Where To?

 Every journey has a beginning and an end. As one journey ends, another begins, but the only thing yet to be determined is the destination. I’ve started outlining the teaching on Job, and it’s a bruiser. It’s not one of those books you can get through in a few days or weeks. It’s challenging, humbling, and encouraging, but it’s not for the faint of heart or those who insist that the purpose of God is to serve man and not the other way around.

Simultaneously, I’ve also been outlining a shorter series on the last days of the world and the last days of the church, not through the prism of what I’d like to see or how I’d like it to play out but what the Bible says about these things.

More often than not, expectation determines how you react to something. If I make a reservation at an uppity restaurant and go through the trouble of selling a kidney to be able to afford it, I fully expect a meal so memorable that many years from now, as I take my last breaths, I’m recalling the taste of the baked brie with the fig marmalade spread and the truffle-infused baguette. Anything less will fall short of my expectations even though, in any other setting, the meal would be deemed excellent and worthy of praise.

What will blindside many Christians in the coming season isn’t so much what’s happening in the world as that their expectations were the polar opposite, and so their reaction to it will be disproportionate.

Some time ago, I made the mistake of ordering some shirts from a website that has since become a meme. I should have remembered the adage that if something looks too good to be true it probably is, but three bucks shipped for a shirt is tempting indeed.

 Being the husky fellow that I am, I ordered their largest size, taking into account that coming from China, they would likely be smaller, and making the requisite adjustments. Since I’m no fan of tight clothing, I usually wear an XXL but ordered the 6XL shirts, thinking that the size disparity would make up for it.

Some six weeks later, after I’d forgotten I ordered the shirts, they arrived in a beat-up envelope and still ended up being a tight medium, if not a small. If I hadn’t accounted for the difference in size, I wouldn’t have been bothered. Because I’d taken it into account, however, and they were still only big enough to fit a malnourished teenager, I was admittedly frustrated.

The point is this: In order to properly prepare for what is coming, we must acknowledge the reality of what the Bible says is coming, not something we hope is coming. Whether spiritually or physically, we must prepare in accordance with what the Word of God says we should expect; otherwise, all our preparations and machinations will be for naught.

There will be people who will have prepared but not for the things the Bible says are coming, and their frustration, resentment, and bitterness will know no bounds.

I said all that to say this: I do believe that a study on the last days of the world and the last days of the church is warranted, but I gave my word that after the study on persecution, we will commence with our discussion of Job.

Given that I am torn about which topic to explore, I will leave it to you to decide. So, if you would be so kind, please leave a comment with either a one or a two, 1 being the study of Job and 2 being the study of the last days of the world and the church. If you are so inclined, you can even write in Job or Last Days, but that’s up to you.

Until the matter is decided, I will be posting stand-alone essays. If you do not participate, you forfeit your right to complain about which path we take.

With love in Christ, 

Michael Boldea, Jr.