by J. Randal Matheny

Wang, a Chinese woman from Nanning, was surprised when a bus seat was offered her, with smiles from everyone around her. Someone finally showed her the note taped to her back: "Please take care of this pregnant lady."

Wang recognized the handwriting of her husband, who must have stuck it to her back before she left home.

We in Christ show the same care for one another. We seek to ease the burdens of those weighed down by their cares and struggles.

So said Paul, "Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ" (Galatians 6:2, ESV).

Even when they themselves cannot carry the burdens of the weak, Christians still search for means to help others, with the creativity of the Chinese husband concerned about his wife.

This is why I am grateful to be a part of a brotherhood that practices fraternal love, that develops daily that care for the brother who needs a hand, that understands that "church" means a community that lives in peace, harmony, unity, and forgiveness, under the benevolent guidance of Christ.

I have often had the sign, "Please care for this burdened soul," stuck to my back. I have often been offered a seat of rest, scarce in a world of selfish people. I have been given the knowing smiles of well-wishers who, aware of my burden perhaps more than I, have more than smiled to lift up my name to the great Inviter of the Light Burden.

In turn, I want to be a burden-bearer myself, for someone coming up the trail behind me.

Wang and I, then, have much in common.

by Phil Sanders

The Preacher of the Old Testament asked, "If no one knows what will happen, who can tell him when it will happen?" (Ecclesiastes 8:7)

There is so much about the future we don't know. We can see some things developing, but we can't be sure it will end up that way.

"In the day of prosperity be happy, But in the day of adversity consider -- God has made the one as well as the other so that man may not discover anything that will be after him" (Ecclesiastes 7:14).

As the election moves ever closer and the polls make it too close to call, we have to leave things in God's hands.

As loved ones lie on the brink of death in the hospital, we do not know what will happen.

Like Elisha, we seem always to be asking, "Is it well?"

We simply don't know what the future holds, but there are some eternal truths upon which we can rely.

The God of all the earth ruled the past, rules the present, and will rule the future. He is always in charge, and always knows beyond the short-term. His plans will stand. "There is no wisdom and no understanding and no counsel against the LORD. The horse is prepared for the day of battle, but victory belongs to the LORD" (Proverbs 21:30,31). If the present or short-term future do not make sense to us, we need to trust that God will make sense of it all in the end.

God's love does not change regardless of the problems we suffer. Paul said, "For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:38,39).

Planning a future without God is indeed presumptuous. James said, "... you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. Instead, you ought to say, 'If the Lord wills, we shall live and also do this or that.' But as it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do, and does not do it, to him it is sin" (James 4:14-17).

We don't know the future, but we do know the God of the future. Hold to Him.

by Michael E. Brooks

"I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me, though he may die, he shall live" (John 11:25).

The Church in Bangladesh was saddened recently at the untimely death of one of its young people. Thirteen-year-old William Hasda died after suffering through a brief illness with one of the fevers so common in flood-time Bangladesh, possibly Malaria or Typhoid. William was the son of Noren Hasda, a Gospel preacher from Naogaon district in the northwest. Every possible effort was made to provide medical care, and many prayers were offered, yet death came.

Death is sad, under almost all circumstances. No matter how old a person may be, or how ill, if they are loved they will be missed and their passing is grieved. The death of young people brings even greater grief. We mourn the unfulfilled potential their future promised. We mourn our inability to guide and help them as they mature and then become blessings to others.

Death is also certain. "It is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment" (Hebrews 9:27). We don't know when, nor under what circumstances, but death will come to all. And in that certainty there is solace. It is not death that is tragic, but death which does not leave the promise of eternal life.

No story in the Bible is more relevant or needed than the resurrection of Lazarus. When Jesus shared in the mourning of Lazarus' sisters, he demonstrated compassion and complete identification with the human condition. But when he raised Lazarus from the grave, he showed Divine power. He also promised to use that power on behalf of all who believed in and obeyed him. Through faith in Jesus, we will all have life. Not just for a time on this earth, but throughout eternity.

The Apostle Paul placed the resurrection at the very center of the Gospel message.

"But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty and your faith is also empty ... If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable" (1 Corinthians 15:13,14,19).

We do have hope in Christ, because he was raised from the dead. And not only that, but he has demonstrated his power to raise the dead. Death remains real and sad, yet it is not tragic. Not when it comes to those who love the Lord, who have hope in His coming.

by Kevin Cauley

A few weeks ago on a Bible Study Forum (www.preachersfiles.com) we received a question about hell. Basically the question was how can the lake of fire described in the book of Revelation be hell if hell is going to be cast into the lake of fire? It's true that in Revelation 20:14 (KJV) we read "And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death." The person who was asking the question was suggesting that there really isn't such a place as hell because this verse says that "hell" was going to be destroyed. What would someone say to that?

One must understand that the King James translators didn't draw a distinction between two Greek words. These words we know today as "Hades" and "Gehenna." The word Gehenna has a historical reference to a valley on the southwest side of Jerusalem where human sacrifices once occurred. After the Babylonian captivity, the place was deemed unclean and turned, more or less, into a "city dump." Fires burned there day and night, consuming the waste and the place became metaphoric for the eternal destruction of the wicked.

Rabbinical tradition used this history and the word "Gehenna" to refer to an afterlife of punishment and torment. The Babylonian Talmud refers to the fires of Gehenna as being different from fire created by men. "The fire which we use was created at the close of Sabbath, while the fire of Gehenna was created at twilight on the eve of Sabbath" (Chapter IV, pg. 93, www.sacred-texts.com). The Talmud also records that wicked men would suffer punishment in Gehenna. "If one is meritorious and righteous, he receives his own portion and also the portion of his neighbor in the Garden of Eden. If he has incurred guilt, he receives his own portion and also the portion of his neighbor in Gehenna." (Chapter II, pg. 33, www.sacred-texts.com). This is important to understand, because it is in this sense that Jesus speaks about hell (Gehenna) in the New Testament, namely, as place for the wicked (Matthew 5:22, 10:28, 23:33, Luke 12:5).

On the other hand, the word "Hades" is not necessarily used to describe the place of the wicked, but merely the realm of the dead. This is the place that describes where the rich man and Lazarus went after death (Luke 16:23). This word is also used to describe where Jesus went after death in Acts 2:27, 31. We know that Jesus went to paradise (Luke 22:42) and that the rich man was in "torments" (Luke 16:23) yet both of them were in "Hades." How could this be? It is simply the case that Hades refers to a general place where the spirits of the dead go, not heaven, and not hell either.

So what was it that was cast into the lake of fire in Revelation 20:14? The word in the Greek New Testament is "Hades" not "Gehenna." Hence, it is perfectly reasonable to understand that "Hades" being the place of those who are dead, is no longer necessary after the judgment as the souls of all men have been resurrected to die no more (John 5:29). So, the place of the dead, "Hades" will be destroyed in that day, along with death itself. However, the place of eternal punishment for the wicked, "Gehenna" is the lake of fire as we see from Revelation 21:8.

by Tim Hall

I don't like to wait! I'm an important person (I think), and I have appointments to keep. I shouldn't have to wait in this long line at the post office. The traffic light ought to remain green long enough for me to get through (I'll help it a little). Doesn't the doctor know that I've got better things to do with my time? I don't like to wait!

Staring me in the face, however, is this injunction from God: "Wait on the Lord." There are two ways in which this word might be used. One is the idea of serving God. The person who serves me at the restaurant is a waiter, and perhaps that's the idea involved. But these people certainly don't seem to slow down. Is that what the Lord has in mind?

The second meaning of "wait" is the more frequent one. Consider Psalm 37:7-9: "Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him; do not fret because of him who prospers in his way, because of the man who brings wicked schemes to pass. Cease from anger, and forsake wrath; do not fret -- it only causes harm. For evildoers shall be cut off; but those who wait on the Lord, they shall inherit the earth" (NKJV). Learning to slow down and patiently await the Lord's guidance is definitely the idea presented here.

There are many models of patience provided for me in the Bible. Abraham waited several years to receive God's promise of a son (Genesis 17:1-17). Joseph languished (unjustly) in prison before the butler remembered to tell Pharaoh about his remarkable abilities (Genesis 40:23-41:13). Moses lived 40 years as an obscure shepherd before God's purposes for him were made clear (Acts 7:30). Saul thought he was ready to immediately preach the faith he had tried to destroy (Acts 9:20-25); it actually took three years of reexamination of God's word before the Lord opened for him doors of opportunity (Galatians 1:18). Who knows how long the martyred saints had been waiting for vindication when they cried out "How long, O Lord?" in Revelation 6:9-11?

Who will deny that Christians living in the 21st century have a special need for patience? Our society is fast-paced. So many things call for our attention and energies. "One minute" how-to books are sure to become bestsellers, for everyone is looking for shortcuts. But are there shortcuts to spirituality and godliness (the "One Minute Bible" notwithstanding)?

Psalm 46:10 renews the call to patience in the presence of God (as do many other passages): "Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!"

"Sorry, Lord, I just don't have time to 'be still' right now. But, hey, you know I appreciate you. When I get a little time, I'll start waiting on you."

Do you suspect something wrong with an attitude like that?