Hollers the man.
“Pregnant?!” he continues,
“How could you? After everything we have taught you?”
By now you’re thinking it’s a case of pre-marital or teenage pregnancy and probably wondering why on earth she’d get herself into all that mess. That’s before you hear the father’s next statement, which prompts you to take a closer look at the “pregnant teen”.
“Ever since you got married, I just knew you were going to get pregnant; you stupid girl!”
Now your attention shifts from the girl to her father…is he for real? Everyone in his shoes with a married daughter is busy expecting such daughters to make them proud grand parents. It is the expected thing for a married woman to give birth. No one raises eyebrows seeing a married but pregnant woman; the eyebrows are reserved for pregnant school girls and teenagers. Why? It is not yet time for such thi9ngs to happen to them. At the stage they’re in they should be in school. But once they’re married, they’re expected at least in our African culture, to get pregnant and give birth. In short, there are stages in physical life and certain things are expected to happen due to one’s present stage.
In relating this to spiritual things, we have an interesting parallel. When we see all the “evil” happening all around us, and keep asking “why?”. We’re like that woman’s father who had no understanding of what is expected after a new stage is entered into by his formerly single daughter.
The Bible tells us in 1Timothy 3: 1 that in the last days, perilous times shall come. It then goes on to list all kinds of atrocities to be committed in these so-called ‘last days’ and constantly it reminds us of these present times.
Someone has said that since the last days or end times started after Jesus’ death, we’re in the “last minute of the last hour of the last day”. How true! Unfortunately, we not only ignore the evidence before us attesting to the fact that we’ve truly come to the end times, we ask funny questions like “why is there so much violence in the world?” Why are disasters and destruction on the increase? Etc.
Brothers and sisters, IT IS TO BE EXPECTED! We’re at that stage in existence where the coming of Jesus is closer than it ever was. We’ve come to the perilous times spoken about in the scriptures.
The questions that need to be asked now is “what next?” “If Jesus comes now, will I be saved?” “Even before he comes, how can I escape from all these calamities happening on earth?” “How can I know peace?”
God’s Word has answers to all these questions. Not only did Jesus die for you and I, he tells his own what to expect in these last days and promises us “His peace”; his very own which he does not ‘give as the world gives’ (John 14: 27). In addition he tells us to “cheer up” why? Because “he has overcome the world despite the hardships (John 16: 33).
Believers in Jesus are confident of their peace of mind both in this world and in the world to come. You see, nothing takes them by surprise because Jesus spoke about these events over 2000 years ago. Also he proffered a solution Himself. The only way of escape is by believing in your heart that Jesus died to shed his blood and save you and that he rose from the dead to enforce your salvation. The only way of escape is Jesus Christ.