Facing Life's Challenges

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Tuck Facing Life’s Ups and Downs

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In Facing Life’s Ups and Downs, William Tuck makes the important connection between religion and daily living. Our Christian faith is not reduced to worshiping on Sundays and participating in private devotions, as important as those disciplines are; our religion is about how we relate to God and other people. Our faith can help us deal with circumstances that try to twist and distort our perspective, bearing us safely over the angry current to the shore on the other side.

Transcript of Facing Life's Challenges

Page 1: Facing Life's Challenges

Christian Living

TuckFacing Life’s Ups and Downs

All of us have known anger, fear, depression, anxiety, or other dark times.Coming to grips with our moods or the low places of life can seem insur-mountable, but Christians need not give way to despair or feel hopelesslydetermined by moods or circumstances.

In Facing Life’s Ups and Downs, William Tuck makes the importantconnection between religion and daily living. Our Christian faith is notreduced to worshiping on Sundays and participating in private devotions, asimportant as those disciplines are; our religion is about how we relate to Godand other people. Our faith can help us deal with circumstances that try totwist and distort our perspective, bearing us safely over the angry current tothe shore on the other side.

We follow a Lord who said he came that we might have life and have itmore abundantly. Christ offers us life at its highest and best. As we turn tohim for support and guidance, we discover a resource that undergirds andsustains us in the most difficult and trying times. Our faith strengthens us tomeet the struggles we confront.

�William Powell Tuck, a native of Virginia, has been a pastor inVirginia, Kentucky, Louisiana and North Carolina. He has also been aseminary professor and has taught adjunctively at several colleges andat the Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond. He is the author ofseventeen books, including Our Baptist Tradition, The CompellingFaces of Jesus, The Lord’s Prayer Today and The Ten Commandments:Their Meaning Today. He received the Parish Pastor of the Year awardfrom the Academy of Parish Clergy in 1997 and an honorary Doctorof Divinity degree from the University of Richmond. He is married toEmily Campbell and is the father of two children and has four grand-children. He resides in Midlothian, Virginia.

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Chapter 1

LIFE GETS SO DAILY

A medical doctor spoke to a friend one day, saying, “There is a diseasewhich no knife or drugs can touch.” “Oh, you mean cancer,” the manresponded. “Oh, no. That’s not it,” the doctor said. “We are going toget that devil or devils one day. I mean boredom.”

It is astonishing how many people suffer from boredom. We hearyoung people say, “Oh, I’m so bored!” But this problem is not con-fined to the young. Sooner or later, most of us discover that much oflife is monotonous, routine, and daily. We must repeat certain tasksagain and again. Young men and women dream of going to college topursue lofty educational goals. At a distance, the pursuit of knowledgeseems like an exciting adventure. Then they go to school and realizethat their education entails sitting in class and listening to lecturesweek after week, reading book after book, writing paper after paper,and taking test after test. The pursuit of knowledge grows routine,monotonous. Some people dream of becoming doctors, lawyers,bankers, dentists, teachers, accountants, or some other kind of profes-sional, and they launch their preparation to get the proper academiccredentials. After they complete their preparation, however, they soondiscover that they must follow certain routines every day and week toaccomplish their jobs. For many, no matter how exciting their jobsseemed at the beginning, soon they become monotonous and daily.

Some people dream of getting married. Before they wed, theydrive miles to see their loved ones, covering each other with roses and

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affection. Everything seems marvelous. Then they get married, andthe monotony of life sets in. They discover the necessity of dailychores. Babies arrives, and there are diapers to change, washing andironing to do, food to cook, dishes to clean, garbage to carry out, ayard to cut, and a hundred other jobs to complete to keep the house-hold moving. The routine changes a couple’s perspective from FantasyIsland to Kroger and Sears and Roebuck. Marriage gets tough anddaily.

BOREDOM: A CAUSE FOR PROBLEMS

Boredom may be the root of many problems in our society. Out of adeep sense of boredom with their lives, some people turn to alcoholfor excitement and eventually become alcoholics. They can’t deal withthe routines of life. Many young people become delinquents andbegin lives of crime because they are bored. “I have nothing to do,”they say. Many marital affairs are a result of one partner becomingbored with marriage. Their everyday existence is so routine that theycan’t stand it. They seek to find excitement in their lives someplaceelse.

A PESSIMISTIC VOICE

The writer of the book of Ecclesiastes seems familiar with the problemof boredom (3:1-11). From his vantage point, life is hard. This pes-simistic writer declares, “All is vanity and vexation of spirit.” This is acry of the boredom born out of despair. Others have fallen into thetrap of seeing life as too daily and boring. I saw a postcard that showeda snail on top of a large ball. The inscription on the card read, “Slowlybut surely I’m getting nowhere!” A lot of folks feel that way.

In a Hagar the Horrible comic strip by Dik Browne, Hagar’s wifestands over him while he sits in a chair with a mug of beer in his hand.She holds a bucket in one hand and a mop in the other. A large basketof dirty laundry is behind her. “Remember how you said I’d live a lifeof luxury as soon as your ship came in?” she asks. “Yes,” Hagarresponds as he drinks with his feet propped up. “It sank, didn’t it?” she

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observes.1 Many people think their ships have sunk. I saw a “DeadEnd” street sign where someone had written the words, “What isn’t?”Many people see everything in life as a dead end. They ask, “What isthe point? Life is so routine, monotonous, mundane, and daily. Whatis the point?”

THE POSITIVE APPROACH (JOHN 4:3-39)

We all struggle with the problem of boredom at some time or another,especially as we get older. John’s Gospel speaks to this issue. In John 4,Jesus had to go through Samaria. The words “had to go throughSamaria” in John’s usage is a theological description, not geographical.Jesus could have bypassed Samaria, as most other Jewish people did.In the country of Palestine, Galilee lies at the north and Judea is situ-ated in the south. Samaria lay between these two regions on the120-mile strip of land. Because of their hatred of Samaritans, mostJewish travelers went around Samaria instead of “through” it. As Jesustraveled through the area, he came to the town of Sychar and sat downat Jacob’s well, the city’s water supply. A Samaritan soon came to getwater from the well, and she and Jesus began a conversation. This pas-sage teaches us four lessons about overcoming monotony: the need towait, the importance of routine, the significance of a different perspec-tive, and the result of a changed life.

LIFE GETS SO DAILY 3

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Christian Living

TuckFacing Life’s Ups and Downs

All of us have known anger, fear, depression, anxiety, or other dark times.Coming to grips with our moods or the low places of life can seem insur-mountable, but Christians need not give way to despair or feel hopelesslydetermined by moods or circumstances.

In Facing Life’s Ups and Downs, William Tuck makes the importantconnection between religion and daily living. Our Christian faith is notreduced to worshiping on Sundays and participating in private devotions, asimportant as those disciplines are; our religion is about how we relate to Godand other people. Our faith can help us deal with circumstances that try totwist and distort our perspective, bearing us safely over the angry current tothe shore on the other side.

We follow a Lord who said he came that we might have life and have itmore abundantly. Christ offers us life at its highest and best. As we turn tohim for support and guidance, we discover a resource that undergirds andsustains us in the most difficult and trying times. Our faith strengthens us tomeet the struggles we confront.

�William Powell Tuck, a native of Virginia, has been a pastor inVirginia, Kentucky, Louisiana and North Carolina. He has also been aseminary professor and has taught adjunctively at several colleges andat the Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond. He is the author ofseventeen books, including Our Baptist Tradition, The CompellingFaces of Jesus, The Lord’s Prayer Today and The Ten Commandments:Their Meaning Today. He received the Parish Pastor of the Year awardfrom the Academy of Parish Clergy in 1997 and an honorary Doctorof Divinity degree from the University of Richmond. He is married toEmily Campbell and is the father of two children and has four grand-children. He resides in Midlothian, Virginia.