Have you ever been in a significant earthquake? I have experienced a couple of little ones where you wondered if it really was an earthquake. You notice the chandelier moving a bit so you turn on the TV, and sure enough it was an earthquake. But I have also been in a fairly big one. The Nisqually quake of 2001 was a 6.8 and got my attention. I was in the office and suddenly it sounded like someone was banging on the door. It was sudden and I was the only one in the building so I my brain was trying to make sense of who would be messing with me trying to scare my by banging on the door. When it kept going my brain put it together with the other things I was experiencing, but by the time I got it all figured out, it was over. Other than a broken decoration or two we didn’t really experience any damage. But they tell us that we should be prepared for “The Big One.”
Earthquakes are relatively rare (unless you are unfortunate enough to live in a fracking area), but something that can be even more devastating is all too common; a lifequake. Lifequakes are those events whether they are from inner struggles or external circumstances like a death or a crime, which shake your whole life up. They are the kind of thing that you don’t walk away from unchanged in some way. They happen to all walks of life, and are fairly unpredictable, other than the realization that we will probably at one point or another experience one.
All sorts of things are done to prepare for earthquakes but seldom do people prepare for lifequakes. What can you do when they just seem to come out of nowhere? The writer of Hebrews suggests that the heavens and earth will be shaken and all that will remain will be what is eternal. Maybe there are some things that can be done after all?! Maybe in our preparation we can indeed be ready for the Big One, and become unshakable.
This week we start a new sermon series “Unshakable” and we will be talking about the encouragements that we find in scripture that help us become unshakable. The Big One is coming, are you ready?
See you at church!
Pastor Chris
