Tsunami  A vivid imagination can be a very good thing. Most, if not all great inventions, lived first in a very creative person’s imagination. If you are familiar with famous inventors like Thomas Edison or Eli Whitney, you know what I’m talking about. They imagined a solution to a problem, and then experimented until they found a way to make their thoughts a reality.

   The problem is that our imaginations can also get us into a lot of trouble. Here is the main danger: Sometimes we use our imaginations to picture what our futures may be like by using a series of “What if?” questions.

   You know how it goes. Life gets difficult, and then we imagine the next bad thing that might come next. We begin to string together a series of “What if?” scenarios that wind up fueling a lot of fear and worry.

   Think about it this way. As we gaze at possible coming disasters, the future begins to look more and more like the rising wall of a tsunami that is about to come crashing down on us at any moment. Maybe it’s that kind of thinking that led to the wisecrack: “Life stinks, then you die.”

   I can think of only two methods of handling that feeling of an impending “tsunami.” Denial is the first one. People use different ways to distract themselves from their threatening futures. They use things like entertainment, extreme busyness, meditation, or just retreating into a fantasy world where nothing bad happens.

   There is a much better solution. We find it described in Isaiah 43:1-3.

   “But now, thus says the Lord, your Creator… ‘Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name; you are Mine! When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, nor will the flame burn you. For I am the Lord your God, The Holy One of Israel, your Savior….”

   I appreciate the honesty of the Bible. It doesn’t promise that we will never go through life’s waters, rivers, or fires. The promise is that they will NOT overwhelm us. That is a very comforting guarantee, but notice that God’s promises don’t belong to everybody.

   It is important to know that there are some conditions (underlined in the verse above) that must be true in our lives before we can claim these promises for ourselves. Look at the Bible verses again. God’s assurance of a bearable future only belongs to those who acknowledge that He is the Creator, to those who have been redeemed (forgiven) by God, and to those who have an ongoing personal relationship with Him. The good news is that this is possible for everyone reading this article.

   You can begin a real relationship with your Creator today. The Bible says that can happen when “you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead,

[then] you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. For the Scripture says, ‘Whoever believes in Him will not be disappointed’ ” (Romans 10:9–11).

   The future holds no dread for a follower of Christ. Author and Pastor Erwin Lutzer explained it this way: “When you come to Christ, you do not come to give, you come to receive. You do not come to try your best, you come to trust. You do not come just to be helped, but to be rescued. You do not come to be made better (although that does happen); you come to be made alive!”

   I hope you are able to claim Isaiah 43:1-3 as your own personal promise. If you have any further questions, please contact me, and I’ll do whatever I can to encourage you.