Wealt of biographies

Saturday January 29, 2022

Wealth of biographies

“We therefore also, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, lay aside every burden and the sin that so easily envelops us, and run with perseverance through the trial set before us.” Hebrews 12.1

We love to read the biographies of great people, and some even make it into movies that are often moving and informative. The paths of life are fascinating and, as Christians, we can satisfy this desire to know and this curiosity by reading the biographies of such and such "heroes of the faith", from those whose stories are told in the Bible to the witnesses of Christ today. Twenty centuries of Christianity and thousands of uplifting lives for Christians every day. These more or less complete, more or less long stories of believers of all times allow us to better understand the many aspects of Christian life, with its joys, but also with its struggles. Thus, examples are presented to us not as models, but as aids to carry on the testimony, from generation to generation. These biographies relate above all the interventions of God in all situations and through multiple circumstances. This is to assure us that God works again and again, that His bounty is not exhausted, that His benevolence lasts from century to century, daily. Those who preceded us have overcome many obstacles and demonstrated many victories, which become positive pledges for us, today and tomorrow. All these lives can help us shed light on ours, in addition to the pages of the Bible whose stories sometimes seem too different, too distant from our own history. It is not a question of idolizing or admiring beyond reason the faith and constancy of such and such a faithful witness in a complicated world, but of seizing the possibilities and of considering without fear the difficulties that we may encounter in our discipleship. And never forget that even the great figures of the Bible are beings similar to us, as James writes when he speaks of Elijah : “Elijah was a man of the same nature as us. He prayed earnestly that it wouldn't rain and it didn't rain on the earth for 3 years and 6 months” (James 5. 17).

Source (His Word for Today)