The Unthinkable Thought

I am a slave to ideals.  I have been for a long time.  And for most of that time I have confused my position with Christianity.  But let me back up a little.

There are two kinds of people in this world.  Slaves to circumstances and slaves to ideals, in religious terms we might call them slaves to sin and slaves to the law.  The Slave to Circumstances lives his life in the immediate.  When things go his way, he is happy.  When things don't go his way, he is sad or angry or whatever.  He lives his life like a boat carried by the waves and he is wherever they go.  When I say the immediate, I don't mean that he doesn't make plans or have goals, maybe even "spiritual" goals, but his thoughts are all consumed with obtaining good and avoiding bad, meaning good circumstances and bad circumstances.  Good things and bad things, good places and bad places, good people and bad people.  Using good to refer to things that please us or make us happy and bad to refer to those which fail to do so.  In other words, making ourselves the standard by which the world is judged.

I have looked down my nose at the Slave to Circumstance for a long time.  You see, by the power of ideals, the concept of right and wrong, of justice, of appropriateness we can free ourselves from our circumstances.  When something makes me unhappy, I can comfort myself with the knowledge that even if it doesn't please me it is right.  I can sink all of my pain in the knowledge that a good God rules the universe and makes all wrongs right.  And I mistake that for faith.  The eternal is a pretty good comfort for the loss of the temporary.

And that is the way the world goes.  The slaves of sin are carried about on their miserable destiny and the slaves of the law look and say "I thank you God that I am not a sinner like this publican."  And as far as they go they are right.  Slavery to the law is infinitely preferable to slavery to anything else.  At least the law is just and good and holy.  It will always look out for what is best for everybody and when that isn't what is best for me I can comfort myself by what Kierkegaard calls letting the particular(myself, my feelings, my good) find its expression in the universal(what is good for everybody).  I can be happy under the law, as long as I am content to be happy in this way.  I can watch the good things in my life go away and I can have peace and comfort.

And there is basically nothing in the world to contradict what I have said.  Only a few tiny objections remain to be disposed of by the Slaves to Ideals and we can all go to our own Hells peacefully and quietly.  If only Isaac hadn't come down from that mountain.

When someone chooses to follow the Way of the Law, they need to understand that it is the way of deadness, of sacrifice in the literal sense of killing.  First the law killed my pain, then it killed my sadness, then it killed my happiness, then it killed my joy.  I am left with a still deadness in the core of my soul, as ultimately I became dead to the law.  Eventually the Way of the Law will require me to be dead to my family and even dead to myself.  This might seem strange but the Way of the Law is the way of sacrificing the less for the greater.  I sacrifice happiness for goodness, fun for peace, friendship for truth, my will for God's will, eventually I walk straight into Hell content that it is where I belong, having felt my sinfulness to its utter depths.  When I say I do these things, understand that that is eternity's perspective.  I can do these things if I have the courage to walk the Way of the Law.  But when we see that the last term is the sacrifice of ourselves, we must learn from this that to follow the Law requires ALL that is in a man.  There is nothing left to do anything else.  I believe it was Robert E. Lee who said, "Do your duty.  You cannot do more.  You should not wish to do less."
And so we explain everything in the world with a few principles.  And are left with a single unexplainable prodigy, a miracle in the fullest sense of the word, when Abraham gets Isaac back.

I haven't gone that far, who has but Abraham?  But anyone who has sacrificed for the Law can imagine what it would be like.  To sacrifice what is loved for something that is greater is a path I know very well.  If Abraham had murdered Isaac, had sacrificed not only his love and his son, but his righteousness, his justification by murdering his own son the Slaves of the Law could well admire him.  He would be the greatest of us.  To sacrifice even justification because it is God's will is the highest expression of the ethical.  As I said before, it is to walk into Hell with a just contentment.  It would be on a level with Paul who would give up his own salvation for the salvation of his countrymen.  But what actually happened I can't understand.  I can't admire.  I can't even accept.

 "Resignation[what I have called the Way of the Law] by itself does not require faith. It has only to comply with the eternal. It renounces, but does not gain. Faith, however, does not renounce anything. On the contrary, in faith I receive everything. Herein lies the crucial difference. It takes a purely human courage to renounce the world of temporality in order to win eternity; but it takes a humble and paradoxical courage to take hold of what is temporal and to do so for the sake of the eternal. That courage is the courage of faith. Through faith Abraham did not renounce his claim on Isaac. No, through his faith he received Isaac"

So we have seen that the highest and best a person can reach is slavery to the Law, to eternal ideals.  And I want to point out again, that slavery to a good and righteous master is far preferable to the situation most of us are in.  And slavery to an eternal good doesn't sound so bad at all.  But the Slave of the Law has to give himself entirely to that Law.  There is nothing left.  It requires all of his heart and soul and mind every second of every day.  Therefore faith is a paradox.  It is just when Abraham is saying with his whole heart and soul, "I will plunge this knife into Isaac."  that he does something more.  He says, "But I will get him back, even from the dead."  But he can't.  Every part of him is strained to the breaking point just to be a slave to the law, and at that moment the unthinkable occurs.  There is something else, some alien presence, which is Abraham and is not.  It is Abraham because it is his very heart, the true core of his being, that believes and not another, but it is not because if it was Abraham, that is any man, it would have to subject itself to the Law, it would be under the curse.

If there is one thing that we are certain of it is that dead men do not rise.  The thought doesn't even occur to us.  If I were to suggest that you might see one of your loved ones who has passed on today, not "in Heaven" not in a dream or whatever but walking down the street like everything is normal.  I think you would freak out.  You would probably be pissed off at me.  It takes the distance of two or three thousand years and oceans of ink to make resurrection seem anything less than earth shattering.  It might be the closest thing to a thought that our minds can't think that has ever been found.  And so, when reason can find no place for hope, when like Abraham on Mount Moriah good has turned to evil, when God commands murder, when all the world is truly upside down, then and perhaps only then, are we ready for the foolishness of faith.

jc

When Christianity came into the world the task was simply to preach. Among “Christian nations,” however, the situation is different. What we have before us is not Christianity but a prodigious illusion, the people are not pagans but live in the blissful conceit that they are Christians. So if in this situation Christianity is to be introduced, first of all the illusion must be debunked. But since this vain conceit, this illusion, is to the effect that we are all Christians, it looks indeed as if introducing Christianity amounts to taking Christianity away. Nevertheless this is precisely what must be done, for the illusion must go.

--All quotations are from S. Kierkegaard, mostly from Fear and Trembling, which to a great extent is the inspiration for this post, the other quotes I will not trace their source right now.

Fear Not

Do not fear.  This command is found repeatedly in Scripture.  Almost every time an angel appears these are among the first words the angel says.

²² Now Gideon perceived that He was the Angel of the Lord. So Gideon said, “Alas, O Lord God! For I have seen the Angel of the Lord face to face.”

²³ Then the Lord said to him, “Peace be with you; do not fear, you shall not die.” ²⁴ So Gideon built an altar there to the Lord, and called it The-Lord-Is-Peace. To this day it is still in Ophrah of the Abiezrites. Judges 6

I don't remember where I heard it now, but someone once suggested to me that the reason for this must be because angels are very scary and they don't want people to be afraid of them.  I suppose it is that sort of thinking that leads to so many of the angel fetishes that are popular today and are perhaps the first root of idolatry.

But if that isn't the explanation then what is?  It is striking that this is the repeated message of the angels, and in that I think we have the key.  I don't know much about angels.  Neither do you, no matter what you think.  Is this some horrible defect in our theology?  It is an issue exactly on a level with the fact that I don't know the person who delivers the mail.

That is in fact what an angel is, a mailman.  And the only interesting thing about a mailman(considered as such, that is as a mailman), is the mail.  I submit that the "Fear not" we are concerned with is not a mark of the angels concern that we not be terrified by their awesomeness but is the very heart of the message that they were sent to deliver.

And God heard the voice of the lad. Then the angel of God called to Hagar out of heaven, and said to her, “What ails you, Hagar? Fear not, for God has heard the voice of the lad where he is. Genesis 21:17

If we look at what is actually said, we will see that the reason why the recipient of the message should not be afraid, is given in the message itself.  "do not fear, you shall not die", "Fear not, for God has heard the voice of the lad".  The message is always "Do not fear because God intends good things towards you."  The reason not to fear has nothing to do with the nature of the angel and everything to do with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I submit that the "do not fear, you shall not die." which was spoken to Gideon does not refer to His allegedly feared imminent death at the hands of the angel and everything to do with being reconciled to God.  I think that is what Gideon wanted us to understand when he marked that location with an altar called "The Lord IS Peace"  He wants us to know that God is not interested in carrying on the war with mankind.  He is offering us a peace treaty.

And the Lord appeared to him the same night and said, “I am the God of your father Abraham; do not fear, for I am with you. I will bless you and multiply your descendants for My servant Abraham’s sake.” Genesis 26:24

The message of Fear Not, has everything to do with the peace treaty that God made with Abraham, the Covenant of Grace.  Perhaps even more to the point, it has everything to do with the fulfillment of that covenant, the living, breathing, proof of God's intentions toward us, The Lord Jesus Christ.

 

²⁸ And having come in, the angel said to her, “Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!” ²⁹ But when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and considered what manner of greeting this was. ³⁰ Then the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. Luke 1

To this generation of men it seems strange to connect a child with peace, or rather we can't see it the way generations of men before us did.  Our generation is just too far distant from the idea of personal government.  But for most of human history peace treaties contained with few exceptions- a marriage between the warring countries.  The closer to the crown the couple were the more sure the peace was considered.  The thinking behind this isn't obscure or complicated.  It is simply that no one wants to be at war with their family.  We go to war for our family not against them.  If the king of Country A is married to the princess of Country B then there will always be a reason for them not to fight.  But far more significant is the hope of children.  A child, who might be heir to both kingdoms.  For such a ruler to declare war on Country B would be like declaring war on himself-utterly ridiculous.

And this is the heart of God's Covenant of Peace with Humanity.  A child who is heir to both kingdoms.  As God, Christ is King of Heaven, He is life, and peace and righteousness, as the Son of David, He is King of Israel, and the heir to the Law, as the Son of Man, He is the heir to all of Adam's sin and death.  The God of All Peace and the Man of Sorrows are one.  The people who walk in darkness have seen a great light.  Not a peace that is signed and then forgotten, an offer of peace continually extended and renewed, so long as Christ sits at the right hand of the Father, an offer of peace that can never be cancelled, annulled, or changed-the Last Will and Testament of Jesus of Nazareth, it became effective on the day of His death, an offer of peace available to us now by the power of His resurrection.

⁵ But the angel answered and said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. ⁶ He is not here; for He is risen, as He said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay. Matthew 28

 So, what is the message that I have for you?  Do not fear, because God is not against you.  He is not out to get you.  He is not setting you up to fail.  Perhaps more importantly if you do fail, even if you are a failure in every sense of the word, it doesn't affect His offer of peace to you.  Your life is not a conflict.  You are not in a competition with the rest of the world for God's love and acceptance.  So long as Immanuel lives there can be no doubt."

If the world you are living in is a world of fear and competition, a world where you have to go to any lengths to avoid failure, a world where you have to be successful, the Good News for you is that that is not the real world.  This is the world where if the good guy loses He rises again the third day, it is the world where you are not judged by your performance, the world of the Power of the Resurrection.  

Loser

If you fail you can't be a Christian anymore.  Or at least you can't tell anyone you are.  Apparently Jesus doesn't like losers.  I guess He is more like me than I ever imagined.

The truth is that I am a terrible elitist, of the particular type usually called a Pharisee.  It isn't money or worldly success that I worship but spiritual success.  I am convinced in the deepest part of my soul that God made us to pass some test, go above some bar, perform in some fashion.  If I don't do Christianity right then I will lose.  Lose what you ask?  Ultimately I think the answer is God's approval.  His acceptance, to be declared "Not a Loser" by the ultimate judge, is the greatest prize of all.  What could possibly be greater or more glorious?  And to that way of thinking the biggest loser in world history would have to be Jesus of Nazareth.  Despite having this amazing setup, two thousand years of prophecy about what a huge winner He would be, star shining on His birth, wise men coming from all directions, the prodigy that set all the teachers scratching their heads He crashed it all in the most epic way imaginable.

The boy with unlimited potential by the age of thirty must have been a massive disappointment.  He spent His time hanging out with His fishing buddies and getting drunk.  Even though He could work miracles few people could stand to be around Him.  I know I have messed up some good things, but how is it that the guy who can heal the sick left and right, multiply food, and raise the dead winds up a homeless drunk?  His miracles are startling failures.  You use divine power to help stretch out a party with more liquor?  Most of His miracles seem to have been worked on the Sabbath deliberately to piss off the church crowd.  There were crowds gathering trying to give Him the throne, they could clearly see that He could whip Rome from one end of the world to the other, if He would just shut up.  The Jews really did try and work with Him I believe but when you insist on your religion being one of cannibalism, "Eat my flesh and drink my blood and live forever" no wonder people think you are in league with the devil.  Kind of an obvious conclusion.

So, the hero of every dream-the great Prince on the White Horse-coming to destroy all the bad guys and rescue all the babes, the ultimate winner, against all odds, in the most stunning display of loserness imaginable, gets arrested, is too stubborn to defend Himself against charges that even the judge said were garbage, is executed like the absolute lowest of society.  And to crown it all, the One He did it all for, His Father, turns His back on Him at the end.  He blacks out the sun as if to cover His shame over what His Son did.

It is surprising how easy that is to write.  You don't have to force any of the facts they all just kind of fall in place.  I think that there can be little doubt that that is the way most of His contemporaries viewed Him, I have done little more than present their complaints against Him.  There are only two things against this opinion, first His Father's own testimony, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." and again, "This is my Son, Hear Him." and second the sequel- the unimaginable resurrection.

But how did we get it so wrong, when it seems so right?  I would like to suggest that our entire premise is wrong.  Not just the premise which I used to write that story, but the premise on which I've based my life.  I think maybe the best way to state that premise is to say that it is the belief that we are made to succeed.  I know a lot of church dorks say that we are making success an idol, but they like me, have just substituted "spiritual" success for more obvious and natural types of success.  Which is probably a move further from the truth and not closer to it.

It is clear, however, that we have some relationship to success, to performance, to all that is called Law, in contrast to Gospel.  If success isn't the measure of a man then what is success' connection to us?  Let us go back to the great champion of failure.

²³ Now it happened that He went through the grainfields on the Sabbath; and as they went His disciples began to pluck the heads of grain. ²⁴ And the Pharisees said to Him, “Look, why do they do what is not lawful on the Sabbath?”
²⁵ But He said to them, “Have you never read what David did when he was in need and hungry, he and those with him: ²⁶ how he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the showbread, which is not lawful to eat except for the priests, and also gave some to those who were with him?”
²⁷ And He said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. ²⁸ Therefore the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath.” Mark 2

Does this have anything to do with what we were talking about?  If we make the not very great leap of logic that the Sabbath is the representative of the whole law, the whole system of condemnation and failure that has trapped us all of our lives.  Is it fair to stretch what is said about the Sabbath out to the whole law, not just the code of laws but the whole idea of ,"The man who does it shall live by it."?  Well, as both Paul and James tell us the Law stands or falls as a whole.  It is all one thing, it is victory or defeat, life or death, success or failure, love or hatred.

 On the other hand, the Sabbath is in one way very different from the rest of the Law, almost in opposition to it.  The whole law commands, "Perform or die" and the Sabbath says, "Stop trying.  Give up.  Accept defeat."  If that doesn't sound true to you, then imagine anyone in a struggle to the death taking a day off, taking a second off.  So if it seems hard to win this great race, then taking a day off in the middle is definately not going to work.  Isn't that how the hare lost to the tortoise after all?

So, why did God set a huge stumbling block right in the middle of the Law?  For you.  The Sabbath was made for you.  The Sabbath was made to make it unmistakably obvious that we can't succeed and to tell us that that is ok.  God's plan is not to hold a measuring stick-any measuring stick-up to you and see if you make the cut.  I know that He will judge us all one day but everything I know about Jesus Christ and His Gospel convinces me that we have radically misunderstood what that means.

Success, performance, righteousness, are not goals for us to strive after.  They are gifts, robes that Our Father throws on His Prodigals as He sacrifices His lamb to make a party for us.

 Jesus was a Capricorn

Love and peace, jc

Spiritual Warfare 2

I think that now we are ready to get down to some specifics. What are the spiritual weapons, the mighty super weapons that change the whole world? I don't know them all but let's look at the few I do know about.

First up is Confession. Confession just means being up front, especially about something that you would rather hide. The world around you is built on the belief that anything that you can hide gives you an advantage. If you hide your weaknesses, especially what you really think and feel, then no one can use them against you. If you hide your strengths you can use them at an unexpected time. To that way of thinking the ultimate power is invisibility, but Christ was never more powerful than when He was most visible, most vulnerable. The more He is exposed the more He conquers His enemies. Letting those that we deal with see us as we really are, instead of posing for them, sends an unmistakable message that we deny that hiding things is an advantage. It says that we would rather have the truth out than cover our bad side while preparing a sneak attack.

To use the warfare analogy, it picks the entire battle up and moves it to a new battlefield.
We move from the Old Fallen World to a New Redeemed World. A world where mistakes aren't held against you. A world where people care more about each other than about winning. A world where it is ok to risk being hurt because it is enough for us to be like our Lord and He was hurt. Confession takes us to a world where fear is pointless because any good thing that is lost rises again the third day-the world of the Power of His Resurrection. Pretty neat weapon.

⁹ Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. ¹⁰ Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another; ¹¹ not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord; ¹² rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer; ¹³ distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality.
¹⁴ Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. ¹⁵ Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep. ¹⁶ Be of the same mind toward one another. Do not set your mind on high things, but associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own opinion.
¹⁷ Repay no one evil for evil. Have regard for good things in the sight of all men. ¹⁸ If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. ¹⁹ Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. ²⁰ Therefore

“ If your enemy is hungry, feed him;
If he is thirsty, give him a drink;
For in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head.”

²¹ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Romans 12

Spiritual Warfare 1

There is probably nothing more common among Christians than to hear or read about Spiritual Warfare.(I said that in my spiritual voice.) And whenever you do they will trot out that old verse,
³ For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. ⁴ For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, ⁵ casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ 2Corinthians 10

And then you hear about the war for our hearts and minds and you REALLY think you are gonna go put a whooping on the devil. They tell you over and over that if you just have faith then you would be putting some kind of holy kung fu on everything that came your way and laugh at all your problems and a bunch of other bull. And the message that you really take home is that you don't have faith, you are a crappy Christian, and it is all your fault. We've been down that road.

It occurred to me not so long ago, that I really didn't have any idea what these super weapons were supposed to be. I mean I decided a long time ago that repeating the same prayer fifty times a day, or praying "HARDER" wasn't the answer. Repeating prayers is forbidden by Christ.(Matthew 6) And the whole idea of praying harder or making God do something because we have enough faith is ridiculous. We can't be so stubborn or persistent that we change the unchangeable God, and faith isn't heavenly dollars that we flash at God to open doors. But what are the actual weapons? I can't answer that for sure but let me try and point us in a little better direction than all that.

Now in the verse we are looking at Paul is not talking about wrestling with some kind of demon. He is talking to his fellow Christians about "5b bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, ⁶ and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled." The warfare he is talking about is about helping believers become more mature, helping them grow up into the kind of Christians they are meant to be. And he does this with his God given ability to teach and encourage and correct, with discipline if necessary. So this is a person to person thing, and frequently but I don't think always between two believers. Before we talk about specifics I think we need to understand what the general idea is.

¹⁸ There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. ¹⁹ We love Him because He first loved us.
²⁰ If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? ²¹ And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.1 John 4

The big battle of spiritual warfare is really a contest between love and fear. Think of every relationship you are in as a box. The closer the relationship the bigger the box. So there is a certain amount of space there and it is all filled up with a combination of love and fear. The more love, the less fear. The more fear, the less love. So your relationship with somebody at work is a pretty small box, not much love, not much fear. But a closer relationship like with a parent or spouse or child is a much much larger box. And there can be way more love in it. Or way more fear...

Now there are lots of kinds of love and there are lots of kinds of fear. Doubt or anxiety or worry are all names for different kinds of fear, and I am sure that there are lots more. Although we wouldn't like to admit it in so many words, most of the time some kind of fear is the main thing guiding our lives. We go to work because we are afraid of what happens if we don't bring home a paycheck. We keep our real thoughts and feelings hidden because we are afraid of what will happen if they come out in the open. Most of the way we treat one another is because when we acted some other way in the past we didn't like the results and are afraid it will happen again.

My apologies to every preacher who has tried to make you afraid of God, afraid of the Judgment, or afraid of Hell, but 99% of Christianity is about battling fear, Spiritual Warfare. Christ endured unimaginable agonies to prove to you that God is not angry at you and that you should see Him as a Father and not as somebody out to get you, to eliminate your fear of God. Although the feelings a son has towards his father and the feelings a creature has towards his God are sometimes called fear they are very different from the fear of rejection, fear of punishment, fear of consequences that we are talking about. Your relationship with God is the biggest box of all. If it doesn't seem that way, maybe it is because it is so full of fear that you won't even get close to it. And fear of God, the unhealthy kind of fear that is the opposite of love, is the number one enemy we are fighting against.
To be Continued...

⁹ Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. ¹⁰ Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another; ¹¹ not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord; ¹² rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer; ¹³ distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality.
¹⁴ Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. ¹⁵ Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep. ¹⁶ Be of the same mind toward one another. Do not set your mind on high things, but associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own opinion.
¹⁷ Repay no one evil for evil. Have regard for good things in the sight of all men. ¹⁸ If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. ¹⁹ Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. ²⁰ Therefore

“ If your enemy is hungry, feed him;
If he is thirsty, give him a drink;
For in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head.”

²¹ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Romans 12

What are you feeding that boy?

I remember hearing a story once, how Billy Graham in later years came to the conclusion that the majority of people who were converted at his Crusades were never really converted at all. He said that had that many people come to know Christ it would have made an unmissable impact on the world, which it hadn't. I wish I knew where to find the interview where it happened but I can't track it down.
I am not trying to disparage Billy Graham's work in any way. I mention it because for a long time that was my belief and my attitude. I felt that someone with no fruit to show was probably not a believer. I always felt the difficulty with that belief, because I knew that I was a believer and I also knew that I had precious little to show. But I felt convinced that Christians wouldn't just stay where they were and never seem to grow in the Lord or have a ministry.
The question is:Are there real and genuine Children of the King, whose lives show no noticeable sign of change? For a long time, I would have answered that question with a resounding NO!, but perhaps I was undervaluing the importance of Christian Encouragement?

¹⁷ This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, ¹⁸ having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart; ¹⁹ who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.
²⁰ But you have not so learned Christ, ²¹ if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: ²² that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, ²³ and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, ²⁴ and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness. Ephesians 4

When a man is taken by Christ, a new man is born inside of him, and we are left with a somewhat bizarre situation. There is a grown man, or if a child still someone with years of experience and habit, years of doing things their way, of seeing things through the cynical, despairing, unloving eyes of the flesh. And there is an invisible, mute, newborn child occupying not only the same body but the same mind, feeling the same emotions, experiencing the same ups and downs of life. In some ways the baby is more mature and wiser than the Old Man, but it is still a baby. It is a seed, an incorruptible, immortal, spiritual seed, but just a seed.
When we think of Christ's parable of the seed falling on different soils, some on good ground, some on stony, some among the weeds, some on dry ground, we are accustomed to thinking of only the one that falls on good ground as being a Christian and the rest as never coming to anything. But where is our love and pity for those other souls? Perhaps some we can do nothing for, but I was once dry ground, and godly men and women did not say "Oh well dry ground". They watered and encouraged me. And if we wish to be like our Father, the Gardener, then pulling weeds is a good start.
So, back to Billy, perhaps the greatest seed planter of the last century. Some of that seed fell on ground that was just plain good. And it just sprouted up like nobody's business. And some of it fell in the weeds, and some fell on dry ground, and some fell on stony ground. Not Billy's fault, he scattered that seed into every ear that would listen. But is that the end of the story, or has God called some of us to be waterers and weed pullers? When we see a child who grows quickly we say, "What are you feeding that boy?!", recognizing the importance to growth of having the necessities. But when we see a Christian who seems trapped in worldliness, discouraged, and without hope we blame them, when we should look at those charged with encouraging them and say, "What are you feeding that boy?!"
I want to apologize now to my brother, Chris. for failing to encourage you all these years. For years, I have practically written you off as a Christian. I don't know what is in your heart, but I owe you better than what I have given you. I have seen your failures, and rather than helping you to get up and do better, or even hoping and having faith in you, I have chosen to doubt you, to talk about you behind your back. Let's not play, you have plenty of failures, you don't seem to be a very effective Christian. But it was never my place to run you down or write you off. Is it just a coincidence that you have so few people in your life who believe in you and encourage you? Why have I not stood beside you as a brother should? How much different would our world be if I had chosen to encourage you?

Ducktape

I have done a lot of what we call "Redneck Tech", rigging things up because you aren't able to do them the right way. When I had my mustang it was held together by tie straps and screws I found in my toolbox. I can make almost anything work "good enough". If something comes out crooked you can knock it straight, you can always rig something up. Somewhere in the core of my soul is the belief that if you do things the right way something won't come out right.
I think that is how we got started in this mess. Eve was worried that if she followed the rules that her and Adam would miss out on the "knowledge of good and evil", and so she fixed it. When Adam looked at her imagine what he must have thought. "If I follow the rules my poor Eve will be left alone. If she has eaten and I do not then we will be separated." There was probably a lot of justifying that went on in his mind before he decided to fix the problem. The world and his family just weren't right, so he rigged them up. He took a shortcut. He ducktaped the world.
When you read through the book of Genesis, you will quickly run into a character named Abraham. He is a pretty good guy, generous to friends, lot of moral and emotional courage, loves his family. His wife was evidently a ten on the hot babe scale.(Genesis 12:10,14) Even at around 90 guys were still willing to fight for her. In fact, they wanted her so much that Abraham figured they wouldn't mind killing him to get her, so he made a habit of lying and saying he was her brother. This was Abraham's fix, his ducktape. Like Abraham, my first response when I run into a problem is to lie. It just seems so easy. When I am trying to be honest, I would say that it is a habit and the lie just pops out before I know what I am doing. But, at the bottom of the habit is that belief, the belief that the world is broke and I need to pull it back together with a tie strap.
If we make it as far as Genesis 20, we find Abraham still up to his same old tricks. They get to some foreign country and he is claiming his wife is his sister. He lets the king tote off his wife to marry her(GRRReat fix, btw) and guess what happens? God curses the whole country because they have messed with Sarah. Well it turns out that the king hasn't actually touched her, the only real harm that happened to her is the humiliation that Abraham caused her. And the king is like, "Why have you put us all through this? What were you thinking?" The whole kingdom had suffered, Sarah had suffered, Abraham and all of his family suffered but God had prevented the king from touching Sarah. There was a plan in place all along. The world wasn't broken, it didn't need a patch.
With the really important things in life it seems like no one who is willing to help is able to help, and the people who are able aren't willing. Throughout history everyone has been looking for a way to make those who are able to help willing. Back in the day, folks realized that no other human could deal with the problems that really bothered them so they looked for some kind of spirit to help. God wouldn't do the kinds of things that they thought needed to be done, so they tried to get spirits they thought were closer to them to help them out. They gave those spirits all the kinds of things that they thought they might like, they praised them, they helped out the spirit's friends, gave them gifts, killed stuff for them, eventually killed people for them. Once we decide that the situation is desperate and it is ok to start doing whatever it takes it isn't long before we are doing things we would never have dreamed of. False religion starts with us deciding that something is good that God doesn't have planned for us. We judge good and evil for ourselves, but out of the whole world the only thing He has forbidden us to do, is decide what is good instead of leaving the decision to Him. Whether we use Law or Common Sense or logic or anything, our faith must be that nothing is good except what He has chosen for us.
Our ducktape is the only thing that is really wrong with the world. Our shortcuts and patches, our deciding what is good and using any means necessary to get it are the whole problem. I am determined to believe and behave as if I believe that the world is not broke, that no situation is desperate, that there is always good reason to hope. If Christ really holds all power and rules the world exclusively for your good, then the only thing hurting you is the way you thrash around and kick up a fuss trying to get what is already promised to you by the One who can never lie.

He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Romans 8:32

Comfort with Truth

It seems like all of my life I have been fighting sin. Fighting and losing. Over and over, day after day, the same old enemies seem to conquer me. I remember a long time ago this battle made me doubt if I was ever a Christian, because I thought we were supposed to be able to win this fight. I have tried everything, I have come up with tricks and strategies to resist temptation but in the end everyone of them fails. This has been my life for as long as I can remember.
While Christ has filled my life more and more, the patches where I feel completely alone remain as terrible as ever. Temptation remains unconquerable. While the beauty and power of His Gospel covers so much of my life, the periods without it actually seem worse than ever before. The closeness to Christ actually seems to stir up the old "Natural Man", that's me, to a frenzy against all that is good, a self-destructive fury where I seem to destroy all the good things in my life. And this is the way that it is supposed to be.
I have come to believe that we are not meant to conquer sin. Our willpower is not meant to resist temptation until temptation goes away. Not that we shouldn't try, but we need to understand that no stubbornness, no hatred for sin, no tricks or techniques will win this victory. Perhaps Christ lets unbelievers bring their sins under a kind of control that way, like scaring off a wild animal with fire, so that they don't go on a rampage and destroy their lives and neighbors. But He hasn't chosen that path for us. In the end, that way is worse than the sin it defeats. To conquer what seems to be a terrible sin to us by willpower and planning may actually be trading your sin for a worse one.
You see when we defeat sin, we become the hero of the story. We become the guy that killed the giant. We become strong and brave. We become holy and righteous. We become our own savior. And that is the most terrible hell that there is or could ever be.
I am sure that if you or I conquered sin we would mention God in our victory speech. He would probably even be first on the list and we would make a big show of giving Him all the credit. How modest of us! How humble of us! How praiseworthy. "God made me strong and then I killed the giant." "I couldn't have done it without Him." But that way it will always be our victory. We will be the hero. We will be the savior. We will be alone and doomed.
I don't want to be the hero of my own story. Not ever, not even a little bit. Or I guess I should say, I do want to be the hero, I want very badly to be the one who can fix things for myself and for Cheychey, I want to be the one who can deliver us from our troubles, I dream about it everyday, but I have come to believe that that is the way to death. Me being the hero is destructive, is hell.
If we defeat our will to sin, our temptation, with a will to do good then we have stolen Christ's glory. What did He fight His great battle for if not to defeat sin? That is His glory, the glory of the Only Begotten, and for anyone else to have a share in that is to steal what is absolutely greatest. It would be less blasphemous to say that we had a part in Creation, that you were His partner on the first day, than to say that you had a part in defeating sin. Because beyond all doubt redemption is more divine than creation. Our dream is to by our will(strengthened by God), our courage(provided by the Holy Spirit), our greatness(with Jesus singing backup) conquer our sin, set our lives straight, lead our families to live happily ever after. In this way, we actually provide the bulk of our salvation and Christ just signs on the bottom line. My God is NOT a spiritual ATM. I have treated Him that way, and I am not sure how to stop.
But I believe that there is another way. Rather than facing sin with guns blazing, there is a knowledge of Christ that will unravel sin, that will cause temptation to blow away in the breeze. We would not find our temptations tempting if we thought the way that He thinks. And that is what I want this blog to be. That is why I wrote it. I made the name Comfort with Truth, because the truth about who Christ is is the only real comfort available to us. It is the comfort for consciences who have lost the fight with sin over and over and are sick of it. The Gospel is the comfort for all of our pain.

¹ “Comfort, yes, comfort My people!”
Says your God.
² “ Speak comfort to Jerusalem, and cry out to her,
That her warfare is ended,
That her iniquity is pardoned;
For she has received from the LORD’s hand
Double for all her sins.” Isaiah 40

The other, and less bad, vices come from the devil working on us through our animal nature. But this does not come through our animal nature at all. It comes direct from Hell. It is purely spiritual: consequently it is far more subtle and deadly. For the same reason, Pride can often be used to beat down the simpler vices. Teachers, in fact, often appeal to a boy's Pride, or, as they call it, his self-respect, to make him behave decently: many a man has overcome cowardice, or lust, or ill-temper, by learning to think that they are beneath his dignity - that is, by Pride. The devil laughs. He is perfectly content to see you becoming chaste and brave and self-controlled provided, all the time, he is setting up in you the Dictatorship of Pride - just as he would be quite content to see your chilblains cured if he was allowed, in return, to give you cancer. For Pride is spiritual cancer: it eats up the very possibility of love, or contentment, or even common sense. Mere Christianity C.S. Lewis