"The rest is not our business"

       A cold, grey, drizzly day outside...but warm here by the fire.  Thank You, Father.  Spring is coming.  Spring is coming.  Winter's trying her best to hold out to the bitter end, but God's gift of rebirth, renewal, and resurrection is coming.
       Just thought I would share something I read recently that really stuck with me.  I think we need to be reminded--and not just every now and then but continuously--of the indefatigable Hope we have in Christ.  Because, as John Piper once said, we "leak."  Even after spending time with the Lord in the early morning, as soon as the day hits, we begin to leak--leak joy...leak energy...leak patience...leak love...leak grace.
       And because we leak, we all need to be continually reminded especially of two things: Who is in control--the Lord who is working all things for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purposes (Rom.8:28).  And Whose we are--we are sons and daughters of the King. The King of Kings and Lord of Lords.  That's our Abba, our Daddy, who loves us infinitely and who does all, all, all things well.
       Just in case you've been leaking a bit this dreary afternoon, can I be the one to remind you--God's on the throne and He's got you and He's got your loved ones and He's got this whole, crazy world in His omnipotent, nail-scarred hands.  And I don't care how it looks right now, God will win the war.  Spring will come.  Hope will prevail.  Because Christ has risen, we can know victory is assured.
      I loved these words from the late Richard John Newhouse: "But we have not the right to despair for despair is a sin. And we have not the reason to despair, quite simply Christ has risen...Optimism is not a Christian virtue. Optimism is simply a matter of optics, of seeing what you want to see and opting not to see what you don't want to see.
We are hopeful, filled with hope, which is a very different thing. Hope is a virtue of having looked unblinkingly into all the reasons for despair, into all of the reasons that would seem to falsify hope, and to say, 'Nonetheless Christ is Lord. Nonetheless this is the story of the world. Nonetheless this is a story to which I will surrender myself day by day.' Not simply on one altar call, but as the entirety of one's life, in which every day is a laying of your life on the altar of the Lord Jesus Christ being offered up in perfect sacrifice to the Father.
       And will we overcome? Will we prevail? We have overcome and have prevailed ultimately because He has overcome and He has prevailed. There are days in which you and I get discouraged. On those days I tell myself — I suppose almost every day I tell myself, sometimes several times a day — those marvelous lines from T. S. Eliot's "East Coker," where Eliot says, 'For us there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.'

        For us there is only the trying. The rest is not our business. Some people read those lines as lines of resignation, kind of shrugging your shoulders and saying, "What can you do?" But I read them as lines of vibrant hope. The rest is not our business. The rest is God's business.  Thank God, we are not God. Thank God, God is God." 

       Amen.  Thank You Father that You simply call us to try and to walk each day with You, as best we can.  Yes, often times faltering, sometimes failing, to be sure. But with our eyes on You and our hearts grateful for Your never-failing, always sufficient grace.  Thank You that "the rest is not our business"--but it is Yours.  And You've so totally, perfectly got it.
       To God be the glory.