WEDNESDAY WISDOM

from Tractatus Politicus (1st published 1676) by Baruch Spinoza:

I have strived not to laugh at human actions, not to weep at them, not to hate them, but to understand them.

 

Poetry in Motion

So another year has passed into the history books, and you’re another year older. Look back at where you were when 2012 ended and 2013 began: what has the passage of time made of you – or rather, what have you made of it? What have you done with this most recent chapter of your life? What have you accomplished?

Because you were created to accomplish something. You exist for a purpose.

We all, Americans in particular, live in a world that has been described as performance oriented, “dog eat dog,” a world were “winning isn’t everything – it’s the only thing.” The vast majority of people don’t care how you feel; they care what you do.

We don’t like to believe God takes that attitude, but he does – not to the idolatrous extreme of our fellow man, no, but he is very much invested in our performance.

Do you object? Dig back into Scripture, then, and reflect on the Israelites’ commission to possess the Holy Land, and divine displeasure with their failure to do so in a timely and appropriate fashion. Reread the Great Commission. There are literally hundreds of examples in the Bible of the Lord telling his people to do things in his name (that is, in his authority) and for his name’s sake (for his reputation). Both collectively and individually, the Holy One has given and still gives us tasks to accomplish, and it should be our ambition to discover and to do them.

Ambition has a bad reputation in certain circles, even within Christendom, but it is never condemned in the Bible. What it instead censures is selfish ambition (e.g. Galatians 5.20, Philippians 2.3, James 3.16), two words in English but a single word in the original Greek meaning “electioneering” or “intrigue.” Whereas that is to be shunned, ambition, in the positive sense, is praised.

Do you remember the little tempest that erupted two years ago with the publication of Amy Chua’s book on authoritarian parenting? The self-professed “Tiger Mother” has a new book, to be released next month, on success and achievement. She and her co-author have found that those who do the best have three traits in common: self-control, feelings of superiority, and simultaneously (and counter-intuitively) feelings of inferiority.

Self-control is a Biblical virtue, of course – but would it surprise you to think the other two are as well?

You ARE a superior being, if the Lord has adopted you into his family and his Spirit has come to reside within you. A child of the King of the Universe, you are, nonetheless, an inferior being, prone to disobey your King, lapsing back to your old ways, a worm who brings nothing of intrinsic value to his Kingdom. As the inimitable C.S. Lewis put it in Prince Caspian,

“I was wishing that I came of a more honourable lineage.”
“You come of the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve,” said Aslan. “And that is both honour enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth. Be content.”

Any virtue can become a vice if it is taken to an obsessive extreme. Don’t allow these two to become pathological. Egos too inflated or deflated eventually become tyrants. Kept in balance, staying mindful that you are simultaneously nothing and something, both worthy and worthless, honest humility and righteous pride aid you to be and do what you have been called to be and do.

It is not for no reason that the word “vocation” (that is, the work you do) derived from the Latin word for “calling” – which in our culture now strictly refers to religious service. An often overlooked part of the Protestant Reformation was the exaltation of ordinary labor. Calvin, Luther, Zwingli and others all affirmed in their own ways what the Apostle Paul so eloquently wrote in the second chapter of Ephesians:

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

We do not work towards our salvation; it is a gift none deserve and none can earn. But the gift, once received, compels us to work – in fact, the lack of any such a compulsion may indicate the gift has never been received at all.

Interestingly, as selfish ambition is in contrast to godly ambition, just so in the Bible “works” and “good works” are opposed to each other. Furthering the word play, “workmanship” in the Greek is poiema, from whence we get our word poem.

What is a poem? It is a composition, something made but not sloppily or hastily; it requires thought and artistic skill. A poem, as the unabridged dictionary puts it, “is characterized by great beauty of expression.”

What is a poem? You are. You are God’s handiwork, his beautiful verse writ in blood and bone and sinew, his creative artwork intended to bring him praise. You are living, breathing poetry in motion, foreordained – mark again the Apostle’s belief – to be someone and do something that makes a difference in this life.

God made you on purpose. Have you discovered what that purpose is (or better, “what those purposes are” since there are probably several things he wishes you to accomplish)?

Again, a year has passed. What have you accomplished? And what yet lies before you to accomplish? Will you bring glory to God in 2014? How?

WEDNESDAY WISDOM

from a private letter by Matthew Simpson:

“If this is to be a happy new year, a year of usefulness, a year in which we shall live to make this earth better, is it because God will direct our pathway. How important then, to feel our utter dependence upon him.”

Simpson (1811-1884) was a Methodist minister and personal adviser to President Abraham Lincoln.

WEDNESDAY WISDOM

“Christmas Mourning” by Vassar Miller:

On Christmas Day I weep
Good Friday to rejoice.
I watch the Child asleep.
Does He half dream the choice
The Man must make and keep?

At Christmastime I sigh
For my Good Friday hope.
Outflung the Child’s arms lie
To span their brief scope:
The Death the Man must die.

Come Christmastide I groan
To hear Good Friday’s pealing.
The Man, wracked to the bone,
Has made His hurt my healing,
Has made my ache His own.

Slay me, pierced to the core,
With Christmas penitence
So I, new-born, may soar
To that Child’s innocence,
May wound the Man no more.

WEDNESDAY WISDOM

from Letters (vol. 4: 276, 1884) by Robert Louis Stevenson:

“Keep your eyes open to your mercies. That part of piety is eternal; and the man who forgets to be grateful has fallen asleep in life.”

Happy Thanksgiving!

Gloom and Glory

It’s been just about a year since I go to know her. She was a woman with her own private tragedy, on top of dealing with her dying mother who was my patient. Two decades earlier, in a failed but heroic attempt, her teenage son jumped into a swollen river to rescue a younger boy who’d fallen in. Both boys drowned. Three adult men, experienced firefighter-paramedics, nearly drowned trying to save them. Despite their best efforts, all that could be done was recover the bodies. Had he survived, her son would be in his thirties now, perhaps a parent himself. She confesses that she to this day becomes an emotional wreck twice a year: on his birthday, and on the anniversary of his death. Thanksgiving and Christmas are difficult for her, too.

The upcoming holidays are difficult for a lot of people, for a lot of reasons, not all of which are understood. What is known is that in America depression spikes in mid-November every year.

Whether or not you are dealing with depression, a lot of people around you are. Yes, even people called to vocational ministry, men and women trained and experienced to care for others. My wife and I were somewhat rattled a few years ago when more and more missionaries, clergy, and their spouses began to confide to us that they were taking prescription antidepressants.

Not that this is exactly new; Mother Theresa, as was pointed out posthumously, struggled with depression for years. So did “the Prince of Preachers,” Charles Spurgeon, and evidently King David, too, at least from time to time:

Be gracious to me, O LORD, for I am pining away; heal me, O LORD, for my bones are dismayed. My soul is greatly dismayed; but You, O LORD – how long? … I am weary with my sighing; every night I make my bed swim, I dissolve my couch with my tears. My eye has wasted away with grief …

Save me, O God, for the waters have threatened my life. I have sunk in deep mire, and there is no foothold; I have come into deep waters, and a flood overflows me. I am weary with my crying; my throat is parched; my eyes fail while I wait for my God. … Reproach has broken my heart and I am so sick. I looked for sympathy, but there was none, and for comforters, but I found none … I am afflicted and in pain …

Hear my prayer, O LORD; let my cry for help come to you. Do not hide your face from me when I am in distress. Turn your ear to me; when I call, answer me quickly. For my days vanish like smoke; my bones burn like glowing embers. My heart is blighted and withered like grass; I forget to eat my food. Because of my loud groaning I am reduced to skin and bones … For I eat ashes as my food and mingle my drink with tears because of your great wrath, for you have taken me up and thrown me aside. My days are like the evening shadow; I wither away like grass …

Any well-read Christian should be able to tell you about “the dark night of the soul,” as St. John of the Cross phrased it. But John didn’t write of it in the sense of being frightened and helpless in the face of the loss of meaning, the lack of purpose, an overwhelming darkness that blots out joy and saps your strength. Quite the contrary, in fact; bad as it may be, he thought depression was – at the right and proper time, handled correctly – a thing to be embraced. In his book The Ascent of Mount Carmel John wrote that depression places “in reasonable order” the things that you love, ultimately purifying and prioritizing your love for God above all. But the beginning of the process, he admits, is quite painful, “caus[ing] the soul to lose sight of both” God’s love and the loves and joys of this world.

Does that sound strange? Certainly, if one has embraced the “health-and-wealth, name it and claim it” caricature of the gospel so common in certain circles. God, it seems, does not want you to be happy if that happiness comes at the expense of holiness. He created this life for us to enjoy, yes, but not for the gift to distract from the Giver. Depression can be a means by which we are increasingly severed from infatuation with worldliness and more closely in love with God. Recall the warning voiced by another John, the biblical Apostle and half-brother of Christ:

Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world – the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does – comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.

Learning to divorce oneself from temporal things – even good things, even against our wishes – actually enhances our spirituality and makes us more satisfied and fulfilled by God. Or at least it has the capability to do so.

This is not to say that depression is good, or fun, or to be sought out, not by any stretch of the imagination. Nor is it a criticism of anyone who struggles with it. Depression is not a sin, neither is it punishment for sin. It’s part and parcel of living in a fallen world; what matters is what you do with it.

The Bible tells us to be grateful in all circumstances. That may seem impossible to you, but the fact that God commands it indicates gratitude is a choice, regardless of what’s happened or is happening to you.

It is intriguing to me that social science underscores this idea; focusing on things in your life for which to be thankful increases your happiness, even for months afterward, and encourages positive interpersonal behaviors. Counting your blessings reduces stress and may protect against neuroses, loneliness, and anxiety.

Again, these are choices you must make in order to help yourself and those around you. So I encourage you: choose to be thankful, and be the sort of person who helps others to choose thankfulness, too – even if you don’t feel it.

I don’t always feel like it, either.

Two years ago was one of the hardest times of my life. I was forced to resign from the pastorate of my church due to unscrupulous and immoral manipulations of a handful of members. One of the ways my wife and I handled the situation was to invite some members of the military to join us for Thanksgiving. Our guests – all of whom struggled with PTSD – were men from the Army, Navy, and Marines (and my mom and I accounted for the Air Force). It was a great time of prayer, gratitude, food, fun and laughter, which I will forever cherish.

There are countless tips and tricks from counselors, therapists, or websites to handle depression, particularly around the holidays, but in the end the only antidote is hope, and the only eternal hope is the kind God provides. “I am sure there is no remedy for [depression],” Spurgeon wrote, “like a holy faith in God.”

My prayer for you is that you have this hope. Devastating as they may be, the hardships of this life are, after all, temporary. May you have the hope of heaven within you; may God grant you to see things from an eternal perspective; and may you be richly blessed this Thanksgiving and always.

As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? My tears have been my food day and night, while men say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go with the multitude, leading the procession to the house of God, with shouts of joy and thanksgiving among the festive throng. Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.

Image credit: “The Last Penitent” by Clive Power, Flickr Creative Commons

Conundrums

Have you ever been in a place where you found yourself torn between conflicting obligations? How did you handle it? How would you think about that situation if you knew God had placed those upon you … deliberately?

Let’s take a simple thing like lying, for example. It is a sin [Leviticus 19.11; Psalm 59.12; Proverbs 12.22; literally dozens more]; God hates it [Proverbs 6.16; etc.], because his very nature is truth [John 14.6; etc.]. In light of this, it might surprise you that lying may be ethical, under certain circumstances. For example:

• The Hebrew midwives, ordered by Pharaoh to kill newborn male babies, refused to obey and lied to him about it.
• The prostitute Rahab hid spies who stayed in her home, telling the authorities they’d left.
• The Prophet Samuel, en route to anoint the next king of Israel, blatantly misled the military police as to his motives for travel.
• The Prophet Jeremiah, following a secret meeting with his king, did as the latter instructed, deceiving his countrymen as to the true nature of their conversation.

In all four cases these people lied (and three of the four involved treason, to boot).  An absolutely inflexible, unthinking, interpretation of the biblical prohibition against lying would mean that all four of these people sinned – yet the texts state they all were not punished but blessed for having done it! In fact, in Samuel’s case God explicitly told him to lie!

How is this possible?

One answer to that question is to say the Bible is not inspired by God at all; it is just a collection of flawed, contradictory human writings. If you, as I, reject that explanation, is there a way to deal with integrity this apparent inconsistency? Yes, there is.

Most of us are aware of the dietary laws found in the Hebrew Scriptures which forbid Jews to eat pork. You might be interested to learn, then, of a rabbinical teaching: If you’re starving, and a pig runs in front of you, kill and eat it. Why? Judaism has always taught that the Divine Law in its entirety is important, but that there is hierarchy within the Law itself; some laws are more important than others. When faced with two seemingly contradictory Divine commands, where to obey one perforce means you disobey the other, you are obligated to discern and do the greater of the two. This principle is found both explicitly and implicitly in the Bible.

The Old Testament book of Ruth brings light to this issue. Boaz, the wealthy farmer, had to choose: he had the command to never help a Moabite; at the same time he had the command to perform the duty of kinsman-redeemer for the widow Ruth … who happened to be a Moabite. What to do? Obviously he couldn’t do both. He chose the latter, because it was the more important command.

Another example: Orthodox Jews, based on their understanding of Exodus 20.9-11, refuse to do any kind of work on the Sabbath day – not even flipping a light switch. Nevertheless, even the Orthodox believe a surgeon or paramedic fighting to save someone’s life, or a soldier fighting to save his own life, on the Sabbath day is not merely acceptable but absolutely mandatory, even though doing so is clearly “work.” The command not to violate the Sabbath is trumped by the command to preserve life (something Christ himself endorsed).

So the “little white lie?” There is no such thing. There’s no biblical precedent to tell a falsehood simply to keep someone’s feelings from being hurt, or to save yourself an embarrassment, or to advance your career, or to protect your church or your ministry. But it is biblical to lie, or commit other lesser sins, in order to rescue someone from an unjust and untimely end. Thus the Ten Boom family – who, in defiance of the law, hid Jews in their home and forged ration cards to feed them during the Third Reich’s occupation of Holland – were obeying God, even though doing so entailed doing things the Bible prohibits, including falsehood, theft, and disobedience to the civil government.

Don’t misunderstand; necessity does not turn vice into virtue. But neither is it virtuous to abstain from a lesser evil if doing so permits a greater evil to occur.

Even – perhaps especially – in a situation where we don’t clearly know what’s right, the Lord will still hold us accountable for our decisions; we can’t blame him if we choose unwisely, claiming we were just obeying his Scriptures. Had Boaz had spurned Ruth, leaving her to rot in squalor and famine, had Rahab denounced the spies, abandoning them to torture and execution, they would have been wrong. If Samuel and Jeremiah had been completely honest they would have foolishly forfeited their lives.

We are obligated to discern what the Lord wants us to do in any and every situation. Thankfully, he grants wisdom generously to all who ask, without finding fault – i.e. he doesn’t hold our ignorance against us. He will help us to understand and obey if we are diligently trying to please him.

Here’s the crux of the issue: morality is not necessarily as black or white as we might wish. Sometimes there really is no clear right or wrong. There is a danger in admitting this: some, concluding all choices are relativistic, might claim there is never any absolute right or wrong. This position is commonly called “situational ethics,” which at its heart is nihilistic. What people ultimately do in that worldview is to develop an ethic that is completely selfish: that which is good and right is whatever personally benefits me or my cause or my ideology. Either extreme – rigid religious moralism or flexible self-centered ethics – is false, for both depend upon human reasoning to make the determination of what constitutes right and wrong. That is something we are simply incapable do doing so on our own.

We live in a sin-saturated culture; our heritage, nurture, training and even our thought processes (yes, even after receiving forgiveness and adoption into God’s family) are all infected by sin. So we dare not think we can make God happy by following a simple list of “do’s” and “don’ts.” We can’t even be absolutely confident that we are reading and applying the Scriptures properly. We have to rely on the Spirit of God to lead us into all wisdom and understanding. And he will! As the Psalmist wrote,

In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will direct your paths.

Live as if you are utterly dependent upon him … because you are, whether you realize it or not.

WEDNESDAY WISDOM

from Reflections on the Psalms by C.S. Lewis:

“The Supernatural, entering a human soul, opens it to new possibilities both of good and evil. From that point the road branches: one way to sanctity, love, humility; the other to spiritual pride, self-righteousness, persecuting zeal. And no way back to the mere humdrum virtues and vices of the unawakened soul. If the Divine call does not make us better, it will make us very much worse. Of all bad men, religious bad men are the worst.”

Rescue

In Syria, the terrorist organization Muslim Brotherhood is providing humanitarian aid to victims of that country’s civil war – and attacking and demonizing other aid groups trying to do the same. They want to be the only “good guys” in this situation, hoping to win hearts and minds to their cause. But other aid groups are trying to help anyway. The most profound story of all: an NGO made up of Israeli medical personnel is operating secretly inside Syrian borders. Israeli TV and the Jerusalem Post both are telling stories about what’s happening.

The Syrian regime may win. But if it loses, what will take its place? There are those involved in the Syrian offensive against President al-Assad who want him replaced with an Islamic state based on Sharia law. But there are also secular Syrians who want a non-religious democratic government. The Israelis are working with the latter group, delivering food, water, clothing, medicine, and other basic supplies. In addition, the Jewish military has mobilized MASH units; of the thousands injured at least a few hundred Syrians have been able to cross their southwestern border to receive medical care from the Israeli army. Severely injured victims are transported to hospitals deeper inside the country. Many, especially children, are initially frightened and suspicious, since not only do they find themselves far away from home and family, they have been taught Israel is their enemy. But at these hospitals they meet Jews, Christians, and Muslims who work together to save their lives. When healed, they are repatriated back to Syria if possible, their identities kept anonymous to protect them from retaliation by Islamists. And all of this is done free of charge.

The Jews are not necessarily motivated out of pure altruism. They trust their efforts counteract terrorist propaganda, and hopefully, slowly, their help just might be part of what could bring about peace in the Middle East. This work, especially for Jews secretly serving inside war-torn area among a people hostile to them, is dangerous. But doing nothing is equally dangerous. In the television report, sitting in a darkened studio, her voice digitally altered, the head of this NGO said it best: “I think that for most of my volunteers, what they fear more than death is indifference.”

Do you? When we are indifferent to the suffering of our fellow man, part of us is dead. Pray for them – and if you need to, pray for yourself as well.

Deception

Twice in my life I’ve received death threats, from two very different groups of people. Or maybe they weren’t so different after all.

For 11 years I lived in two different Islamic-majority nations, and never once did a Muslim threaten to kill me. That’s not in any way downplaying the murderous action of certain Islamic activists, who do indeed all too frequently kill, or threaten to kill, any who don’t submit to their particular interpretation of Islam – I’m simply saying it has not been my personal experience. No, in my case the first group that wanted me dead was a coven of witches, and the second was a group of Christians.

As far as the witches, I never did find out what I’d done to earn their animosity; they refused to say. At any rate, they tried to kill me by supernatural means, which clearly didn’t work, and after a few months of harassment they eventually left me alone. At least the second group told me why they wanted me dead. They took issue with my interpretation of a part of Scripture near and dear to their hearts.

The trigger was my rebuttal, published in an online news and opinion magazine, regarding the Sabbath day. The original article insisted that Gentile followers of Christ must worship on the seventh day of the week. This demand, I contended, is an integral part of the Mosaic covenant, which never, except under limited circumstances, applied to Gentiles. Scripture is quite clear in this regard. I’m not picking on Sabbatarians; we are free to worship on the seventh day if we wish, just not free to demand it nor denounce those who chose a different day. A number of email replies came in, some thanking me – but most attacked my intelligence, questioned my parents’ marital status, and/or pronounced my eternal damnation. And quite a few threatened to seek me out and kill me for daring to challenge their belief system.

It baffles my mind that people who claim to be Christians thought they could uphold the 4^th Commandment by violating the 9^th Commandment and threatening to violate the 6^th Commandment. And yet it’s not so strange after all. The disconnect between claiming to follow Christ and actually following Christ is well documented.

In this country, the divorce rate among evangelicals – generally the most Biblically conservative in Western Christendom – is higher than the US average. They are no less likely to be bigoted than non-Christians. Christian teens are just as sexually active as non-Christian ones. And while Christians, particularly evangelical Christians, are slightly more likely to be out of debt and give more to help the poor, as a whole they don’t give sacrificially. Worse, statistical polling cited in George Barna’s book The Second Coming Of The Church shows that when Americans were asked to describe the God they believe in, only two-thirds were able to do so in biblical terms. The remaining  third described their god as “the total realization of personal, human potential” or “a state of higher consciousness that a person may reach,” while others agreed with statements such as, “everyone is God” and “there are many gods, each with different power and authority” – this, mind you, in a nation where well over 80% of the population consider themselves Christian. “Evangelical Christians,” says theologian Michael Horton (himself an evangelical), “are as likely to embrace lifestyles every bit as hedonistic, materialistic, self-centered, and sexually immoral as the world in general.”

But should this really surprise us? The Bible repeatedly mentions false prophets, false teachers, blind guides leading the blind. Christ himself warned,

“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”

“Only a few.” That’s all. For all the masses of church buildings which dot this land, can we afford to imagine them filled with passionate, devoted followers of Christ? Is it not more likely they are filled with a handful of God’s children surrounded by unconverted and uncaring souls, a few stalks of wheat amid acres of weeds? Be honest, reflect on the widespread pornography, sex trafficking, corporate and government corruption, fear and suspicion, and ask yourself: does our culture look like one where the majority of people are imitating the Galilean?

Why doesn’t the Christian faith seem to make much of a difference? Do you even know the point of the Christian faith? The Apostle Paul identifies it in Romans 8.29 and 1 Timothy 1.5:

For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son.

The goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.

All the Bible study you participate in, all the doctrine you absorb, all the church meetings you attend and every bit of religious activity in which you’re engaged: these are merely means to an end, and that end is for you to be transformed into the image of Christ. If that does not happen – if your character, thought patterns, habits and choices do not increasingly, howsoever unevenly or incrementally, resemble Christ’s – they are worthless. They are worse than worthless, they are sulfurous and bile. Looking back at my personal experience with those Sabbatarians who were enraged at me, it’s obvious they abandoned the goal (Christlikeness) in their zeal to defend their means to reach the goal (their doctrine). And this is just a single example of a scenario that plays out all over this country in big ways and small ways. It inevitably leads to Phariseeism, stagnation, and decline … exactly what we see happening in the Western Church.

Judas Iscariot still appeared to be a follower of Christ long after he had, in fact, stopped being a follower of Christ. How often does that scenario continue to play out in the Church? Does it play out in your life?

Your character trumps your creed hands down. Your behavior is your belief system. They cannot be separated. Never forget this.

Christian, does knowing you are finite and prone to failure make you humble … or do you arrogantly condemn others in an effort to redirect your (and God’s) attention elsewhere? Are you honest enough to admit you may not be interpreting the Bible perfectly? Are you wary of man-made rules and doctrines that will supposedly make you more ‘spiritual?’ Are you asking God to conform you into Christ’s image? Do you cry out as did King David,

“Who can discern his errors? Forgive my hidden faults …. May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.”