Pastoral: The Coming Trials

The Spirit moves me to offer a few pastoral comments.
We know the political situation is moving toward chaos and repression. We know the economy is going to crash. We also understand this is all intentional on the part of some folks who have lots of power and wealth, and want all they don’t already have of those things. We also know it’s highly unlikely there exists any human agency which can match willingness with capability to relieve us of this oppression.
In short, we rightly see suffering and sorrow increasing as we watch.
What many may not see clearly is how utterly improbable it is much of this will happen suddenly. Yes, it’s vaguely possible to bring about catastrophic events with rather dramatic suddenness, but extremely difficult to engineer. The systems involved are ponderously huge. Even at Internet speeds, there are limits to this beast. Things can be carried only so far before the cost of pressing farther demands a geometric rise in terms of resources. That cost includes the length of time, because it means human hands doing things. Only so many hands can be employed doing the same things at the same time in all places.
There will be drama and trauma, but each event will be limited.
I dare say the primary symptom of discomfort for most folks will be the disappearance of material goods we take for granted. While I don’t mean it literally, it would be as if all the Wal-Marts simply closed over a period of a week or two. Rather suddenly the variety and low price of stuff not locally produced will go away. By the way, the business of “price” is relative to income. The cost of your morning coffee habit will approach car payments, and “eating out” will be limited to picnicking. But milk will simply get more expensive, and only folks in large urban areas will have a hard time getting any.
It’s going to be rough. Whole sectors of the economy will disappear, and most CEOs are cruel enough to deceive all their employees about this. So you’ll get short notice on the day of closure, but he probably knows already when it will happen. Lots of reputations will change if we get an honest report of who does what, lots of surprises. Employees are a disposable resource in America. We refer to the “friction” factor of how long it takes folks to adjust to the new reality and do something different. I can’t really estimate that factor, and I’m pretty skeptical the experts are any better at it. Multiple traumas in each life, against the resistance individuals have to accepting and adjusting to a changed situation, and all sorts of other factors, make it pretty fuzzy.
Yesterday’s post about seeing all this as a game was intended to prepare your mind for the worst. Those who shout “Maranatha” are the same people who long for departure from this world. When you learn to take your personal suffering lightly, and realize with a strong element of fatalism there is only so much you can do for anyone else, then it’s not so hard. You don’t get bogged down in clinging to “necessities” which aren’t actually necessary. You realize there is a God in Heaven and your whole duty is to show His glory by how you handle suffering. The game is all in the playing, not the givens nor the results; the end point is wholly unknown to you.
The hardest part is convincing yourself His glory really is the your best interest. When that becomes more valuable to you than any other thing you can name, you are as ready as any human can be. The ultimate resistance to oppression is not being concerned about it.
Heed what the Spirit says and train your mind to embrace His revelation of Truth.