2 Peter 3:11-12 GOD’S WORD Translation (GW)
So think of the kind of holy and godly lives you must live as you look forward to the day of God and eagerly wait for it to come.
In the month of January, less than 6 months before I retired from teaching, my stomach started feeling funny and making noises. That night it exploded into full-fledged stomach flu. I slept very little if any. I was feverish. Foul liquids gushed from both ends of my body every hour or so. This continued throughout the next day, slowly abating as I ran out of liquids to expel. I began to hope and pray that this was merely the 24-hour flu that seemed to be going around. I figured I just might be able to endure twenty-four hours of this. I didn’t even try to eat anything that first day. I didn’t want anything: in fact, the very thought of eating was revolting.
The next day, I still ate very little. I sort of tried the BRAT diet. The acronym stands for Bananas, Rice, Apples and … Sylvia and I have always argued about the fourth item: she says Toast, and I say Tea. Anyway, I had a small amount of a blend of a fresh apple and banana that took me most of the morning to get down. That afternoon I ate half a small bowl of soft white rice. In the evening I ate a banana. It took me all of about three hours to get it down. It seemed way too big. The next morning, I weighed 8.2 pounds less than three mornings previously. That’s roughly 4% weight loss. I could be delighted about the weight loss—except that I know by week’s end I will have regained it all.
I was looking forward to getting over the terrible discomfort I felt during this disease. I hoped in the soon coming of relief. I ate and lived strictly with one goal in mind: to endure and hasten the end of the distress. I certainly eagerly awaited the end of the ordeal. I cannot help but ask myself if this is not a parable of Peter’s urging us to order our lives in holy and godly living so we can survive the ordeals of this life and achieve the magnificent end of the ordeal when Christ comes and destroys the evil that continually harasses us.
Lord, thank You for a very uncomfortable object lesson of how to order our lives for Your coming.
