Charles R. Swindoll - Clinging to Hope: What Scripture Says about Weathering Times of Trouble, Chaos, and Calamity

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Clinging to Hope: What Scripture Says about Weathering Times of Trouble, Chaos, and Calamity

Copyright 2022 by Charles Swindoll. All rights reserved.

Cover photograph of person copyright borchee/iStockphoto. All rights reserved.

Cover photograph of rainbow by Agustin Gunawan on Unsplash.

Designed by Julie Chen

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Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked NASB are taken from the (NASB) New American Standard Bible, copyright 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.lockman.org.

Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

ISBN 978-1-4964-3538-5 (hc)

ISBN 978-1-4964-3539-2 (sc)

ISBN 978-1-4964-3541-5 (ePub); ISBN 978-1-4964-3540-8 (Kindle); ISBN 978-1-4964-3542-2 (Apple)

Build: 2022-10-03 15:46:19 EPUB 3.0

It is with much admiration and appreciation that I dedicate this book to our two daughters:
Charissa Ann Gaither and Colleen Alissa Thompson.

Both of them have experienced numerous trials, major disappointments, anguishing pain, and personal heartaches. They have endured them all with great grace and without losing their sense of humor. Their mother and I love them deeply and have a respect for them that knows no bounds.

O NE THING I VE NOTICED IN RECENT YEARS is that people have no margin. More and more, people from all walks of life seem to be living on the ragged edge of chaos.

• one financial crisis away from bankruptcy
• one blowup away from relational collapse
• one temptation away from moral failure
• one calamity away from emotional meltdown
• one illness away from physical breakdown
• one doubt away from apostasy

If chaos and calamity havent found you yet, its only a matter of time before they do. When not if that happens to you, where will you go for strength to endure and for hope to carry on? None of us is exempt from the sudden trials and lingering tribulations of life. None of us.

Throughout 2020 and in the early months of 2021, it seemed everybody around me was dealing with their own calamities. They rolled in like a storm, stopped people in their tracks, and left their victims feeling helpless and even hopeless.

This reality hit hard while I was working on this very book. For about eight months, I lost sight in one eye. It was like a dust storm had blown in from the Texas Panhandle and obscured my vision. With one eye out of commission, the complications began to domino. My depth perception evaporated, and my night vision weakened. That made driving exciting. Needless to say, my passengers suggested I give up driving for a while.

Others around me faced their own trials.

A very close friend of mine had to be rushed to the ER in an ambulance. It turned out he not only tested positive for COVID-19 but also had pneumonia, bronchitis, and strep! They got him to the hospital just in time, but that quartet of troubles could have easily done him in. Im sure we could all close our eyes and picture people who didnt fare as well as my friend did.

Another friend of mine had his daily life come to a screeching halt during the infamous Texas Icepocalypse in February 2021. Historic below-freezing temperatures combined with lost power caused a pipe in his home to freeze and burst, flooding his downstairs. In the months it took to repair the damaged house and replace ruined property, everything in his life was put on hold. When something like that T-bones your life, you never really catch up, do you?

I know people who have spent their last cent of borrowed optimism struggling against cancer. They suffered through aggressive chemotherapy, gathered prayer warriors around them who pleaded their case before God, and gripped hope with numb fingers while their suffering tried to rip that hope from them like a thief. Then they went in for a checkup and heard crushing news. Instead of the tumor shrinking, it metastasized. Perhaps you know all too well what that ride home was like or what dinner around the table felt like that evening. How easy to just give up on hope in days of deep disappointment and despair!

Were living in some tough days, friends. Sudden calamities hit us like nuclear meltdowns. The disaster itself is bad enough. But the aftermath and desolation can linger for years even decades.

All of us are in desperate need of strength and hope. Life is difficult and demanding. Its often filled with pain, heartache, setbacks, and detours. Our disappointment in others saddens us. Scandals among those we respect shock us. Disputes in our families, churches, or workplaces demoralize us. When such troubles strike, they can be downright devastating.

But they dont have to be!

We can endure unexpected calamities. How? By taking our stand on the strong foundation of Gods Word. When trials and tribulations rumble in like a fleet of bulldozers to demolish our lives, we can emerge from the rubble with a strong resolve to recover and rebuild. We dont have to settle for merely surviving; we can set our sights on thriving.

Our good, powerful, awesome God is inviting each of us to run to Him as our only strong tower, which can never teeter or topple.

In Him alone, we can find the strength and hope to endure.

Wisdom When You Face Long-Term Suffering

S OME TROUBLES COME AND GO like occasional spring storms that keep you huddled at home for a day or so but eventually blow over. When the sun peeks through the clouds again, life goes on. No harm done.

Other times, though, troubles come and stay like fierce hurricanes that not only ravage our lives but leave long-term wreckage in their wake. I know people in my home state of Texas whove suffered total loss from merciless Gulf Coast hurricanes, resulting in years of hardship and heartache from which they have never seemed to recover. Weve all known days, weeks even months or years when our particular troubles refused to go away. Instead of waning with time, they intensified or even multiplied!

Sometimes we feel like these immortal words of Shakespeare have been permanently inscribed on our lives: a wretched soul, bruised with adversity. Those bruises dont always show up on our skin. They may mar our relationships, crush our spirit, dim our hope, or drag us into the mire of emotional misery. Troubles that affect us this deeply dont just come and go. They get even more complicated.