Behind the Silver Lining
John Milton, most famous for writing Paradise Lost, once wrote in his masque Comus:
"Was I deceiv'd, or did a sable cloud turn forth her silver lining on the night?"
It is belived to the the orgin of the more commonly known phrase, "Every cloud has a silver lining." It should be understood that the `silver lining' referred to is the edge of a cloud that seems to glow when rays of sunlight shine brightly from behind the cloud. Thus, this creates a lining to the cloud. It is a phrase we understand to mean that in the midst of difficult times there are often positive things that come from it or that occur in the midst of it.
Such was the case for Southwood Christian Church this past week. The church was broken into not once, but twice in the same week. The whole process of dealing with the police, checking what was missing, cleaning up the mess, etc. was not only time-consuming, but frustrating as well.
On the surface, I did a good job of being level-headed. After all, I am the senior minister of the church. People look to me to be the voice of reason in difficult circumstances (I know ... scary, huh?). Underneath, I was mad. Worse, I knew I had a right to be mad. We didn't deserve this. Wait ... I didn't deserve this. I didn't have the time to deal with the hassle, but there I was dealing with it. If I was annoyed after the first time, I was really torqued after the second time.
Who was I mad at? Ah, there's the rub. I was annoyed at God. I know ... stupid, but it was the way I felt. God knew our little church couldn't afford to be robbed; we couldn't afford a lot of repairs for vandalism. More than that, I didn't have the time to deal with all the things associated with it.
As usual, God allowed me to have my little pouting moment and then the Spirit began to remind me of some simple things:
It is belived to the the orgin of the more commonly known phrase, "Every cloud has a silver lining." It should be understood that the `silver lining' referred to is the edge of a cloud that seems to glow when rays of sunlight shine brightly from behind the cloud. Thus, this creates a lining to the cloud. It is a phrase we understand to mean that in the midst of difficult times there are often positive things that come from it or that occur in the midst of it.
Such was the case for Southwood Christian Church this past week. The church was broken into not once, but twice in the same week. The whole process of dealing with the police, checking what was missing, cleaning up the mess, etc. was not only time-consuming, but frustrating as well.
On the surface, I did a good job of being level-headed. After all, I am the senior minister of the church. People look to me to be the voice of reason in difficult circumstances (I know ... scary, huh?). Underneath, I was mad. Worse, I knew I had a right to be mad. We didn't deserve this. Wait ... I didn't deserve this. I didn't have the time to deal with the hassle, but there I was dealing with it. If I was annoyed after the first time, I was really torqued after the second time.
Who was I mad at? Ah, there's the rub. I was annoyed at God. I know ... stupid, but it was the way I felt. God knew our little church couldn't afford to be robbed; we couldn't afford a lot of repairs for vandalism. More than that, I didn't have the time to deal with all the things associated with it.
As usual, God allowed me to have my little pouting moment and then the Spirit began to remind me of some simple things:
- First, for better or worse, the thieves/vandals were good at neither thieving or vandalizing. In all, the damage and loss was minimal. Why did the perpetrators steal only a few video games, gas cans and a mower battery, when several thousand dollars of musical instruments and sound/video equipment was there for the taking? I'm not really sure, but I'm glad they didn't take those things. Why do such silly acts of vandalism when they had access to destroy many things in all of our buildings? Again, I have no answer, but I am glad we were so fortunate.
- Second, as it became obvious that our buildings were too easy to access by criminals, several of our guys answered the call to help make them more secure. Jim Spann, Terry Dyson and Brandon Brown stayed late on Thursday night and continue to work on making our buildings safer.
- Third, it is stuff. Oh, I know ... it is God's. But then, everything is, isn't it. I know we are to be good stewards and all as well, but we are definitely not supposed to worry about this stuff as much as I did this week. What if more had been stolen or destroyed; would that kept us from worship of God? Obviously not, but my attitude about those events of the week sure could have kept me from worshiping him.
- Finally, because of the events of this week, our church buildings are more secure against those who might have been more nefarious than the ones who broke in this week. We got a wake-up call so that we might be better prepared.
I'm sorry this happened to you and the church. I'm glad that it was minimal. I'm impressed by the lessons learned!
Posted by
Gregory Fish |
3:16 PM
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