China is having a bad typhoon, and millions have had to be evacuated.
I have been in one typhoon in northern Japan with 135 mph winds, weeks of rain, trees uprooted, no power or heat and water everywhere.
My younger brother helped with feeding 30,000 people in one day, when a hurricane hit our country. Many people were taken to shelters, homes, churches or benevolent facilities. Many were thankful and very appreciative for what was done for them or for the attempts that were made to help. But that was not the case for all.
I have heard eyewitness accounts where some people became drunk, disorderly and insulted or abused the people trying to help. They also trashed (destroyed) the places where they were staying and some so bad they could not use the facilities any more.
The two and totally different responses remind me of something the Bible talks about.
First the Bible says God loves us very much.
1 John 4:19 We love because he first loved us.
Second, He has provided a way of helping us.
1 John 4:10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Just as many did not respond to the help offered, or they abused that help. We might be treating God the same way. The Bible is very clear that there are those in those situations who will look to God and find help or others who will just turn their noses up to that help.
Revelation 22:11-12 Let the evildoer still do evil, and the filthy still be filthy, and the righteous still do right, and the holy still be holy.
See you in Church next Sunday.