The world around us is getting uglier and by that I mean, disgusting.
Any person still in their right mind has winced at the plethora of photos and images plastered for attention by all the media sources. When evil is called 'good' and then put on parade the result is a society in chaos and Chaos comes somewhere on the timeline after Decline. It’s enough to create fear in the hearts of the faithful or worse—despair.
But a quick read through the New Testament epistles which were written, by the way, during Rome’s dominance, we can see that in that era of depravity and debauchery the Church went about their Kingdom building business without any hesitation.
Apostles, Paul, Peter, and Jude never describe how armed or formidable the Gates of Hell might appear. Their confidence in the Gospel’s power is utterly childish. When it comes to their assurance in God they, in a word, believe.
The culture in which they lived and served God was much darker than ours—even though ours is rapidly catching up. But ugly didn’t faze them.
And it is here where we find the power. When engaging the world around us we confess that we were ugly and still act ugly. We then tell them about the Ugly of all uglies. We talk about Jesus who was perfect and pure and innocent and good, and about His taking upon himself the sin of the world and becoming the most disgusting spectacle that will ever mar God’s green earth.
We meet Depravity and Stench on the battlefield and out-ugly them with the Cross and with our honest confession.
In a fallen world still falling, God got ugly in order to make the world beautiful.
