I have no idea how to play Bridge. (Technically, I think the game is called ‘Contract Bridge’ - not that I care that much about semantics.)

I’ve seen it played a few times. I’ve heard people talking about it a few times. I’ve even watched a couple videos on YouTube. I still don’t fully get it. To me, the game play of Bridge seems needlessly complex and over the top. First, there’s a bidding stage that’s apparently a very important part of the game (coulda fooled me). Then, there’s a trick taking stage where one player’s hand is completely open to everybody else (you know, for the scenic touch). Finally, there’s a scoring system that seems so foreign to me that it may as well be a three thousand year old dead language once spoken on the Asian Steppe. 

I have no idea how to play Bridge, and I can’t seem to figure it out. Plus, when I watch others play I get the very strange sensation that I don’t know a secret everyone else is in on. I don’t know what’s being dealt, I don’t know the value of the cards, and I don’t know what we’re all bidding on.

And I’m betting that most of us feel that way about life in general right now. Recently I heard a commentator state the living during this pandemic is like someone forcing you to play a card game that you don’t know - you don’t know what the rules are, you don’t know what the value of the cards are, you don’t know what’s being dealt.

 I think that’s a very astute observation about life right now.

 Many of us feel rudderless, like we don’t know how to steer or what to even aim for. This pandemic keeps going on and on and on and on...and we find ourselves seated at a game where we don’t know the impact of our everyday decisions. This is uncertainty at the level of daily prescription. It is very unpleasant.

So, to counteract this, I’d like to give you another daily prescription: God’s Word. It is through His Word that we are reminded of how our God is in control of everything. It is in His Word that we see God promising and then delivering on joy and salvation and protection for His people. If you read the Psalm you’ll see that more than once David had to sit down to play a game he didn’t know, being dealt things he didn’t understand. God got him through it. In Acts you see Paul facing daily uncertainty over and over again. God got him through. For though the Pandemic seemingly goes on and on and on - our God’s love and protection goes farther.

I still have no idea how to play Bridge. 

I do, however, have an excellent prescription to cover that - as well as all of life’s other worries - God’s Word. 

Take daily.

 

Pastor Joshua Zarling



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