No people have ever had so much and appreciated it so little as Christians in America. We belong to a privileged few who have been able to carry Bibles, attend church and live for Christ without fear of imprisonment or the loss of our lives. Other Christians in other centuries or in other lands have often paid with their lives or freedom for identifying with the Saviour.

Because of the persecutions brought by communistic governments, it is generally agreed that there have been more Christian martyrs in this century than in any other. Still Christians in America have been virtually untouched.

How strange it is then that we are so given to complaining! We gripe about so many things: the weather, our jobs, our wives or husbands, our homes, our churches, our pastors, our health, etc. What would we do if things were really difficult?

This question raises a frightening thought! If we are edgy in affluence, may God have to chasten us to allow us to see what blessings we have been experiencing? Must goods and loved ones be taken away before we appreciate them? Must freedom flee before we realize its importance?

One winter morning I was walking through a blizzard to my office and complaining silently about the storm. When I stepped inside my office my eyes fell on a tiny book in my library, entitled Come Wind Come Weather. Immediately my grumbling ceased, for the book I saw upon entering that warm room is the story of the persecution of the church in China. Our storms here are few. Thank God for freedom!