Fighting On Our Knees

As we pause to reflect upon the formidable picture of the Christian warrior regaled "in the full armor of God" [Ephesians 6:10-17] everything about it denotes action! Readying himself for battle, he adjusts his war belt. His heart races under his breastplate so that it becomes palpable. He scuffs at the earth like a baseball hitter with his nail-studded boots, securing his traction. He repeatedly draws his great shield across his body in anticipation of the fiery barrages sure to come. Reflexively, he reaches up and repositions his helmet. He gingerly tests the edges of his blade. The enemy approaches. A thousand swords ring from their scabbards in dreadful symphony. The warriors stand motionless, breathing heavily. And then the Christian soldier does the most amazing thing -- he falls to his knees in deep, profound, soulful prayer! To be sure, there will be action. He will rise, and his steel will flash, but all will be done in prayer, for prayer is primary!

This is the precise picture we get from reading Ephesians 6. For after the full depiction of the Christian warrior's armament is concluded [vv. 10-17] we read: "And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints" [v. 18]. Those who would engage in spiritual warfare, regardless of how well they wear truth and righteousness and faith and salvation, regardless of how well they are grounded in peace, regardless of how well they wield the Word, must make prayer the first thing. The Christian soldier fights on his knees! As Edward Payson has said, "Prayer is the first thing, the second thing, the third thing necessary to minister. Pray, therefore, my dear brothers, pray, pray, pray."

The first element of this type of prayer is that it is Spirit-directed. "And pray in the Spirit ... " begins Paul. How does this prayer in the Spirit occur? The principal text to help us here is Romans 8:26, 27 where we read: "the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will." Ultimately, the Holy Spirit tells us what we ought to pray for and he will settle certain things in our hearts to pray with the conviction that they are God's will -- so that we are praying in faith. Oswald Sanders elaborates here noting "that the very fact that God lays a burden of prayer on our hearts and keeps us praying is prima facie evidence that He purposes to grant the answer."

The second component of this type of prayer is that it is continual -- "on all occasions." This was the experience of the Apostolic Church as featured in Acts 1:14, "They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers." Paul told the Thessalonians to "pray continually" [1 Thessalonians 5:17]. Is this possible? Yes and no, according to Kent Hughes. While it may not be possible to carry on a running verbal dialogue with God while we do our business, he believes prayer is not so much the articulation of words as it is the posture of the heart." John Wesley takes this thought a step further when he says, "His heart is ever lifted up to God, at all times and in all places ... his heart is ever with the Lord. Whether he lie down or rise up, God is in all his thoughts; he walks with God continually, having the loving eye of his mind still fixed upon Him, and everywhere 'seeing him that is invisible.'"

The third aspect of this type of prayer life is that it is varied -- "with all kinds of prayers and requests." If we are to pray continually, then the various situations that we will encounter will demand variety in prayer. Think of the variety appropriate to life's unfolding situations: confession, thanksgiving, intercession, adoration, meditation, humility before God, and even song. We are called to be skilled in all these types of prayer -- and constantly exercising them.

The fourth aspect of a life filled with prayer is persistence in prayer -- "With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying." The Lord delights to honor perseverance in prayer. This is not to suggest, however, that God regards prayer as a meritorious work -- when there are enough prayers, he answers. Rather, he sovereignly chooses to encourage persistence in prayer and to answer it to his everlasting glory. In one of Jesus parables, he dramatizes what he wants from all believers when he told the story of the Godless judge who was worn down by an old widow who kept coming back to him for justice. He finally relented if for no other reason than his own peace of mind [Luke 18:2-5]. The cultivation of persistence was a recurring motif in Jesus' teaching on prayer. At the end of the Sermon on the Mount he enjoined his followers to the tenacious pursuit of spiritual things: "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you" [Matthew 7:7]. The Lord's language is unusually compelling because the three verbs [ask, seek, knock] indicate an ascending intensity. The stacking of these three words is extremely forceful, and the fact that they are present imperatives gives them even more punch. The text actually reads: "Keep on asking, and it shall be given to you; keep on seeking, and you shall find; keep on knocking, and it shall be opened to you." This tenacity is exactly what Paul has in mind here in our passage on spiritual warfare as he calls us to "be alert and always keep on praying."

Do we [do I?] pray this way for the Kingdom's work? Are there individuals or ministries or groups for which we persist in prayer? There ought to be. I can say I have been effectual in prayer for Alison, a friend who was near death with widely metastatic endometrial stromal sarcoma back in the Spring of 2006, or for a few missionary friends to Cameroon and Uganda [Mike, Kay, Terrill, Amber, Chad and Tiffany] as well as Leigh in Indonesia...but I run hot and cold on this, and miss far too many opportunities to avail myself in effectual prayer for them except when one is stricken with malaria, etc. Sadly, my intercessory prayer life tends to go from crisis to crisis rather than the continual praying that Paul is exhorting us to. We are in an invisible war, and those who persist in prayer prevail. The call goes forth!

The fifth and final aspect of a life of prayer is intercessory prayer [as I just alluded to] -- "for all the saints." There are many worthy things to pray for, but believers/saints are to be granted a large part of our prayer life. Sure, we are to pray for those without Christ, but high on our list should be fellow Christians, "all the saints" -- even the great saints like Paul himself. How often are we praying for those who provide our spiritual cover? We need to make this a daily part of our prayer life.

Imagine with me for moment the aged Apostle Paul -- with gray flowing beard and a thinning gray mane falling askew around his weathered face. His sinewy body bears the marks of war. The bow of his legs shows his repeated marches across the Roman Empire. Scars cover his torso as he has five times received the thirty-nine lashes [195 stripes in all]. He is bent forward not only by the gravity of time but also from the cosmic burdens of his apostleship -- "Who is weak, and I do not feel weak? Who is led into sin, and I do not inwardly burn?" [2 Corinthians 11:29]. Can you see him? Now imagine his well-worn armor. He has worn his war belt so long that has been sweated all the way through and is comparable to old horse's bridle, holding everything perfectly in place. The 'belt of truth,' God's truth, has girded him tight for years, so that it has permeated his life and reigns within. He is armed with the clear eyes of a clean conscience. He can face anything. His torso is sheathed with a battle-tarnished breastplate. This 'breastplate of righteousness' has preserved his vital organs intact. His holy life rendered his heart impervious to the spiritual assaults of Satan. His gnarled legs are comfortable in his ancient war boots. He has stood his ground on several continents. The boots are the 'gospel of peace,' the peace with God that comes through faith in him, and the resultant peace of God -- the sense of well-being and wholeness -- shalom. He stands in peace, and being rooted in peace he cannot be moved. Paul's great shield terrifies the eyes, for the broken shafts and the many charred holes reveal him to be the victor of many fierce battles. The 'shield of faith,' held up as he has repeatedly believed God's Word, has caught and extinguished every fiery dart of doubt and sensuality and materialism that Satan and his minions have launched against him. None has as much as touched him. On his old gray head he wears a helmet that has seen better days. Great dents mar its beauty but serve as reminders of furtive blows dealt to him by the enemy. Because the 'helmet of salvation,' the confidence of knowing that he is saved and will be saved, has allowed him to stand tall against the most vicious assaults, his great confidence in God gives him almost a regal bearing. And then there is his sword. He was equal to a hundred, nay a thousand, when his sword flashed. The 'sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God,' the ultimate offensive weapon, cut through everything -- armor, flesh, glistening bone, and running marrow -- even the souls of men.

What an awesome figure the apostle was. He had stood before Felix and Agrippa, the legates and officials in Rome [and would soon stand before Caesar himself] -- and he had not and would not give even an inch. He was the consummate warrior. If anyone could do it himself, it would have been Paul. But could he? Listen to the warrior's plea: "Pray also for me, that whenever I open my mouth, words may be given to me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should" [6:19, 20]. "I cannot do it without your prayers!" says Paul. "I fear that I may lose courage and fail under the stress. Pray that I will have the courage to declare the gospel fearlessly. I need your prayers." Was Paul just putting them on? Was this a self-conscious attempt at humility? We know that it was not. Remember the words of Payson, "Prayer is the first thing, the second thing, the third thing ... pray, pray, pray." Paul says the same thing when he says, "always keep on praying for the all the saints" [v. 18].

As I close, I exhort you and I exhort myself ... Do I/we intercede regularly for others? Do I/we have a prayer list for our brothers and sisters in Christ, and do we use it? We are in a cosmic battle: "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms" [v. 12]. Remember these words from John Piper's book Desiring God: "Unless I'm badly mistaken, one of the main reasons so many of God's children don't have a significant life of prayer is not so much that we don't want to, but that we don't plan to." Therefore, let us take time this very day to rethink our priorities and how prayer fits in. Make a new resolve. Try a new venture with God. Set a time. Set a place. Choose a portion of Scripture to guide you/me. Stop being tyrannized by the press of busy days. We all need a mid-course correction from time to time. Make this a day of turning to prayer -- for both the glory of God and for the fullness of our joy.

Turning Fifty: Coming Closer to Myself

Lord, you have been our dwelling place

Throughout all generations.

Before the mountains were born

Or you brought forth the earth and the world,

From everlasting to everlasting you are God.

You turn men back to dust,

Saying, “Return to dust, O sons of men.”

For a thousand years in your sight

Are like a day that has just gone by,

Or like a watch in the night.

You sweep men away in the sleep of death;

They are like the new grass of the morning –

Though in the morning it springs up new,

By evening it is dry and withered.

We are consumed by your anger

And terrified by your indignation.

You have set our iniquities before you,

Our secret sins in the light of your presence.

All our days will pass away under your wrath;

We finish our years with a moan.

The length of our days is seventy years –

Or eighty, if we have the strength;

Yet their span is but trouble and sorrow,

For they quickly pass, and we fly away.

Who knows the power of your anger?

For your wrath is as great as the fear that is due you.

Teach us to number our days aright,

That we may gain a heart of wisdom.

Relent, O Lord! How long will it be?

Have compassion on your servants.

Satisfy us in the morning with your unfailing love,

That we may sing for joy and be glad all our days.

Make us glad for as many days as you have afflicted us,

For as many years as we have seen trouble.

May your deeds be shown to your servants,

Your splendor to their children.

May the favor of the Lord our God rest upon us;

Establish the work of our hands for us –

Yes, establish the work of our hands.

The preceding Psalm [90] is a prayer attributed to Moses written some 3,500 years ago and is the oldest of the psalms, but its truths are timeless and could have easily been written less than 100 years ago. I have been reflecting on this prayer this month as I find it rich with a poignancy and a pathos that befits my “milestone” [or perhaps maybe my millstone].

The brevity of my life which vanishes like the night, the inevitability of my death regardless of how many ellipitical training sessions I perform or how carefully I watch my diet [or don’t watch my diet as the case may be], the futility of every effort to transcend my finitude, and the clarity of my failures, faults and sins that feels like a glaring exposure before a holy God – these are the blessed birthday reminders of the Jewish poet and patriarch.

The Psalmist’s somber reminders are “blessed” even though at first glance they read like a recipe for anxiety and despair. At my age, the ordinary experiences of everyday life might suggest just that. At fifty, gaining weight is easy, staying in shape is hard, losing weight is even harder. I once exercised out of vanity; I now exercise out of necessity. My biology is my certain destiny, and already my body betrays me [and has for two plus years now] – but nothing like the destiny of dust that awaits me. However skillful my future mortician, I too will revert to stardust, whither like dry grass, just as venerable old Moses did in an unmarked grave almost 3,500 years ago. My family of origin is my inherited legacy, for good and for ill. Professional accomplishments bring limited fulfillment; why did I ever imagine otherwise? Personal inadequacies unsettle me. The consequences of some life choices feel irreversible, such as tilting back 1,300 pounds of standing drywall resulting in the crushing/amputation of my left foot and ankle in 2003, moving from Hawai’i to Florida in 1995, sending my second daughter, Alli, to Venezuela in August for a two-year mission trip [What may befall her there? How can I possibly be a shield for her on a different continent? Can we really ever truly shield our children anyway?]; and my son, Andrew, why didn’t I spend more time with him doing the things he liked to do? Just how many more chances will I get to truly speak into his life? God, why doesn’t He hear your voice like his sisters do? Will he ever? Still, he hears you far better than I did at his age. Will that hearing improve over time? What can I do to adjust the tuning dial on his receiver? Sadly, a lot less than I’d like at this stage of his life. I could go on and on, but at some point the sovereignty of God is something we must simply accept at face value.

So if you live anything like a “normal life,” sorrow and heartache will visit you sooner or later, and certainly by the time you reach fifty [striking me before my tenth birthday] – whether through your parents, spouse, children, friends, boss, job, the stock market/economy, the random roll of the genetic dice, or just plain old bad luck [if a Christian can even use the word “luck”], or from what Wendell Berry once called our “irremediable ignorance.” “Life is difficult,” wrote M. Scott Peck in one of the most famous first sentences ever [The Road Less Traveled]; he too was “swept away in the sleep of death” almost five years ago from pancreatic cancer at the age of 69. So, brutal realism, modesty, and the embrace of the fleeting mystery of life all befit a man turning fifty. I resonate with the many people who quote the lines of the German poet Rainer Maria Rilke about “living the questions now.”

Some people at my age resist the analysis of the Psalmist as too gloomy and overly pessimistic, and instead throttle full speed ahead as if nothing has changed. Displaced desires, reversion to superficial pursuits, social affectations, sublimation through obsessive work, escapism through play, cutting and running, and the old stodgy standby of denial are all strategies people employ to avoid the obvious [and I’ve done all these things myself over the years], that my banal, ordinary life is speeding toward its completion, and that with what the Psalmist describes as “labor, sorrow and a moan.”

One of my favorite philosophers, Soren Kierkegaard [special thanks to Mrs. Murrel McDougal, my senior Honors English teacher, for the introduction] describes in detail his own carefully crafted avoidance mechanism. Throughout his short life [1813-1855] he battled a pronounced and chronic melancholia and used his prodigious writing to both distract and protect himself. And there is no doubt that it served as a fund for enormous artistic creativity and interior reflection, as he embraced his melancholia as form of despair. Invoking a distinctly Christian audacity, Kierkegaard made peace with it, and even believed God forgave him for his proclivity to despair. Even though one might justifiably feel increasingly old and world-weary because of the litany of woes described by the Psalmist, in relation to eternity, insists Kierkegaard, one can live “forever young.” Overwhelmed by God’s love that overcame his melancholic despair, he describes coming close to his self that he had formerly analyzed only at a distance:

Alas, ultimately I know of no truer prayer than what I pray over and over, that God will at any rate allow me – that he will not be angry at me – that he will allow me to thank him continually, thanking him because he has done, and indeed, continues to do, so indescribably much more for me than I had ever expected. Surrounded with mockery; plagued day in and day out by the pettiness of people, even of those closest to me, I know of nothing else to do in my home or in my inmost being, but to give thanks and to thank God, for I understand that what he has done for me is indescribable … He permits me to weep before him in quiet solitude, to weep away my pain again and again, blessedly consoled in the knowledge that he is concerned for me – and at the same time he gives this life of pain a significance that almost overwhelms me, he grants me success and strength and wisdom in all my accomplishments … Now life is coming closer to me, or I am coming closer to myself.

Kierkegaard and the Psalmist provoke me to take inventory of my fleeting life, to seek a heart of wisdom, and to embrace rather than resist what is at any rate inevitable. In my human imperfections and limitations, they insist I can discover divine consolations.

They further point me to confidence, joy and gratitude. In a culture of victimization, it takes audacity to celebrate gratitude for life itself with all its problems. In a society that winks at greed and encourages entitlement, contentment with one’s station in life supposes a radical experience of grace. In a world of staggering pain and inequality, there is still cause to enjoy the small things that give life its meaning.

In closing, I can take solace in the fact that I do not need to be anything other or greater than my own little faltering preface – having the confidence that at some point in eternity, God will surely bring order out of my divided and piecemeal tale and write an emphatic postscript.

Thoughts On Spiritual Warfare

As we read through Ephesians the first five chapters are filled with a deep beauty of thought as we are exposed to the bright secrets of grace: the mystery of our election, the celebration of divine power in our lives, our heavenly position, our peace, our unity, our unique giftedness, and then the call to live our lives as light and to be filled with the Spirit. These were such exalted thoughts, substance for almost dreamy reflection, and then a cold slap in the face, the ugly blood, grime and gore of war with the enemy of our souls. Nevertheless, it is still a beautiful life to be lived even though we are camped out in enemy territory.

This is a spiritual reality and to thoroughly understand this is necessary for those of us who want to live out a victorious life in today’s post-modern world. The prevailing materialistic, mechanistic thinking of our age leaves no room for the supernatural, or indeed anything without a physical cause. Sadly, many believers are so influenced by this thinking that even though they give conscious assent to their belief in Satan and spiritual warfare, their lives show no evidence of this reality. They actually live in unconscious disbelief [as Kent Hughes describes it]. For people such as these, this passage [Ephesians 6:10-17] provides a much needed antidote. And then there are those who have an unhealthy preoccupation with the Devil and attribute every problem in their lives to demons. So spiritual discernment and a sense of balance are key.

“For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” [v. 12]. In asserting that “our struggle is not against flesh and blood” the apostle makes three key points. First the struggle is supernatural – beyond flesh and blood. Second the struggle is personal. The word for ‘struggle’ here indicates a hand-to-hand fight [as the Spanish say, mano a mano]. The root idea here is not an exchange of artillery or arrows, but sweat against sweat, breath against breath. And lastly, the struggle is futile if fought in and by our own flesh. We are all involved in a superhuman battle in which conventional tactics will avail nothing.

The angels we struggle against “rulers,” “authorities,” “powers,” and “spiritual forces of evil” form a vast organized hierarchy. The word translaterd “powers” or “world rulers” is kosmokratoras, basically cosmocrats, which F. F. Bruce thinks refers to high-ranking fallen angels such as the angel-princes of Persia and Greece who hindered the archangelic messenger in his divine errand as recorded in the book of Daniel [10:12, 13].

The immediate implication is that Satan is terribly powerful. To be sure he does not possess anything near the power of God, but in God’s inscrutable arrangement he temporarily dominates and drives the world, which on the whole is separated from God’s grace. Though Satan can only be in one place at a time, with his myriads of malignant spirits he imitates God’s omnipresence and omnipotence – for he desires to be God more than anything. His cosmocrats are strategically positioned in the world’s culture, both secular and ecclesiastical. His lieutenants are likewise well-schooled and well-placed so as to best spread their cancer. The consensus of Scripture is that this world is the cosmos diabolicus. John tells us “We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one” [1 John 5:19]. Paul writes that “The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” [2 Corinthians 4:4]. In 2 Corinthians 2:2 he adds that Satan is “the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient.”

In our own culture we see some of this in the immoral and amoral banter on the TV talk shows and especially in the network and cable programming with the recent exaltation of the homosexual, bisexual and transgendered lifestyles. Our culture has become a herd of morally desolate groupies committed to unthinking, doctrinaire relativism, regularly calling good evil and evil good [see Isaiah 5:20], approving actions that even dogs under full sway of their animal natures would never do! The “Evil Empire” is worldwide, sometimes showing itself in oppression of the truth and at other times in license and debauchery, and both are typical of the cosmos diabolicus.

A parallel implication is the terrible total spiritual evil of Satan. Our verses allude to this as we are told that we struggle against “the powers of this dark world” [or “this present darkness” as the RSV has it]. We understand from Romans 1-3 that all of us are totally depraved. By this we mean that every part of our nature is tainted by sin. This does not mean that we are as bad as we could be. There is always room for more "depravement" and some humans fall deeper into their depravity than others – say serial murderers such as Ted Bundy or dictators such as Adolph Hitler or Joseph Stalin. Yet even those who have gone so low have not equaled Satan’s evil. Satan has no conscience, no compassion, no remorse, no morals. He feeds on pain and anguish and filth. This is the spirit with whom we wrestle. There is nothing in Satan which is redeemable. There is no virtue, but only a dark, cannibal void. Along with this, he is supremely cunning. Verse 11 refers to this as “the devil’s schemes” or as the Greek says, methodias – methods. And he has been honing his methods for millennia. His emissaries visited the church councils at Nicea and Chalcedon. He sat in on medieval faculty meetings. He is an accomplished philosopher, theologian, and psychologist. He has had thousands of years to study.

Sadly, one of his most deadly methods is masquerading as an agent of God, as Paul records in 2 Corinthians 11:14, 15 “And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. It is not surprising, then, if his servants masquerade as servants of righteousness. Their end will be what their actions deserve.” Today his emissaries may don Brooks Brothers suits, flaunt Madison Avenue aplomb, and travel between New York, London, Berlin, and Paris. He specializes in mixing just enough truth with falsehood to make it seem plausible, just as he did with Eve in the garden. Heresy is truth out of proportion, and twisting the truth is his specialty. Perhaps his most common method today is sensuality. How many people have sold their souls to accommodate their declining morality. Theological aberration is as often the result of moral declension as it is an intellectual process.

One of the Devil’s most effectual methods is to instill doubts about God’s goodness. This was the tool he most effectively used against Martin Luther. Roland Bainton, his great biographer, writes: “The content of his depressions was always the same, the loss of faith that God is good and that he is good to me.” Seldom does Satan ever attack openly. His strategies as ministered by his demons are nearly always unseen, shrewd, and perfectly tailored for the victim. What a terrible foe we face. He is immensely powerful, imitating God’s power and presence with his demonic hosts. He is evil beyond our comprehension and without conscience or principle. He is diabolically cunning. And he is after us!

“Our struggle is not against flesh and blood.” This struggle is too much for the 21st century, one-dimensional materialist and indeed for many who think themselves Christian. Our enemy is subtle and powerful. He hates Christ. He hates God’s children. He hates the Church.

On earth, among mortals, Satan has no equal, but in the heavenly realms he is far exceeded by the Triune God. Paul’s letter to the Colossians states dramatically that Satan, and in fact the entire invisible spiritual realm, owe their existence to Christ: “For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him.” Satan is not the counterpart of God. Because Satan is finite and God is infinite, our enemy is infinitely inferior! Satan’s power is overwhelmed by the power of God. Recall in Exodus 7 [vv. 6-12] when Aaron at God’s command threw down his staff before Pharaoh and it became a snake, demonstrating that God’s power was with Moses and Aaron. But then remember how Pharaoh’s magicians did the same and there were vipers everywhere! But then Aaron’s viper swallowed up all the rest. Those grotesque moments, as Aaron’s snake was consuming all the other serpents, said it all: God has power – Satan too has power – but God’s power is far superior! Think how Aaron felt when he reached down and picked up that fat snake and it again became his staff.

But that is not the end of it – Christ is not only more powerful by virtue of his being the spirits’ Creator. He is also more powerful because he defeated Satan at the cross, and as a result, Satan and his minions are under the feet of Christ. In fact, the apostle Paul tells us in Colossians 2:15 that our Lord Jesus Christ has led them in a victory parade: “And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” He has sealed their doom, although during the present overlapping of the new age with the old, they still exercise control over those who have not yet found freedom in Christ.

So in respect to these cosmic realities about Satan’s vast power, but Christ’s transcendent power, what must we do? Paul leaves two commands, which dominate his advice to the end of this passage. First: “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power” [v. 10]. According to Hughes, this is a passive imperative: be made strong in the Lord, find your strength in him. We cannot fight Satan ourselves. All our own doing will be in vain. Nevertheless, there is something we can do, and that is to avail ourselves of the Lord’s strength. Paul says in 2 Corinthians 12:9, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” We are to acknowledge our weakness and invite his power. Next we are to “put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes” [v. 11]. But what is most called for here is a breathing out of dependence upon self and a breathing in of God’s mighty power. I can’t think of a better time to start than right now!

My next blog entry will be posted on my 50th birthday, which incredibly is a mere four days away. It is entitled, Turning Fifty: Coming Closer to Myself. Read it and weep. I know I did as I wrote it.

Shades of Life

It was the morning after the annual spectacular nighttime ceremony known as the Illumination of the Temple when Jesus, standing in the very place where the event had occurred only hours before, lifted his voice above the crowd and proclaimed the immortal words, "I am the light of the world" [John 8:12].

In ancient Israel, the Illumination of the Temple was the culmination of the annual Feast of Tabernacles. It took place in the Temple treasury before four massive candelabra topped with huge torches. According to Kent Hughes, the candelabra were as tall as the highest walls on the Temple, and at the top of the candelabra were mounted great bowls each of which held 65 liters of oil. There was a ladder for each candelabrum, and when evening came, the healthy young priests would carry the oil up to the great bowls and light the protruding wicks. Then huge flames would leap from the torches illuminating not only the Temple but all of Jerusalem. A modern day equivalent may perhaps be the Olympic flame but here there were twelve flames [perhaps one for each of the twelve tribes of Israel]. The Mishnah tells us that "Men of piety and good works would then dance before the candelabra with burning torches in their hands singing songs and praise and countless Levites would play on harps, lyres, cymbals and trumpets as well as other instruments of music." Imagine the spectacle of fire, oil, heat, smoke, and perspiration as the priests whirled and danced before the enchanted and dazzled throng. Hughes continues by reminding us that this exotic rite celebrated the great pillar of fire [the glorious Shekinah cloud of God's presence] which led the Israelites during their sojourn in the wilderness and spread its fiery billows over the Tabernacle.

Then imagine Jesus Christ standing in the same location merely hours after the fires had been extinguished, with the great charred torches still in place, lifting his voice and bellowing "I am the light of the world!" There could scarcely be a more emphatic way to announce the supreme truth of the universe. Christ was saying in effect, "The pillar of fire that came between you and the Egyptians, the cloud that guided you by day in the wilderness and illuminated the night and enveloped the Tabernacle, the glorious cloud that filled Solomon's Temple is me! ... "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." He is everything suggested by this sublime metaphor of light -- and so much more.

This immense truth that Christ is the very light of this world must be foundational to our thinking as we consider Ephesians 5:8-14. "For you were once darkness, but now are light in the Lord." [v. 8] We are light! It has been said by a number of preachers including Dr. Gary Barnhouse, and perhaps you have even heard it said, that "When Christ was in the world, he was like the shining sun. When the sun sets, the moon comes up. The moon is the picture of believers, the Church. The Church shines, but not with its own light. It shines reflected light. At times the Church has been a full moon dazzling the world with almost daytime light ... and at other times the Church has been a thumbnail moon, and in those days very little light shown on the earth. But whether the Church is a full or thumbnail moon, whether waxing or waning, it reflects the light of Christ. Our light does not originate with us."

But our text suggests even more than reflection -- we actually become light ourselves: "For you were once darkness, but now you are the light in the Lord." Hughes states that "our light is derived from him -- not a ray of it comes from ourselves. But somehow our incorporation in Christ allows us to actually be light, however imperfect." Peter says that we "participate in the divine nature" [2 Peter 1:4]. Hughes continues that "so authentic is our participation, so real is our light, that in eternity we will actually be part of the light ourselves." Jesus said as much in his Mystery Parables, "Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father" [Matthew 13:43]. C.S. Lewis even seems to concur as he writes "Nature is mortal. We shall outlive her. When all the suns and nebulae have passed away, each one of you will still be alive. Nature is only the image, the symbol ... We are summoned to pass through nature beyond her to the splendor which she fitfully reflects." The heavens do reflect the glory of God. But we share in the glory of the Father in Christ -- and we shall be more glorious than the heavens. As Christians there is a glory awaiting us that involves, in some mysterious way, shining [not reflecting]. Somehow we are going to enter into the fame and approval of God, and we will be glorious beings far beyond description. The mysteries of Christ are endlessly amazing to ponder indeed!

But there is a caveat! Because we are light, we have a huge responsibility in the world. How are we who have been transferred from darkness to light to live? Paul commands us to "Live as children of light [for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth] and find out what pleases the Lord" [vv. 8-10]. In a word, Christ's light as it passes through the prisms of our lives should produce a sterling character. According to F.F. Bruce, goodness here implies generosity. Righteousness is integrity in all dealings with both God and man. And finally, truth is the absence of falsehood and deception. These are the ethics of light. When the light of Jesus is refracted through the prisms of our lives, there will be sanctifying shades of life for others to see. In this we "find out what pleases the Lord," and so do others.

Jesus spoke as much in his Sermon on the Mount, "You are the light of the world" [Matthew 5:14]. The more luminous our integrity -- our goodness, righteousness and truth -- the brighter the light. How can we shine more brightly? We must spend time alone with Jesus -- the Light -- in prayer, exposing our lives like Kodak film in the pre-digital era, to his presence so that his image, his very character, is melded into ours. If we do this, we can become spiritually like Moses when he descended Sinai after being alone with God -- his face shone with the light of God. This is our calling ... its time we stepped into it!

Happiness in a Capsule

Happiness in a capsule. This is our world. Prozac. Paxil. Lexapro. Xanax. Ativan. Millions are spent to advertise such medications. And billions are spent purchasing them. You don't even need a specific psychological trauma; just "depression" or "generalized anxiety," as if sadness were as treatable as Strep throat.

Now, of course, I know all too well that depression is real. After all, I see it every day. But I also know we overuse the word. Much of what passes for "depression" in our lives is really more dissatisfaction, a result of either setting the bar impossibly high or expecting treasures that we are unwilling to work for. I know people whose unbearable source of misery is their weight, their baldness, their lack of advancement in their career, or their inability to find the perfect mate, even if they themselves did not behave like one. To these people, unhappiness is a medical condition, an intolerable state of affairs. If pills can help, pills are taken.

But pills are not going to change the fundamental problem in the construction: wanting what we can't have. Looking for self-worth in the mirror. Layering work on top of work and still wondering why we aren't satisfied -- before working some more. I know. I've done all that. I've had periods in my life that I could not have worked more hours in the day without eliminating sleep altogether. I've piled on accomplishments. I've made fairly good money [for a non-surgeon]. I've earned accolades. And the longer I've gone after it, the emptier it has made me feel, like trying to pump air faster and faster into a leaking tire. I can say from experience the satisfaction from such striving is fleeting at best and hollow at worst. Yet sadly, it still doesn't render me immune from further such striving from time to time. The flesh dies hard.

Yet, I can honestly say since the age of 2o I have known why I am here. I have never had to resort to popping a pill for peace of mind. God has placed me here in large part to help relieve the suffering of others. And I've been "privileged" to suffer a bit myself ... a severely arthritic right knee, a virtual amputation and crushing injury to my left foot and ankle, a right shoulder so damaged by years of throwing that surgery was able only to take the edge off the pain accompanying overhead activities such as lifting and, yes, throwing. Lastly, two years ago I faced my own potential mortality when the bottom fell out on my health with a paralyzed left eye [the differential diagnosis of which included brain cancer, stroke, multiple sclerosis, etc.] with resulting double vision, daily hammerknocker migraine headaches, an out of control blood pressure and a thyroid gland that mysteriously just "disappeared" over the course of four weeks. Still to this day, there has been no medical explanation for this sudden constellation of symptoms. I know many people who have suffered more and have experienced much more sorrow than I, and of course, I see the suffering of my patients on a daily basis. But I can at least relate to much of what they have experienced. You may recall a poem written by Robert Browning Hamilton that seems to sum up a lot of what I'm trying to say here:

I walked a mile with Pleasure;

She chatted all the way;

But left me none the wiser

For all she had to say.

I walked a mile with Sorrow,

And ne'er a word said she;

But, oh! The things I learned from her,

When Sorrow walked with me.

Yet society tells us the things we must do and what we must acquire to be happy -- a new boat, a bigger house, a better job, a beach, lake or mountain home. I know the falsity of this. I have counseled many people who have all these things, and I can tell you they are not happy because of them. I've seen too many marriages that have disintegrated when they had all the stuff in the world ... families who have fought and argued all the time despite the fact that they had both money and health. Having more does not keep us from wanting more. And if we always want more -- to be richer, more beautiful, more well known -- we miss the bigger picture, and I can tell you from experience that happiness will never come.

Remember that when a baby comes into the world, his hands are clenched into a fist. Why? Because a baby not knowing any better, wants to grab everything, to say in a way, "The whole world is mine." Yet when an old person dies, how does he do so? With his hands open. Why? Because he has learned the lesson. You can't take it with you. So there it is ... the secret to happiness. Be satisfied. Be grateful. For what you have. For the love and grace you have received. For what God has given to you.

Paul said in Philippians 4:11 that he "had learned to be content whatever the circumstances" and in 1 Timothy 6 that "if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. [For] people who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs."

On Growing Old

In less than two months I'll "celebrate" [???] another one of those birthdays that end with a zero. You know the ones we all seem to dread the most. So over the past few months I've been contemplating just what it means to "grow old." It doesn't help much that one of the men I most admire, Kent Hamilton, a fellow elder in my church just turned 60 in February. He has been "going there" as well. And, heck, at least I'm not yet turning 60!

Getting old we can deal with ... it's more the being old that is the problem! My father turned 80 in January. This is a bit of a miracle in itself, because I never thought he'd live that long for as much as he smoked beginning even in his preadolescent years and continuing until a year ago. Nevermind that he's already suffered at least two prior strokes. As an aside, why is it that both sides of my family seem to only have strokes??? That is certainly not the way I want to exit this world ... unless it is just one massive stroke and I'm gone. But my father is now a shell of the tall, strapping man he once was. Despite the fact that his mind is still very sharp, in many ways he's a shadow of his former self ... stooped over, hard of hearing, and much more frail than I could ever remember. It grieved me to see him this way at our last Currieo family reunion this past June, just how much he'd lost even over the preceding year. Anyway, I now know that his time could be anytime. And after that, I'm next. A simple but yet frightening thought. What do you do when death's natural pecking order puts you at the front of the line? When you can no longer hide behind, "It's not my turn?"

What do people fear most about death? Hmmm. Well, for one thing, it's what happens next? Where do we go? Is it what we imagined? Does anything actually happen at all? Or is it just over and we no longer exist? Of course, if you know me, you know I don't believe that. But our next biggest fear I think, is being forgotten.

Rabbi Albert Lewis called this "the second death." Of course, we all know "the second death" to be eternal death and greatly to be feared. But this "second death" is also a painful thing to ponder. How often do you ever see someone go to a cemetery and decorate a grave? When I was a child, people did this on Memorial Day but now no one even seems to bother any longer. When was the last time I visited the grave of my own mother? Not since my college/medical school days. For shame!

I recall a poem by Thomas Hardy that speaks of a man walking among tombstones, conversing with the dead below. The recently buried souls lamented the older souls that had already slid from memory:

They count as quite forgot

They are as men who have existed not,

Theirs is a loss past loss of fitful breath

It is the second death.

The second death ... The unvisited in nursing homes. The homeless found frozen in alleys. Who mourned their passing? Who marked their time on earth? To think that you died and no one would remember you. I wonder if this is why so many try so very hard to make their mark in America? To be known. Think of how important celebrity has become in our culture. We sing to become famous, expose our worst secrets to become famous, lose weight, eat bugs, even commit murder to become famous. Our young people post their deepest thoughts on public Web sites like this and Facebook. They run cameras from their bedrooms. It's as if we are screaming, Notice me! Remember me! Yet the notoriety barely lasts. Names quickly blur and in time are all but forgotten.

Is there a way to avoid this "second death?" In the short run, perhaps yes, simply via one's family. We can hope to live on for a few generations ... when they remember us, we live on. When they speak of us, we live on. All the memories we have made, all the laughter, all the tears. But even that, too, is limited. If we do a good job, we may be remembered for one generation or perhaps two. But eventually they are going to say, "What was his name again?" How many generations, even in especially close-knit families, does it take for this fabric to unravel???

This is one more reason why faith is so important. It is a rope for all of us grab, up and down the mountain. I may not be remembered in so many years. But what I believe and have taught and shared about Christ, about the foundations of our faith -- that can go on. It comes from our parents and their parents before them. And it stretches to my children and hopefully to their children after them. Then we are all connected. And we have hope to all be reunited on the other side.

Ashley & Matt arrived here last night and we all went to Jordano's to share a pizza that I call the Delight ... most just know it as the Deluxe. Today Ariel and Alli will arrive, and we'll make more family memories as we have done so many countless times before. But it dawned on me yesterday that this is precisely how a legacy is built. One memory at a time. My kids are almost all grown now. My oldest is a nurse. My number two graduates from college in four weeks and soon will begin her career as a missionary teacher in Venezuela. My number three is just two semesters away from entering nursing school herself. My baby is about to finish ninth grade. We'll likely take our annual Christmas picture on the beach tomorrow. I hope to look at that picture and say, "Steve, you've done okay." This in many ways is my immortality.

It All Goes Back in the Box

This is excerpted from the "Ideal" speech [or Rollo if you will] that I gave at a Tres Dias weekend in 2002. The thought is good I think ... even if some of the illustrations might be a bit "dated."

Does anyone here but me seem to notice that the pace of life seems to be accelerating...that what it takes to keep all the plates spinning in our lives is constantly moving faster and faster? Citicorp became the number one lender in America when it cut in half the number of days it took to let people know whether or not their loan got approved. Domino’s Pizza became the number one seller of pizza in the U.S. because they guaranteed that they would deliver your pizza within 30 minutes. The CEO of Domino’s said, “We don’t sell pizza, we sell delivery.” And if you have ever tasted a Domino’s Pizza...you know what it is that he is talking about. There was an article in the newspaper I recall a few years ago about a guy who drives for Domino’s and he said that when he is in his car driving for Domino’s and puts that sign on his roof, he will go down the road and cars will actually pull off to the side of the road to let him through...like we used to do for ambulances. We don’t yield to ambulances anymore. We yield to pizza delivery drivers...because we are a people in a hurry.

About five years ago, USA Today had an article about a hospital in Detroit who must be taking a cue from Domino’s Pizza. A Detroit hospital guarantees that emergency patients will be seen within 20 minutes or the treatment is free. So far Doctor’s Hospital has delivered; since the offer was first made, business has been up 30%. Mortality rates have been up 120%...you know, win a few, lose a few; get ‘em in, get ‘em out.

People have fax machines; ATMs are proliferating; no one would think of living in a house without a microwave oven. Pert Plus became the number one seller of shampoo...you know why? Shampoo and conditioner in the same bottle. Remember all those years when you had to shampoo and then rinse, then condition and then rinse...and now it is just all in one bottle. “Wash and go” is their slogan...number one.

In 1967, expert testimony was given to the U.S. Senate and it was said that the labor and time saving technology was going to change the way that Americans work...that within 20 years, people would be working only 32 weeks per year or 22 hours per week or that they would retire at about the age of 40...we’d be saving all this time due to our technology. They said that within 20 years the number one challenge that Americans would face with regards to time would be what to do with all the excess time. Now it is 35 years later and let me ask you, is that really your number one challenge when it comes to time...what to do with all the excess?

About the same time, a new kind of restaurant became very popular and the American culture...a restaurant that for the first time sold food not on the basis of quality, not even on the basis of price, but on the basis of the speed with which it is served. And we coined a phrase for that type of restaurant, we called it “fast food." Fast food; not good food; not even cheap food; just fast food. But with fast food restaurants you still had to park the car, get out of the car, walk all the way inside, order the food, sit down someplace and then throw away all the stuff. And all that took time. So we invented drive thru windows, so that families could eat in vans as God intended them to.

Now even gas stations have a new deal where you can just pay at the pump. You don’t have to walk all the way into the office at the gas station and all that way back...save a good 11 or 12 seconds each way...just pay at the pump. And their slogan is...they have slogans at these gas stations...” we help you move faster.” We live in a world in which we will pay anybody who can help us move faster.

If you look at the life of Jesus, you will see a person who was never hurried. He was often busy. He had many things to do. But as he went through life he did things in such a way, he arranged his life in such a way that he was always in every moment available to His Father; able to led by the Spirit. And he was always able to love the people that came into His life. He was never hurried.

One of life’s greatest illusions challenge us here. It is contained in this little phrase, “when things settle down.” The illusion is that someday life will slow down and there will be time to get around to the things that are important. The reality is that “things are not going to settle down.” So if we don’t want to end up being so busy building up our little kingdoms that we have no time for the kingdom of God; so busy making a living that we have no time to make a life...we must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from our lives. Instead, invest your time in the kingdom in your family, in your kids, in their school making it better...making it all God wants it to be.

Now do things ever get better, slower, more peaceful at Christmastime? Malls are crowded; airports are busy; traffic gets worse…all those things. And it seems to come earlier and earlier with each passing year. Sears had their Christmas stuff up on October 30 last year! October 30! These are sick people. If anything, around Christmastime it gets worse…you can tell it by the music we listen to. 150 years ago what kind of music did people like for Christmas? Silent Night…all is calm…sleep in heavenly peace. Now we like songs like Jingle Bell Rock and Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer. Evidently the reindeer were in a big hurry like the Dominos guys. You know they gotta get all the way around the world in just one night.

Really what all these examples are about is a disease that completely ubiquitous in our society, one that might be called “Hurry Sickness”. If you have this syndrome, when you come to a stoplight with two lanes to choose from and a single car is in each, you find yourself calculating…you try to assess how recent the car models are, how much horsepower each of them have under the hood, who’s going to pull away the fastest. And that’s the one you pull up behind.

When you go grocery shopping and it’s time to checkout, you find yourself counting how many people are in each line, how full their carts are, etc. Now if you are really sick, you keep track of who would have been you in the lines next to you and you kind of watch as you go through the lines together. Which one is going to get through faster…and you may even mentally pressure the people ahead of you. If the person who would have been you in the line next to you gets through first and is out the door while you are still standing there in line, you go away kind of depressed. I mean, YOU LOST! People like that are “polyphasic”…they have to be doing more than one thing at a time…I know, I suffer from it too. But God wants us to be still and know that He is God. He also wants us to spend quality time cultivating life-changing relationships with members of our eternal family.

I learned to play Monopoly from my grandmother. She was the most ruthless Monopoly player I had ever known in my life. Imagine, if you will, that Donald Trump had married Leona Helmsley and they had had a child. You get some picture of what my grandmother was like when she played Monopoly. She understood the name of the game was acquisition. When I would get my initial money from the bank, I would just try to hold on to it because I didn’t want to lose any of it. She, however, spent everything, bought the properties she landed on as soon as she could and mortgaged it to buy more properties. And eventually, of course, the way the game goes, she would accumulate everything. She would become the “Master of the Board.” She understood that money was how you kept score in that game and that possessions are a matter of survival. And she beat me every time. And at the end of the game, she would look at me and say, “One day you’ll learn how to play the game.” She was kind of cocky, my grandmother, “one day you’ll learn how to play the game."

A year or two later, when I was about twelve, I played every day with a kid who lived on my block. And it dawned on me, as I played every day all through that summer, that the only way to beat someone at Monopoly was to make a total commitment to acquisition. That summer I learned how to play the game. By the time fall rolled around I was far more ruthless than even my grandmother. Then I went to play her. And I was willing to do anything to win. I was even willing to bend the rules. I played with sweaty palms. Slowly, cunningly, I exposed the soft underbelly of my grandmother’s weakness. Relentlessly, inexorably, I drove her off the board. The game does strange things to you. I can still remember it like it was yesterday. It happened at Marvin Gardens. I looked at my grandmother. This is the person who had taught me how to play...and she was an old woman by now... she had raised my mother...she loved me. And I took everything she had. I destroyed her financially and psychologically. I watched her surrender her last dollar and quit in utter defeat. It was the greatest moment of my life. And then she had one more thing to teach me, my grandmother. Then she said to me, “now it all goes back in the box.”

All of the houses and hotels, Boardwalk and Park Place, all of those railroads and utilities, all of that wonderful money, it all goes back in the box, she said. I didn’t want it to go back in the box. I wanted to leave the board out...permanently...bronze it maybe as a memorial to what I had achieved. See when she said it all goes back in the box, it was a way of saying to me, none of this is really yours. It doesn’t belong to you. You don’t own any of it. You just used it for a little while and now it all goes back in the box, and next time, it will all go to someone else. That’s the way the game works...so when you play the game, don’t forget this one lesson...when the game comes to an end, and the game always comes to an end, the stuff all goes back in the box.

We tend to try to become the master of our own little boards and often forget this one little thing, that the game will end. The game always ends folks. Sooner or later, it all goes back in the box. A businessman is jogging and he feels a sudden pain in his chest, and in an instant, it all goes back in the box. A mother is driving in her car and someone misses a stop sign, and in an instant, it all goes back in the box. The doctor says it’s malignant, and in a hospital bed in an instant, it all goes back in the box. House, car, boat, clothes, toys, they all go back in the box. So you have to ask yourself, Jesus says, “What is it in life that matters? What is it that is worth giving your life to?” This story gets lived out across the world millions of times every day, and in the end, it is only what you’ve done for the kingdom of God that counts for anything in this life and in the life to come.

Two great illusions prop up the lives of rich folks like this guy and like a lot of us. One of them is contained in this little phrase, “when things settle down.” The illusion is that some day life will slow down and there will be time to get around to the things that are important. Listen friends, do you know when things will settle down? When you die. Things will settle way down when they put you into the ground. But until that day comes, it is not likely that things are going to change in your life so that all kinds of time will become available for you to get around to important things. The second illusion that props up rich young lives is that someday more is going to be enough. This guy kept thinking that if I just get more…bigger barns, bulging portfolios, etc. The Bible says that contentment is a learned skill. It’s an attitude. It’s not that eventually I am going to have enough stuff so that I will become content. I must learn to be content with what I am living with right now.

I remember a Peanuts cartoon that showed Snoopy sulking on his doghouse eating dog food on Thanksgiving Day while Charlie Brown and his family were warm inside eating a turkey dinner. Then he remembered that it could be worse, he could have been the turkey. It could be worse. It could always be worse.

So when Tres Dias is over and you go out into the parking lot and see your car and that fancy Lexus across the lot…you’re going to say with passion, “It could be worse.” When you get home to where you live and you walk up to the door, you’re not going to wish you lived in a fancier house, but you’re going to say with passion, “It could be worse.” Lastly, and more importantly, when you wake up Monday morning, roll over and look at your wife, you’re going to say with passion, “….” NO, NO, NO, don’t do that after all!