NEWS

If there is anything the world needs it is good news. I feel like I am suffering from bad news overload. The cable news channels love to get their hands on bad news. Earlier this year I thought  my life was over along with millions of other poor souls when the pandemic was making its rounds. Have you noticed how everything now is breaking news? It used to be that only major events like the explosion of the Space Shuttle or the shooting of President Reagan was breaking news. Now, everything is breaking news. Breaking news…It’s April! Breaking news…eating quarter pounders makes you gain weight! Breaking news…the Sun is hot.

I am tired of the news. Everything is a big deal, everything is bad, everything is exploited, and everything is overblown. In fact, I wish that during the Lenten season I would have decided to give up listening or reading the news. That would have done wonders for my soul.

The ironic part is that all of the bad news doesn’t really impact me  because I have been exposed to so much. The starving children in the Sudan…the Aids epidemic in Africa…the orphans in Haiti…the death in Chile. Why does this unbelievable suffering not bother me more? I can watch the news about the orphans in Haiti and the next minute go outside with my kids like I have never heard the news. I can eat dinner and never even think about the 7 year old child in the Sudan that has not eaten for a week. After seeing the news, how can I as a follower of Jesus not care more than I do?

1 Peter 2:23-25 (New International Version)
When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. For you were like sheep going astray, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

It is Good Friday. Finally, I hear some good news. By the wounds of Jesus we are healed. I hope that this will be news that changes what I do.