Pieces of Glass

“Mostly I'm tired of people being ugly to each other. I'm tired of all the pain I feel and hear in the world everyday.  There's too much of it.  It's like pieces of glass in my head all the time. Can you understand?” (John Coffey, The Green Mile, Directed by Frank Darabont, 1999).  In this movie, John Coffey had a special gift that allowed him to heal others, but it also gave him extraordinarily long life.  This quote comes at the end of the movie, when John has lived too long and seen too much.  His knowledge has caused him, as the writer of Ecclesiastes says, much grief, “Because in much wisdom there is much grief, and increasing knowledge results in increasing pain” (Ecc. 1:18 NASB).

I think that maybe this is why God told Adam to not eat from the tree of the KNOWLEDGE of good & evil.  He wasn’t trying to keep anything from his children; rather, He was trying to protect them from pain.  It was because of His love that He said, “Don’t eat it.”  When our children begin to grow up and learn about the world, they learn that it is a painful place.  It hurts them, and it hurts us to see them in pain.

The Apostle Paul clearly understood this when he wrote, “If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable” (1 Cor. 15:19).  But this Apostle also knew that there was – no, IS – a hope for the believer!  Keep reading this chapter:

But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.  For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.  For as in Adam all die, even so IN CHRIST shall ALL be made ALIVE.  But every man in his own order:  Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at His coming.  Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when He shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.  For He must reign, till He hath put all enemies under His feet.  The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death!  (1 Cor. 15:20-26 KJV)

Friend, there is pain in this world.  But the hope in Christ is greater than any pain.  Remember:  You are righteous through faith in Christ (Phl. 3:9); you are saved by grace through faith (Eph. 2:8); you are His workmanship (Eph. 2:10); you can handle whatever comes your way (Phl. 4:13); you overcome by the blood of the Lamb and by your words (Rev. 12:11); you are an ambassador of the King of Kings (Eph. 6:20); you are a King-Priest (Rev. 1:6); you have His peace (Jn. 14:27), His joy (Rom. 15:13), His name (Jn. 17:6), and His love (Jn. 17:26)!

Keep shining!

“Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor. 15:13 NASB).

Peace,

Davina