How to Survive a Crisis? Part 2
What is a crisis?
A time of great disagreement, confusion, or suffering, experiencing a time of great difficulty, danger, or suffering.
The definition of a crisis is a turning point or a difficult or dark time when disasters are happening or when tough decisions must be made.
It is something you are nor responsible for. Something you did not cause, you cannot control it, cannot blame someone else for it.
Satan delights in causing “panic attacks” in a crisis
In neurological terms, crisis signals our brain’s fight, flight, or freeze response.
What can you control?
- Your thinking processes.
You are in control of your thinking process. You are in control of your perception of what is happening. You cannot control a crisis, but what you can control is how you think about it.
You can turn a molehill into a mountain or you can turn a mountain into a molehill.
Philippians 4:8(ESV) “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.”
Romans 12:2 ESV “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect”
2 Corinthians 10:5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
Proverbs 23:7 says, As he [a man] thinks in his heart, so is he. I like to say it like this: Where the mind goes, the man follows.
2. When you enter a crisis be incredibly careful how you speak.
Whatever you call or label a thing, that is what it is to you. You control what you name a thing. Whatever a thing is to you controls your response to it.
We read about a couple who were childless in 2 Kings 4:8. Later God promised this couple a son. God delivered on that promise, and the woman gave birth to a son. One day during a harvest season, the couple’s son fell sick in the fields where his father was working. The father sent the young man to his mother by one of the servants, and later that day, the son died! She arose to go to Elisha on behalf of her dead son. When her husband questioned her, she said, “It is well”
2 Kings 4:23 (NKJV) “So he said, “Why are you going to him today? It is neither the New Moon nor the Sabbath.” And she said,“It is well.”
Her son was dead, but this mother declared, “It is well”! She immediately run to Elisha, the prophet of God. When Elisha saw her coming, he instructed his servant, “Run now, to meet her, and say unto her, Is it well with thee? is it well with thy husband? is it well with the child? And she answered, “everything is fine” What a bold statement under these circumstances?
2 Kings 4:26 “Run out to meet her and ask her, ‘Is everything all right with you, your husband, and your child?’” “Yes,” the woman told Gehazi, “everything is fine.”
Although she knew that her son was dead, she kept believing in the promise. Remember, the son was a promise of God. She believed that God was bigger than her problem. And she refused to let go of her faith, which was so powerfully echoed by three simple words: “It is well!”
2 Kings 4:36 “So he called her. And when she came in to him, he said, “Pick up your son.” 37 So she went in, fell at his feet, and bowed to the ground; then she picked up her son and went out.”
The outcome, the son lived. This woman refused to allow the promise to die.
Although, Abraham was faced with a similar situation, he kept believing the promise of God.
Hebrews 11:17-19 (AMP) “By faith Abraham, when he was tested [that is, as the testing of his faith was still in progress], offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises [of God] was ready to sacrifice his only son ; 18 to whom it was said, “Through Isaac your descendants shall be called.” 19 For he considered [it reasonable to believe] that God was able to raise Isaac even from among the dead. [Indeed, in the sense that he was prepared to sacrifice Isaac in obedience to God] Abraham did receive him back figuratively speaking.”
The sickness is not to the death. Let’s go and awake him. What do you call it. What is your response to life?
Proverbs 18:21 Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.
Isaiah 55:11 So shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
Psalm 19:14 NASB
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my rock and my Redeemer.
3. Controlled perception is not the denial of reality but the control of one’s response to reality
We are not saying there is no crisis. Our interpretation of this is different.
All things work together for my good. Romans 8:28 (NLT) 28 And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them
This is one of the most misquoted and misunderstood passages in the Bible. It doesn’t say, “God causes everything to work out the way I want it to.”
Obviously that’s not true. It also doesn’t say, “God causes everything to work out to have a happy ending on earth.” That is not true either. There are many unhappy endings on earth.
We live in a fallen world. Only in heaven is everything done perfectly the way God intends.
To fully understand Romans 8:28–29 you must consider it phrase by phrase.
“We know”: Our hope in difficult times is not based on positive thinking, wishful thinking, or natural optimism. It is a certainty based on the truths that God is in complete control of our universe and that he loves us.
“that God causes”: There’s a Designer behind everything. Your life is not a result of random chance, fate, or luck. There is a master plan. History is His story. God is pulling the strings. We make mistakes, but God never does. God cannot make a mistake—because he is God.
“everything”: God’s plan for your life involves all that happens to you— Including your mistakes, your sins, and your hurts. It includes illness, debt, disasters, divorce, and death of loved ones. God can bring good out of the worst evil. He did at Calvary.
“to work together”: Not separately or independently. The events in your life work together in God’s plan. They are not isolated acts, but interdependent parts of the process to make you like Christ. To bake a cake you must use flour, salt, raw eggs, sugar, and oil. Eaten individually, each is pretty distasteful or even bitter. But bake them together and they become delicious. If you will give God all your distasteful, unpleasant experiences, he will blend them together for good.
“for the good”: This does not say that everything in life is good. Much of what happens in our world is evil and bad, but God specializes in bringing good out of it. God’s purpose is greater than our problems, our pain, and even our sin.
“of those who love God and are called”: This promise is only for God’s children. It is not for everyone. All things work for bad for those living in opposition to God and insist on having their own way.
“according to his purpose”: What is that purpose? It is that we “become like his Son.” Everything God allows to happen in your life is permitted for that purpose!
4. Crisis is simply a change in the environment that demands a new response.
A crisis can prompt progression in a new direction.
A response you haven’t scheduled. You must respond differently. A new way to respond. It introduces the end of traditions. A crisis needs a new response.
In Chinese, the word “crisis” is composed of two characters. One represents danger, and the other represents opportunity.’ Every crisis is, at the same time, an opportunity.
All of us have problems. Many of us will face crisises. How do we respond to a time of trouble, danger or great difficulty? What do we do about a crisis in our personal lives?
Isaiah 43:19 Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.