Every Wednesday night during the summer we gather the high school students at a nearby beach for a game of Ultimate Frisbee, BBQ dinner, worship and a lesson from God’s Word. I have really enjoyed our study this summer, Bobby calls it “In-N-Out Evangelism.” Now I realize that some of you might not even be familiar with the culinary delicacy of In-N-Out because you don’t live in California, but I’ve never met anyone who didn’t like it!

My husband’s series wasn’t sparked because he was trying to just be innovative and keep students attention. In-N-Out actually prints references to Bible verses on their paper goods because this fast-food establishment is owned by a Christian family. Since our students love In-N-Out Bobby had the idea to study one of these wrapper references a week and challenge the students to use them as a way to evangelize their unsaved friends.

Printed on the Double-Double wrappers is Nahum 1:7 which says–

This seems like a very encouraging and comforting verse, doesn’t it? Well, we all were challenged took take a look at context last night as Bobby had us read almost all of chapter 1 to get a bigger perspective of the depth of this verse’s meaning. Here is Nahum 1:2, just to give you a glimpse of the tone–

The rest of the chapter goes on to say that God is great in power, will not leave the guilty unpunished, the earth trembles before Him, no one can withstand His indignation and He will pursue His foes into darkness…

Not exactly the warm fuzzy feelings we typically want to have about God. I have a great concern for how people and churches are obsessed with trying to recreate God into our image. People are so insistent on trying to feel good about themselves that they will let their mind accept only the god they feel they are willing to deal with. In the end this is not even God at all.

God is powerful. He is our comforter. His wrath is all consuming. He is patient.
He is the righteous judge. He is gracious. He is jealous. His compassion never fails.

Some of these things seem like they contradict themselves, but as attributes of God they perfectly exist in Him. Someone might want to skip all of Nahum and just cherish verse 7, but that isn’t a full picture of what the verse is saying. Amidst judgment, wrath and vengeance on the wicked–“The Lord is good, a refuge in times of trouble. He cares for those who trust in him.”  Bobby challenged us to be careful that we don’t pull verses out of their context to make them mean something they don’t.

What a powerful backdrop for His goodness and care. So many people want to question God, “Why do bad things happen to good people?” Really we should be asking “Why do good things happen to bad people?” Since the beginning of history mankind has deserved judgment for sin, and yet consider all the good that is daily poured into our lives from God–the sun rises and sets, the rain falls, food, homes, family. Those are even just common ways that God is good to all people. Imagine how good He is and tender the care He gives to those who trust in Him?