11 : Abandoned God
We Are Never Abandoned By God: 11 Encouraging Scriptures.2 Corinthians 4:8-9, NLT We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed. We are perplexed, but not driven to despair. We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God. We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed.
11 : Abandoned God
Rev. Dr. Ray Hammond Photo by Kalman Zabarsky But when Hammond described being called -- twice -- his words seemed to resonate fully with the congregation. He painted a picture of the turmoil of his undergraduate days at Harvard, where he arrived from Philadelphia in 1967, and "found it difficult to keep his mind on academic work when there were so many other compelling concerns on the local, national, and international stage. Like many others," he admitted, he "abandoned the God and Christ of his father and mother," finding that "this God seemed unconcerned about issues of justice, and this Christ seemed too European and allied with those who resisted the march toward freedom and equality." And, when everyone was doing his own thing, "neither God nor Christ was much fun."
A recent news story about three newborns abandoned at intervals over several years in the same town, explains that from the time a safe-haven law was passed in the state of California, 182 newborns have been taken to hospitals and police and fire stations (Associated Press, March 28).
It makes me face up to a question: "Shouldn't those of us who have frequently experienced the effects of prayer be doing more to bring this powerful force to bear on this subject of abandoned babies?"
A friend of mine was abandoned as a child and never knew his parents or even his birth date. He lived in foster homes and was abused. But after he found Christian Science, his sense of himself changed radically for the better. One of the things I've found most interesting is that his sense of bitterness, and even his conviction of the darkness of the past, disappeared as he realized that God had never actually been absent from him even in those worst of times. He realized that God's presence was constant for him, then as well as now. 041b061a72