Consent

Then call on me when you are in trouble, and I will rescue you, and you will give me glory. – Psalm 50:15

As the growing number of consent cases rise in the UK, campaigners are calling for new laws to combat this increase. More and more young adults are falling victim to the pressures of such assaults, and in the worst case, can lead to death, like in the case of 21-year-old Gillian Millane. As more high profile cases of historic and prolonged instances of abuse come to light, we find ourselves in times of heightened anxiety, uncertainty and fear. As we have entered the final month of the year, do you find yourself in a space filled with uncertainty and fear? Has something been taken from you without your permission?

Consent is described as ‘when one person voluntarily agrees to the proposal or desires of another’. In other words , it is the permission for something to happen. We live in times now more so than ever when the ideas of freedoms to make a choice in all areas of our lives are perpetuated and being discussed openly. But what if you haven’t given permission?

Job was a man in the bible who is described as ‘blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil’ (Job 1:21). The beginning of Jobs story and life resembles that of a fairy tale. He was an archetypal man of God who had it all. He was wealthy and had the ‘big house and picket fence’ as it would be described if it was in our time. He was the man that everyone looked up to, but all that changed when his fairy tale came to an end and the devil attacked him.

In the space of one day, Job lost everything, his wife, children, cattle., friends and his health. He was struck down with painful boils from head to toe and lying down was excruciating. Here was a man who had done everything right, hadn’t fallen into taking drugs, wasn’t part of a gang, didn’t move in wrong crowds, wasn’t fornicating and wasn’t hanging around on the street. But everything he had known and acquired had been ripped from his hands, and he hadn’t given permission for it to happen.

But in everything, God is working. Job was delivered from his season of misery. Though everything around him including his friends, were telling him to give up, to call it quits, to stop relying on God and accept his circumstances, Job knew the God he served and knew he would be delivered. Therefore this week, although it may feel like everything around you is imploding without your consent, God is at work and just like he did Job and many more others, he will deliver you.