Rivers of water

Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water

Jane was a typical student at a huge state university—but one who had an extraordinary impact.  As an undergraduate she felt called by God to start a prayer group in her dormitory.  She put up fliers in her dorm announcing a weekly time that was sure not to conflict with classes—6am.  For a year she held a prayer meeting for two people person—herself and one senior.  For the next year and a half, she did the group alone.  She was, at that time, praying through something like a Christmas list:  “God I want this; I need that, please give me this and such…”  Then she read a biography of a great revival preacher that opened her to the power of God's Spirit.

God began to pour into her what was planning to give to others through her.  And then He moved forcefully to show her the reality of his power.    

Spring semester of her junior year, thirty-seven people showed up on one particular morning.  Week after week they came back.  Miracles happened.  People came to a saving belief in Jesus.  Calls to serve the Lord were heard.  Jane was given the vision to start prayer groups in every dormitory on campus.  Without an office, income, or human supervision, she started prayer meetings in twenty-four dorms.  Each group had its own leader:  young men or women who had been blessed by the refreshing life-giving water of God’s Spirit became wells for others to be refreshed.  Twenty-four different leaders—twenty-four different wells—twenty-four different strategies--all going deep in prayer; all praying for people to come to know Jesus.  And Jesus, who is the fount of every blessing, after making Jane a well, turned these twenty-four into wells and they refreshed others who have gone to bless still more people.

Jesus promised this kind of multiplying power and blessing as he cried out:

          “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the 
           Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’"(John 7:37-38)

St John comments on this promise by saying that the water he was speaking of referred to the Holy Spirit

          Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive

The Holy Spirit is life for a Christian.  He is as necessary to a Christian as water is to a person.  A Christian's power in witness is bound up with the presence of the Holy Spirit.  Coming to Jesus with our spiritual thirst we are met at the point of our hearts--the center of will, imagination and self.  Our parched soul is refreshed and satisfied as our Heavenly Father lavishes his own spirit over us and in us.  To stay connected to Jesus is not only to drink but to be transformed from the inside out.  Once the connection is made, the very Spirit of God wells up inside us as a spring pours forth in the wilderness.  As we are changed, the people surrounding us have the possibility of life. 

Evangelism is more than one thirsty soul pointing out a well to another.  It is the power of God to transform a human life into an oasis for others.   When the Holy spirit takes up residence and flows through a person, the one who shares the message is not only a sign pointing to the living water, but becomes a well him or herself. 

Jesus said that we would be like him because he gives us new life, a new power, and in fact a new identity.  Jesus was the Son--He makes us sons.  Jesus was the Well--he makes us into wells.  So evangelism is not by the power of the person, as if he or she had anything to give, but by the power of God’s Spirit, living in the person and giving him a new identity, that others are refreshed.

Whoever drinks from the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again.  The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up for eternal life (John  4:14)  

Jane heard this invitation from Jesus.  She went to the Lord for the water.  He broke through the stony soil of her heart.  She met with the Lord, drank deeply the living water, and in time became a source of living water for many around her.  Her connection to the Lord was strong, consistent and life-giving.  He blessed her to bless others.   

One can’t give what one doesn’t have.  And in God’s economy, He gives to us so that we will give to others.  In fact, it is as necessary to give his gifts away as it is for a river to give away its water.  Jesus promises that those who drink deeply from him will have more than enough of him to share.  If we lack power to evangelize, as most of us do, we can hear his voice and ask for this deep opening to his life.  As we cry out to him who first cried out to us, we can be sure that he will answer.

Lord, help me hear your voice calling me to drink.  Break through the rocky ground of my will that I may be refreshed by your Holy Spirit and have your pure, life-giving power at the center of who I am.  Make the connection so deep and clear that your water overflows and others find your healing and life through me. Make me a well in the desert, a spring in the wilderness, an outpost of your Kingdom.  Take my heart Lord Jesus and use it as a door to bless others, just as yours has blessed me. 

Consider the Flowers

Consider the Flowers

Enthusiastic, creative, empathetic, and often late to meetings. David was, like all artists I know, a little bit scattered. But he had one of the most beautiful spirits—one of the most giving hearts—of anyone I have ever known.  If you had a need, he was there to help.  If you needed encouragement, his words were perfect. 

He was, and is, the son and grandson of ethnically German missionaries in India.  As he completed his studies in the US, he moved in with his brother who was studying with me in graduate school.  David immediately became a vibrant member of our Monday night prayer group.  One night he shared with us the burden that God placed on his heart to help the poor in Africa through medical missions. 

He needed a Visa and applied to the consulate of the East African country to which he was called. 

“Can you prove that you have enough money to live on for the summer and to buy a plane ticket to leave our country at the end?” they asked.  “If you can’t, you can’t come here.”

In fact he had no money and was raising just enough to get over there.  If he had been a US citizen, this problem would have been overlooked, after all, what American would go to Africa for welfare?  But as he was an Indian citizen it was not.  This poor country didn’t want another poor person to drain its resources.

He still felt called by God to work there.  Somehow he needed to prove his good intentions or come up with a large sum of money before his internship was to begin.  He gave permission to the consulate to check his bank account—an account where a couple of hundred dollars sat lonely for more.  He said his prayers and had us pray. 

He knew that if God indeed wanted him to go, he would make a way.

Imagine our surprise when he was granted a visa with no real money in his account.  Imagine our further surprise when we found out that the agency responsible for granting the visa had seen $20,000 in his account.  

 How was this possible?  The bank had made an error in his favor for $20,000 the day before his account was checked.  The day after it was checked the bank caught the error and removed the money. David had all he needed for as long as he needed it.  Not one minute more.

Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?  Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?...Look at how the lilies grow.  They don't work hard to make their clothes. But I tell you that Solomon with all his wealth wasn't as well clothed as one of them (Mt 6:25-29).

Do you know that your heavenly Father has all you need?  Do you know like David that God the Father is your Father and that he is looking out for you?   Did he work hard to raise funds? Yes.  Did he put time into communication and contacts?  Absolutely.  But well before his anxiety grew very great, the Father gave him what he needed.   David story exemplifies the words of Jesus:

…the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.  But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. 
(Mt 6:32-33)

He had the same type of relationship with the Father that Jesus had.  There was no fear between them.  Only love.  The Father wanted David to go to Africa and David said yes without condition.   All the while he understood that the Father pays for what he orders. 

If the bank’s “oversight” reassured the consulate and verified David’s faith, it also taught me.  God promises to care for me as I walk with him.   He supplies the needs of all who follow him.  “Give us this day our daily bread,” I recite all the while remaining anxious about tomorrow and forgetting that I am speaking to the one who actually has more money, power, influence, and goodness than all the billionaires in the world.   I am still learning this lesson.  I am still learning to walk with the Father like Jesus did. 

Jesus not only shows us the way to simple, beautiful faith, he is the way to it.  When he lives in us, he gives us a new identity as sons of the Father.  This means that all the Fathers riches are ours for as long as we need them.   When we die and see our life from the vantage point of eternity, we will understand that all our wealth and gifts were fleeting like the lilies, and like them given to us for God’s glory.  

There is little so beautiful as field of flowers which silently praise the Father by their very being.  There is little so wonderful as the trust and peace sparrows show as they gather only for today and take no thought for tomorrow.  But in fact a person alive to the truth of the Father’s love is even more beautiful, even more wonderful. 

Heavenly Father:  Grant that I may so come to know you as a good, loving, and providing Father that I may rest from all my anxieties about food, clothing, and the future.  When I am anxious, remind me of your presence; when I am scared, remind me of your love; when I am worried about the future, give me the sure and certain knowledge that you are already there and that all is well where you are.  Remove fear from my relationship with you.  Forgive me for not trusting you, for not believing you, for not putting you first. Grant me a simple trust in you like Jesus had.  Form in me the character of your Son that I might become who you say that I am, your son by adoption.  This I pray in Jesus’ name. 

The God of the Prodigals

The God of the Prodigals:   


Jason was in prison for what he did in order to keep himself enslaved.  You see, a drug habit has a way of commanding you to rob and steal and flee the police all so that the habit will grow and grow.  The habit was the master and he was the slave.  Right out of Psalm 107, "some sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, prisoners in afflictions," he found himself trapped.   Then he was literally caught, and as the psalm goes on to speak of being bound "in irons," he found himself in prison.  The only hope he had was to turn to the same God who had helped his father, who had also been in jail, who had also had a substance abuse problem, who had also cried out to the Lord.  

Jail time was a gift by subtraction:  there was just him, his great need, and God.  There was nowhere left to run.  He had all the time in the world.  And so even though he couldn't walk anywhere, even though he couldn't physically return to his home and family, he began the walk spiritually with Jesus at his side. 


Jesus made this walk of shame with many people:  tax collectors hated by their own people for working with the Romans; a woman caught in adultery on the verge of being executed; the notorious sinners, the unclean lepers, the prostitutes who had no one else to turn to.  Jesus made this walk with them and was criticized by the religious ones: "this man receives sinners and eats with them."  Now to eat with anyone in Jesus' culture was to say to the whole world, "this person is part of my family."  The host was pledging his friendship love and undying protection--and Jesus, a holy man, was doing this with sinners?!


So Jesus told them a story:

There was a man who had two sons. And the younger of them said to his father, “Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.” And he divided  his property between them. Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything.

But when he came to himself, he said, “How many of my father’s hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you.  I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.’”  And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.”  But the father said to his servants, “Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate.  For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.”

Jesus says that his Father, whom the critics know as the Holy One of Israel, is like the father in the story.  Not only will God eat with sinners, he will welcome them back as long lost members of his family.  A scholar notes that the father of the story does several surprising actions, each of which underscores the truth of our Father’s love and his work to reconcile us to himself.  


First, despite the son’s request which means in essence, “Dad, why don’t we pretend that you are dead so that I can have your things,” the father is amazingly gentle towards the son.  The son’s insult, not lost on Jesus’ listeners, was real; and yet, Jesus continues, the father not only gives the son his “share” but does so without ending their relationship.   This is forbearance.


Secondly, as the son wastes all that for which the father has worked so hard, the Father is on the lookout for the son.  Why? It is because he not only knows his son’s deep need, but also the gauntlet of shame the son must run to come home.  The father himself looking, standing vulnerably, foolishly like a jilted lover pining for his beloved, waits.  This is sacrifice.  


Thirdly, the father shows his eager desire for reconciliation and the lengths to which he will go to achieve it as he runs to the son.  Men in Jesus’ day did not run--this was considered beneath their dignity.  Here the father counts what remaining dignity he had as nothing for the sake of having his son back.  Now the son knows without delay that he is restored.  Now he is covered by his father’s cloak, a sign of protection, given his father’s ring, a sign of authority, and given shoes again, a sign of his status as a son rather than a slave.

Our heavenly Father acts the same way for us.  His mercy is extended even though we have lavished his gifts on ourselves while pretending that He is dead.  His mercy is extended as he waits to cover our shame with his righteousness.  His mercy is extended as he does not stand on his dignity but runs toward us.  Paul wrote to the Ephesian Christians of the unsearchable riches of God and prayed that they would “have the power to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and the length and the height and the depth and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge” that they may be “filled with all the fullness of God”(Eph 3:18-19).  If the Father’s love for us in Christ is an ocean, Jesus leads us to the shore and immerses us in it.  


In the process of restoration as sons we remember who we are.  Just as the younger son “came to himself,” we find the knowledge of our identity as beloved sons of the Father.  


Jason found himself, in prison.  Face to face with the God of the prodigals who ran to meet him there.

Almighty Father, God of the prodigals, thank you for sending Jesus to meet me in my brokenness.  I traded my birthright as a son and instead became your enemy.  I spent your wealth on myself all the while resenting your presence and direction.  You gave up your dignity in allowing your Son to die for me.  Though I did nothing to deserve your forgiveness you offer it to me in Jesus.  While a long way away from you, you reminded me of who I am in you--a son.   Give me grace to understand who I am in Jesus.  Help me to see and know and feel your love and mercy.  And grant heavenly Father that I would grow up to look like you:  merciful, patient, and forgiving of all your sons and daughters.  This we pray through your Son Jesus Christ who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns one God now and forever, Amen.

The Father wants our freedom



He was tall and thin and pale and had the bushiest--shockingly bushy--eyebrows I had ever seen.  Walter was a retired school teacher who drove up the mountain to camp every day to run the zipline over the lake for the boys who wanted to soar out over the water.  

He slowly carried the two heavy pulleys down the road, haul them up the tower with himself, and then yell out in his southern baritone, "Let the HIGH WIRE FLY!"  


This was the signal for the boy, held up only by the strength of his hands, who would launch himself over the flat water 20 feet below and gather speed as he raced to the shallows near the opposite bank.  Soaked and exhilarated, the boy would then unfasten the pulley and lug it back along the road.  


It wasn't so much Walter's age nor his physical characteristics that resonate with the mental picture I have of God the Father:  it was instead his pure delight in seeing boys free and joyful and delighted.  He would chuckle as they launched themselves out into into space.  He was patient and encouraging "That a boy--you can do it--look how strong you are!"  as the child half-dragged the the 12 pound piece of metal back to the tower for another launch into the air.  He took such obvious joy in our freedom--that moment when we overcame the limits of gravity and set out on a wind-ripping adventure. 


Walter knew this joy himself because, old though he was, he was a child of our heavenly Father.  Every time he gave a testimony at campfire or Sunday service he sparkling eyes would begin to weep almost unbecomingly as he told us of the Father's love.  He recounted the story of the leper who came to Jesus saying, "Lord if you will, you can make me clean."  and how Jesus touched him and said, "I will, be clean."  


The leper's freedom from disease had become Walter's freedom from sin and guilt.  The leper's joy in knowing the love of God had become Walters joy in knowing himself to be a child of the Father.  The way he exhorted the boys to drag the weight to him, how he did the heavy lifting, it was all in keeping with Jesus who said, "come to me you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will refresh you, take my yoke upon you." 

Jesus is the most free man ever to live.  Never was there a man so free of need, anxiety or attachment.  Never was there a man so free from soul crushing affects of the disapproval of others, nor so free from the need to please.  Never was there a man so able to go “as the wind blows.”  Yet his whole life was centered on obeying his Father.  In his active ministry he ordered his steps with military precision achieving goal after goal undeterred by any outside concern...but he always had time to bless little children. 

This is the Father's heart:  our freedom from sin; our knowledge of his love.  This is his yoke.

Father you delight in my freedom.  You are the most free being in the universe and your delight is that I become like you.  You have delivered me from sin and death in your Son Jesus.  You have placed my burden upon him and now the weight of guilt, the iron of the nails of the cross, are fashioned in his hands into an instrument of flight.  Help me to understand that true freedom is doing your will and that you will that I be separated from the bondage of my past.  Complete the work you have begun in me.  Let me soar with Jesus unshackled by the world, the flesh, and the devil.  Give me grace to walk with you all the days of my life.  

Restored as Sons

Look at the birds of the air, they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not of more value than they? (Matt 6:26)

Just because George Muller was in seminary and training to become a pastor, it didn't mean he was following God.  He had spent his youth fulfilling his own desires--desires that none of his earthly father's riches (and they were substantial) could satisfy.  He was a wealthy seminary student on the way to becoming a pastor of a large and comfortable congregation when he heard the call of Jesus to give up a life centered on pleasing himself.  


When George came to understand his identity as a son of his heavenly Father, it was his natural father who opposed him on the grounds that he couldn’t make a good living unless he looked after himself.  Then came almost continuous disappointments as he left his homeland for England where he was to prepare for a life of gospel with Jews in Persia.  After disagreements with the missions board had been overcome he was forced to withdraw due to his health.  He began to preach and pastor in England instead and there his life began to prove the truth of Jesus' words--that he had a loving Father in heaven. 


Muller's work was characterized by almost continuous self emptying:  he took no regular salary in order that church members give from love of God rather than duty; he and his new wife sold her trousseau and gave the money for the gospel; he forbade pew rents in the church as it scandalously favored the rich over the poor.  And all of this was of a piece with what he later became known for:  opening his home to orphans.  He and Mary opened their lives to 30 children.  

Then they built homes for 130 then almost 2000.  By the time he died he had clothed, fed, educated, and housed over 10,000 orphans.  But the most miraculous thing about the Muller’s ministry is that God the Father provided for all these children without George or Mary ever asking any human for anything.  “Your heavenly Father knows what you need before you ask,” Jesus said.  Muller believed this, and took his requests only to Him.  “I want the people of England to know that they really do have a heavenly Father so I resolved never to ask for our needs from men”

     When you pray, do not heap up empty phrases like the gentiles     do for they think they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your heavenly Father knows what you need before you ask him. Pray then like this, “Our Father…”(Matt 6:7-9)

“Our Father:” while perhaps no two other of Jesus’ words are as easily recognized as coming from him, it is more certain that no two others are as ignored.  And although ignored, none have the power to change us like these.  He puts these two little words in our mouth to radically reorient us from estrangement to sonship, death to life, and darkness to light.  “Father” is a word of personal address, a word of family relationship, and a word of love.   This one simple word identifies us as sons and is a token of the special audience we are granted with the master and creator of the universe.  Though God is worthy of all praise, Jesus did not teach us to flatter him.  This would be manipulation.  Instead, Jesus has us address God person to Person, child to Parent. 

Though we had become estranged from God, Jesus rebuilds our relationship to him stone by stone starting at the foundation:  trust.  On the human level, we see broken trust all the time; interestingly, it is most often the one who broke trust who has the hardest time entering back into the relationship and becoming reconciled. And it is so often left to the one who was betrayed to work on the rebuilding.  It is just so with God and man.  Though God had done nothing to destroy our relationship with him, he takes action to restore it by teaching us, the betrayers, how to trust him again.  As a token of his trust and a pledge of his love, he sends his Only Son to live among us, the rebels.  Emptying himself of divine prerogatives (glory, perfect freedom and power and health) and becoming a servant, his Son Jesus shows us God’s love simply by his life among us. And as prayer is the medium by which we relate to God person to Person, it is here that Jesus takes care to instruct us how to trust: he teaches us to pray to the God who is our Father.  

This writer notes with embarrassment his former lack of understanding concerning the Father’s love and the reality of joyful interaction and intimacy with Him.  Though I knew my heavenly Father as a child, I lost this simple awareness as a young adult.  Searching the scriptures to find out the character of my heavenly Father has been more valuable than anything else in my restoration to a joyful walk with Him.   The gospels of Matthew and John are particularly helpful in this respect for in them the words of Jesus concerning the Father show us his very heart.  Both books are, among other things, sustained meditations on what it means to be a son by adoption of our Creator.  As sons, our needs are known[i], we can talk to our Father[ii]; and we are loved[iii]; provided for[iv], and seen and heard and rewarded by him[v]. God values us so much that he offers the greatest gifts we could possibly be given, fellowship with the Himself in the Persons of the Trinity—with the Father and the Son[vi] and the Holy Spirit[vii]. 

As we come to know him as Father, we become like him[viii].  The family resemblance begins to show as we grow more mature.  Jesus is the measure of this likeness.  The church has been given to us as a school until we reach mature manhood (and womanhood), until we grow up into “measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ[ix]”  What a gift he gives us when he makes us his sons! 

 

Father of Jesus, our Father:  thank you for sending your Son to teach me who I am in you.  Thank you for re-establishing me as a member of your family and teaching me to trust you in Jesus.   Continue this work of restoration in me that my words in prayer to you, "our Father," might not be in vain but find fulfillment through your grace.  Help me live into my identity as a son who you love.  Where I have doubted your love, I ask your forgiveness; where I have pretended to be my own provider and protector, I ask your pardon.  You want me to grow so that I look like you; I give you myself.  Let me know the length and the breadth and the height and the depth of your love through your Son Jesus.  In his name I pray, Amen.

---

[i] (Matt 6:8)

[ii] (Matt 6:9)

[iii] (John 16:27; 17:26)

[iv] (Matt 6:8)

[v] (Matt 5:16; 6:6)

[vi] (John 14:23)

[vii] (Matt10:20)

[viii] (Matt 5:45, 48) 

[ix] (Ephesians 4:11-13)

---

As Jesus Suffered, So Shall We

Felicitas, a young Christian mother to be in Carthage, was accused of worshipping strange gods.  Ordered to offer sacrifice Caesar, she refused and was thrown in prison to be used as sport with the lions.  While giving birth in the cell beneath the Coliseum, she cried out in agony.  Her guard questioned her, “If you can’t handle the pain of childbirth, how will you stand up against the lions?”  Thinking of the curse given to mortals as a result of our sinfulness--specifically the pain given women in childbearing--she replied, “Today I suffer the consequences of my own sinfulness.  Tomorrow I won’t suffer alone, but Christ will suffer in me.”

A defeated, powerless Christian is an oxymoron.  Not because he is righteous on his own, nor because he has the strength in himself to overcome sin, death, and the devil, but because Jesus has won the victory on Calvary and works it into him as he suffers with Christ dying daily to himself and daily finding new life in him.  This is no “pie in the sky” overcoming (“everything will be good when you finally die”) or a willful suppression of the difficult facts of our existence (“everything is just rosy in my life”).  Our victory happens now, in time; it is costly and deals with our sins honestly.

We would like victory without suffering, but it can’t be so.  We would like to coast into God’s heaven having hardly broken a sweat, but Jesus says, “Take up your cross and follow me[i].”  A victorious life is one of suffering because it is one of constant struggle against the world, the flesh and the devil. 

Victory comes through combat.  Combat implies pain.  Christ suffered and said that we would too.  St. Peter wrote about this to churches in Asia Minor, “Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God”(1 Peter 4:1-2). This is the battle—for whom are we living?  For whom are we fighting?

When St. Paul exhorted his protégé Timothy to “fight the good fight,” he twice used the word from which we get the word “agony.”  There is no victory without suffering because it hurts to say no to the temptations of the flesh.  It is not easy to choose the narrow path of obedience over the attractive offers of the world and the devil.  

But to do so in the power of Christ is to participate in his victory.  Note the identification of the believer with his Lord.  Since he suffered, so will you.  We’d rather stress the vicarious nature of our salvation story - “Since he did it, I don’t need to.”  It’s become an article of faith in the weakened Protestantism of today: since we are saved by grace through faith, we had better not attempt to do anything.  This, of course, uses the means of our salvation (Christ’s totally gracious self-offering for us undeserving sinners) as a screen for ignoring the divine command to live a life like Jesus.  No, we can’t earn the merits of the blood of the lamb no matter how perfectly we begin to live.  As Archbishop Cranmer put it so comprehensively, Jesus on the cross “made there by his one oblation of himself once offered, a full, perfect and sufficient sacrifice, oblation and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world.”  But Jesus himself expects us to participate in his life in such a way that the very life of God’s overcoming and victorious power will be made manifest in us:

“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me,” shows us that he expects our suffering and eventual victory.  “I am with you always to the end of the ages,[ii]” shows that he is with us working his victory out in our lives.

Are you victorious over sin?  Do you care so much for the new life of God in you that you will honor it at all costs—even at the expense of your body?  Why are exposed as weaklings and cowards in comparison to servant girls in Roman times?  The Christian life should be one of training for, reckoning on, and arming ourselves for battle and fighting the fight.  Could it be that the world is not evangelized because we have not armed ourselves?  Because we have not accepted the suffering to which all disciples are called? 

Father God, giver of all virtue and strength, give us grace like Felicitas to hold on to the victory of Christ even while suffering.  Let no fear dissuade us, no pain prevent us, and no memory of past sin hinder us in our struggle against the world, the flesh, and the devil.  As Christ became like me and suffered the death I deserve, let me become like him a son who knows obedience through pain that you might be glorified in me; all this we ask through him who lives in us, even Jesus.

---

[i] Luke 9:23

[ii] Mt 28:20

The Fight and Jesus’ power

“I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me”(Gal 2:20).

Joseph was fleeing the war in Rwanda while genocide began.  But he was not afraid of death:  God had rescued Joseph physically and spiritually. Shelled by mortar fire and buried in the earth by the explosion, hunted like an animal, facing danger on many sides, he had come to the end of himself while meeting Jesus.  He pledged his life to share the joy and truth of the gospel for the one who died for him.  So although they were refugees themselves, Joseph and his parents, who were also Christians, hid and fed two women who were running two days ahead of a murderous posse.  

   Hearing that the killers were closing in, Joseph sent them on their way just in time.  “Where are the women the people say you have?” they demanded.  “What women?” He answered.  The men left with threats and a reminder that Joseph and his family would be killed if they helped anyone from the hunted tribe.   

That week he was called to preach to the local Anglican Church.  He chose as his text the story of creation from the book of Genesis.  He preached forcefully that the killing was wrong; that in God’s eyes we are one people with the same blood; that they should help the fleeing tribe; and that murderers, without God’s grace, would go to a fiery hell for destroying the children of God made in his image.  

He said all this in a culture that had become filled with the fear of death, where the gangs were using this fear to force others to join them and to silence all who opposed them.  Though Joseph didn’t know it, the head of the posse was in the congregation as he preached.  This man heard the word of God and was convicted of his sin.  He cried out, 
           “I am a murderer:  I have killed eight people!”  
The congregation surrounded him, prayed for him, and counseled him.  Joseph told him to share the message of Jesus with those in the posse.  He did.  The posse disbanded and many refugees were allowed to escape the country because the killers were changed from the inside out.   Joseph was not afraid of death; what could they do to a man who had been “crucified with Christ,” who had already died to his old way of life and was now living out of the power of Jesus?

From the moment we wake up to reality, we are being attacked, bullied, and besieged by forces that want to keep us from what is true, good and beautiful.  Most of all, these forces want to keep us separated from God.  We awake to life in war.  Worse yet, this war is even inside us--at the gates of our hearts.  

  

Acknowledging the inner nature of the conflict, Paul writes,

        I delight in the law of God in my inmost being, but I see in my members another     law waging war against the law of my mind…” (Rom 7:22-23)

The consequences are even more enormous than we think:  what seemed like a threat to his physical life was for Joseph a fight over the destiny of his soul and the souls of those around him.  Who does he belong to?  Whom will he follow? Though it would, on some level, have been easier to give in to the devil who “prowls around like a roaring lion seeking some one to devour,” the Holy Spirit speaking through St. Peter charged Joseph and all Christians to “resist him firm in your faith knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of your brotherhood throughout the world” (1 Peter 5:8-9).  Why is suffering required?  The logic of our suffering with Christ begins at the cross.  There Jesus suffered and died with and for us emptying himself[i] and becoming a sin offering[ii].  He identifies himself with us dying the death we deserve so that we could be identified with him in the life he lived:  a life of overcoming sin, flesh and the devil.  How do we overcome?  We do it in the power of Jesus. Maybe it would be better to say that he does it in us. Paul, summing up both our death to sin and our new life of victory writes the Galatians, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.[iii]” How far on this road of suffering are we called to walk?  To the end.  The book of Revelation gives us a view of the saints who have made it to the end:

       And they have conquered [the devil] by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death (Rev 12:11).

What happens when fear the fear of death is taken away from a believer?  He perseveres until the end.  And in life or death, in victory or defeat, the life of Jesus is manifest in him. 

Almighty God and Father, whose love is so great that you sent your son Jesus to die for us; enlighten the eyes of my heart that I may see Jesus victorious over sin and death, grant me grace to understand that I have been buried with Christ in baptism and raised with him in his resurrection, and give me such freedom from the fear of death that I might confess his name before all rulers of the earth and join him in triumph before you.

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[i] Phil 2:7

[ii] Rom 3:25

[iii] Galatians 2:20