President's Message April 2021

“On Miracles” by Susan St. Peters
Recently, I met a man who witnessed a miracle, an undeniable, medically documented miracle that cannot be explained away. Patsy, the wife of this man, Ron, was suddenly stricken with full-blown herpes simplex encephalitis, a debilitating, brain-destroying disease; doctors gave her a less than 10% chance of surviving the disease and said that if she did, she would be severely impaired.
Nonetheless, Ron prayed and heard God’s promise that his wife would be healed. In obedience to God and showing what one ministry leader called “audacious faith,” Ron rented ad space on billboards all over Georgia, publicly thanking God for his wife’s healing before she had actually been healed. People told Ron that he was crazy, but he knew what he had heard. Taking a step of faith, Ron ordered a new car for his wife in January, when she was in a coma, and in December of that same year, she was able to drive that car home from the hospital. Ron and Patsy’s story is amazing and faith-affirming.
In the same week, a member of my own family has undergone a tragic accident. My great-niece, Rebekah (age 16) was working on the family ranch when her hand was smashed between a chunk of concrete and the backhoe. The middle finger on her left hand was severely damaged at the third joint. The nail was removed, the bone was chipped off at the end, and the surgeon reattached the skin and pad after trying to mend the bone. However, the blood flow did not return to the fingertip, so part of her finger had to be removed at the knuckle.
Rebekah is a godly young woman who loves playing the piano, learning the guitar, quilting, sewing, and doing all things industrious. Does the fact that she was not miraculously healed mean that God’s love for her (and her family) is less than God’s love for Ron and his wife and family? Not in the least! As God has knit every fiber of our beings together, restoring a damaged finger is no harder than mending a diseased brain, yet God heals in some instances while withholding healing in others. And who knows that the fact that she did not lose her whole hand or suffer some worse injury was not, in itself, miraculous?
What do these two contrasting stories have to do with anything? In this springtime season of new life and hope, our circumstances as Americans, particularly as Californians, can look anything but hopeful. I find myself combing the conservative news outlets, think tanks, and blogs looking for good news but finding precious little. And then it hits me: hope does not reside in circumstances! While we can (and should) be thankful for good circumstances and any good news that comes our way, our God is good all the time, and He is greater than our circumstances.
Once I get my perspective correctly adjusted (recognizing that I serve a good God who wants to give me a “future and a hope” as promised in Jeremiah 29:11), I begin to see not just my situation but everything through different eyes. Plenty of negatives still exist, but much good that I had overlooked or brushed aside as insignificant now takes on new importance.
Additionally, I can choose to become encouraged by those willing to call out the falsity, anti-conservative bias, and outright wickedness of big tech and the mainstream media; those standing up to Cancel Culture; and those fighting against the heinous critical race theory and sex education curricula being used to indoctrinate and victimize our children and who willingly face the ire of the “woke” and of the powerful teachers’ unions. I’m encouraged by those who remind us of the freedoms this country was founded on and why we must not surrender those freedoms today, even under the guise of “security.” I’m encouraged by those who faithfully declare Truth in the midst of those who call for the “re-education” and even the eradication of people of faith.
Among those aforementioned encouragers are YOU, my fellow San Clemente Area Republican Women Federated Members and Associate Members. I am encouraged by your passionate defense of righteousness and by your willingness to speak out to help preserve our way of life and the liberties we have been granted by our Constitution.
As we celebrate this Easter, Passover, and spring season, may we go forward with an “attitude of gratitude” and a renewed hope that enables us to see beyond our circumstances, reminded that, while we don’t see the whole picture, we can find comfort and confidence in the words of Psalm 46:
1 God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.
2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
3 though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.
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7 The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
When we don’t see a hoped-for miracle, we must remember that the God of miracles hasn’t changed. His answer for now may be “No” or “Wait,” but He hasn’t abandoned us. In Galatians 6:9, believers are admonished, “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” So let’s persevere; as we do, we may experience the miraculous.