Battles & Wars Part Two: Knowing Our Battles.

In the last post, I ended with a verse that is so very relevant to my life these days:

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Ephesians 6:12 (KJV)

I have been familiar with that verse for many years, but it seems that just recently my eyes are opened to it like never before. God has really been moving in my heart about the times we are living in right this moment, and I find myself asking other people if they are feeling the same way. Everyone I have asked has replied with a strong "Yes!"

Think about what the Bible is telling us here: we are wrestling with something, and that 'something' is not flesh and blood.

I'm no Bible scholar, and I'm not the most intelligent person in the world, but I don't need to be to understand God's words. He is speaking to anyone who studies on His words with sincere prayer.

When I have think about this verse now, I think about it in very real terms. I think about what the 'principalities', 'powers', 'rulers of the darkness of this world' and 'spiritual wickedness in high places' mean.

We are in a war and we need to be identifying for ourselves who the opposing forces are. For me it was pride and arrogance. I was always pursuing anyone and anything that made me feel important and special. I focused a lot of time and energy on these pursuits.  This went on for so long that I convinced myself that I had no purpose outside of finding a niche for myself within those goals.

Other people get caught up the same way in other things: their love of some form of entertainment, or their dreams of being successful at something, and so on.

There is one other story in the story in the Bible that brings all this home for me personally. It's the story in Mark 10 of the rich man who encountered Jesus:

As Jesus was starting out on his way to Jerusalem, a man came running up to him, knelt down, and asked, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

“Why do you call me good?” Jesus asked. “Only God is truly good. But to answer your question, you know the commandments: ‘You must not murder. You must not commit adultery. You must not steal. You must not testify falsely. You must not cheat anyone. Honor your father and mother.’”

“Teacher,” the man replied, “I’ve obeyed all these commandments since I was young.”

Looking at the man, Jesus felt genuine love for him. “There is still one thing you haven’t done,” he told him. “Go and sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

At this the man’s face fell, and he went away sad, for he had many possessions.

Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the Kingdom of God!”  (Mark 10:17-31)

I would like to think that, had I been that rich man, I'd be able to give up everything to follow after Jesus. But, truth be told, there are so many things that stop people from following Jesus. When I put myself in the place of the rich man, substituting riches for my love of other things, I know that I am being a hypocrite to judge the man in that story.

For years, I was that man. I wanted to hold on to defending things I did, people I associated with, and my love of certain things. I would clean some things out of my life, but hold on to other things. And I was really good and convincing myself that to do so was harmless.

If you want to think about that point on a personal level, ask yourself what would be hard to give up right now?

I know that I am redeemed. I know that I will never be sinless as long as I live in this body. God loves me and has forgiven me for all that has been, is, and will be. I know that, but I want to honor Him with my obedience.

Picking our battles has to start with admitting we have battles.

If we are supporting, being involved with and being entertained by blasphemous relationships, people, goals and ways, then we are like that rich man. What are we willing to walk away from to walk into the arms of Jesus?

I really do feel that time is getting so short for any of us who have not accepted Jesus' pardon. Since none of us know whether we will make it alive into our sleep tonight or wake up in the morning, it's time to pay attention.

Peace
--Free

When Things Get Real

Do you remember the moment when you shifted from feeling "not grown" to "grown"? Or when you underwent any other major change of attitude, style, or sense of yourself?

I don't remember those moments. I don't remember when it happened that I stopped playing with adulthood and actually started being a true adult. Or when I stopped thinking about relationships in a shallow way and begin to understand their seriousness.

Yesterday, though, I underwent one of those major moments. Something in my soul shifted and rearranged itself in some way that I am still trying to understand.

I was sitting in my sister's room, watching as her son tried to begin going through her some of her belongings. We want to pack everything up and store them until we decide what to keep and what to donate. It's been a month now since she passed away and I guess my nephew and I thought we were ready to deal with this task. We weren't.

My nephew looked around at all those things - the hats she wore throughout her chemo treatments; the miniature bottles of perfume that she preferred over the full-sized ones: "Obsession" and "Queen" and "Giorgio"; cards and gifts that she'd received for birthdays and Christmas - and he suddenly was overwhelmed with the very gone-ness of his mother. My sister. And everything in him just gave in to the grief. It seemed that he was just winded with the pain of it.

I think this is the first time that he was understanding that she really is gone. Not here. Not ever going to be sitting on that bed, or putting on those hats or that perfume, or laughing with us, advising us, comforting us, fussing at us.

And so.

It was later, after my nephew had gone home, and I was sitting there on my sister's bed that I had that moment I was talking about. I'm not the first to have this particular moment but, for me, it was like my heart had always been partially blind until just then. That moment.

Though I'd always known that nothing is as important as the soul, it was at that moment that I truly understood that fact.

I understood that nothing - not issues of politics, race, gender, sexuality - none of it matters as much as God. What I realized is that, not only does none of that stuff matter as much as we've been made to believe, but a lot of it - most of it - is a distraction.

The other week, I saw someone online pondering about whether or not Ebola had been a distraction from something else, considering how big a media topic is was for such a short period of time. Now I was thinking of all the other issues that keep us busy and distracted and warring among ourselves.

Maybe, I thought, everything is a distraction from the biggest thing: eternity.

I think it was in "The Screwtape Letters" that C.S. Lewis talked about ways Satan and his tempters distract humans away from the very thoughts we ought to be having. I know that that's been true in my own life.

Always before, I allowed myself to be distracted from important matters. I can list things that I spent way too much of my energy on:

• Anger at injustices (personal and in general)
• Competing with myself in personal goals and with others on the job
• Finding ways to fill my "me" time with fun and adventure and any kind of entertainment
• Worrying about my shortcomings as a woman, a wife, a sibling
• Working to improve my outer self

It's not that those things don't matter at all, but I let them matter too much. I wasn't spending enough (or, in some cases, any) time and energy on things that really do matter:

• As a Christian, I am called to be ready to give an answer for why I believe. I can recite some Bible verses, but I can recite some popular book and movie lines better.
• I don't pray enough. I'm too busy allowing myself to be distracted about how and where and what to pray for. Until I get into some kind of trouble.
• I don't share my faith enough with the people right around me. I might profess my beliefs, but I don't always show those beliefs with actions.
• I don't ask myself the hard questions about whether or not everything I do might be pleasing to God.
• Most of all, I don't always live as if this moment could be my last on earth.

What I realized is not only have I allowed myself to be distracted but, a lot of the times, I've wanted to be distracted. 

It's easier for me to argue how racial profiling affects me than it is to think about racial profiling as being part of the bigger issue of ignorance, intolerance and injustice. None of those things are new and we aren't going to solve them.

That's dangerous because instead of focusing on the fact that evil and wrongdoing exists (as it always has) I (and especially non-believers) are tempted to focus on why a "good" God "allows" such things.

It's easier for me to worry about work and making more and more money than it is for me to ask myself how much money really matters. I've even allowed myself to be manipulated into worry about what kind of work I do rather than just working at all.

That's just insane because so many of us will suffer by going without any decent work because we think we deserve something better. (And "better" might mean work that we aren't qualified for, suited for, etc.) Some of us get to the point where we'd rather sell drugs than work at a fast food restaurant once we're past a certain age.

It's easier for me to pursue useless entertainment. Simple enjoyment has taken a backseat to more and more and more. Where I used to be happy with just enjoying a good book, now I get caught up in having the newest devices for reading a book. Where I used to just get out and walk and enjoy being out, now I have gadgets that monitor how much I'm walking - or I even just stay indoors and walk on a machine.

And it goes on and on.

Bottom line is, we've been manipulated and distracted. Not all of us, but so many of us - and by "us", I mean those of us who call ourselves Christian. So, if we - those who claim Christ as our personal Savior, those of us who read and study the Bible, those of us who know the warnings - then what about the people we are supposed to be spreading the Gospel to?

Anyway.

I can't speak for anyone else or have "the moment" for them but, now that I've had mine, I've got changes to make. I'm really focusing on balancing out the time and energy I spend of anything. And I have to pray constantly about these distractions.

Peace

Joy in Place of Grief

I'm dealing with my grief much better this week. I believe that's because of two things:

1. I went to church Sunday
2. I realized how selfish my grief is

The sermon Sunday wasn't directly related to grief, but it did affect my thoughts about death. The current sermon series is on the Bible book of Daniel. Daniel is a book of prophecy. All Bible prophecy is about the promise we Christians hold for our salvation. 

While the pastor talked on various verses, I kept reflecting on the fact that we are living in the "end times", and that no matter how long those times might last, every person - saved or not - lives their own end times because of our mortality.

My sister believed on the blood of Jesus Christ. The last hours she was alive, she called out His name and prayed, even though she was in so much discomfort. I believe now that she was praying and yearning for rest. I believe her rest was granted.

Yesterday, while I was going through some of her things, I prayed to God to help ease my sense of loss. I'm not breaking down at every memory of my sister like I was earlier on. I still have moments of pain at the "gone-ness" of her, but I feel more relief and joy as every hour passes. I think of what we all have been promised as Christians. I think of the Henry Van Dyke poem that my dear friend +Sandy Sandmeyer shared with me: 

Gone From My Sight (by Henry Van Dyke)

I am standing upon the seashore. A ship, at my side,

spreads her white sails to the moving breeze and starts

for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength.

I stand and watch her until, at length, she hangs like a speck

of white cloud just where the sea and sky come to mingle with each other.

Then, someone at my side says, "There, she is gone."

Gone where?

Gone from my sight. That is all. She is just as large in mast,

hull and spar as she was when she left my side.

And, she is just as able to bear her load of living freight to her destined port.

Her diminished size is in me -- not in her.

And, just at the moment when someone says, "There, she is gone,"

there are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices

ready to take up the glad shout, "Here she comes!"

So now, when I think of my sister (and my mother and father and my brother), I think of their gain more than I think of my loss. While I realize, as my little brother just told me in a recent phone call, that our grief is normal, I know that it can also be selfish.

My sister would be heartbroken to think of any of us wallowing in our misery at her death. She would want us to think of her with love and laughter, not regret and pain. She would want us to go on. Mostly, she would want us to know that her death was not an end for her but a beginning.

I still miss her, but I am better now. Now when I think of her, I try to imagine the joy of those who were calling out to her as she arrived on the other shore. 

We have been promised that there is no weeping in Heaven and, if I believe in that promise, I must put away my time of weeping here on earth for those who are now Home. I'll save my sorrow for those who don't yet believe in life everlasting.

If you are in pain from the loss of a loved one, here are some of God's promises that may help comfort you as they did me:

In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? (John 14:2)

And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.” (Luke 23:43)

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. (2 Corinthians 5:1)

My favorite right now is Luke 23:43 because it reminds me that my sister went immediately into Paradise. Immediately. And it reminds me that my brother who, like the thief beside Jesus on the cross, was accepted into Heaven even though he found Jesus very shortly before death. Praise God.

Peace

--Free