HOW TO HANDLE ADVERSITY!

HOW TO HANDLE ADVERSITY!

Prov 24:10

10 If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small.

          If you are reading this you already know that this morning’s devotional is approximately seven hours late! You also need to know that there are few things so bad that they can’t be made worse by adding a computer. I am at the office and suddenly my laptop recognizes the wireless signal here. But it gets worse. Now my phone will not connect to the wireless signal at the office. Yet I have the audacity to give advice on how to handle adversity! What good is advice from someone who is inexperienced?

          Experience in adversity is hugely overrated, by the way! Nevertheless, after more than forty years in ministry, I recognize adversity more quickly than ever before and I have learned that the only real way to deal with it is to “faint not.” I guess that makes me a plodder and I know that frustrates those with more aggressive personalities but it works for me. The plan is to keep on plodding till something better comes along.

          A careful examination of the words of Proverbs 24:10 provides a needed education. First, we see that the word “faint” means “to slacken” or to slow down but the spiritual idea is to slow my response to the leading of the Lord. That’s not good! The word “adversity” is the word tsarah and it means “tightness.” If the wide opportunities you have been enjoying have narrowed down to a “tight spot” then you understand the word. Curiously the word “small” is tsar which means narrow.

          If you glue together the meanings of the original words you come out with something like this: “If you slow down your responses to God’s leading during times of tightness then your strength has been squeezed and made narrow.” Anyone can hang tough when he has a 21 point lead late in the game. It is when the game is tied and the outcome is not resting on the arm of your quarterback but the toe of your kicker that hanging tough really means something. The church at Ephesus received commendation from Jesus for just this kind of perseverance. The problem is that they had allowed adversity to weaken their love.

Rev 2:1-4

2 Unto the angel of the church of Ephesus write; These things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks;

2 I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars:

3 And hast borne, and hast patience, and for my name's sake hast laboured, and hast not fainted.

4 Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.

Dear Lord, why is it that when things get tight our first response is to pull away from you? It saddens me to recognize this tendency in me. Forgive me and help me to hang tough. AMEN