A Ramble About Trusting in What You Can See

In the Old Testament readings in the lectionary over the last few days, the Ark of the Covenant, God's throne on earth during the time of the Tabernacle and the Temple, had been captured by the Philistines. I remember my professor of Old Testament History, Mr. Batten, in Bible School covering these chapters of first Samuel. The Israelites were being routed on the battlefield by the Philistines. The way he put it, their solution was to “go get the box”, the Ark of the Covenant. They made the mistake of trusting in “the box” which they could see instead of the God whose glory dwelt between the gold angels on the lid of the box. Instead of looking for God whom they couldn't see to save them from the Philistines, they looked to “the box” which they could see to save them. As a result, God allowed them to be slaughtered on the battlefield and “the box” was captured to teach both Israel and the Philistines a lesson in respect for Him.

Recently, my family and I visited a children's home in Gallup, New Mexico. As we were talking with some of the houseparents, we were discussing that we had wanted to start the home for disabled children which we're now researching by faith, depending on God for all the resources needed. In the course of the conversation, one of the houseparents brought up another children's home that was also supposed to be operating on a “by faith” basis. Someone had donated upwards of eight million dollars to this children's home. It came to pass that they were looking to put up a new building, and rather than pray and seek God's will and provision for it, because they already had the eight million, they just went ahead and did it, because they already had the money. Without giving more specifics, he said that money nearly destroyed that children's home because the people stopped trusting in God, and started trusting in their bank account.

When we started the journey which we're on, we went out with almost no money and only half a tank of gas, trusting that God would somehow supply our needs, and He did. Then, someone donated about four hundred dollars for our journey, and we were able to get gas and stay at an RV park for a few days in Flagstaff, Arizona. On the way back to the interstate highway, I saw someone sitting at a street corner with a sign which said, “traveling, need money.” It pulled at me to give him something out of what we had, even if it was only five dollars, because we ourselves had no resources of our own. But I didn't. The fear crept up that we wouldn't have enough if I did that. And my opportunity to share what God had given passed in that moment and I immediately knew I had done something wrong. I had put my trust in the money in my wallet, rather than the God who had provided it. I then became worried that somehow this would come back to bite us and I confessed it to my wife who also had wondered if we shouldn't have given something to him.

Sure enough, within a couple of days, our money ran dry and we wound up staying a night in a Walmart parking lot. We continued to try and visit children's homes, but those doors closed. After a day, only one opened up for us to do it, and it was fifty miles from where we were at. We had only a quarter tank of gas left to get there (at 5mpg, that isn't a lot, trust me). We made it, but used up most of our remaining gas doing it. We had just enough money between the five of us (including a ten dollar loan from my teenage daughter) to get enough gas to make it to a second Walmart parking lot where we could only stay for one night (the previous one would have let us stay two). My fears overwhelmed me at this point as I was only looking at my empty wallet and empty gas tank. I felt defeated, and I was terrified as all the worst case scenarios kept flooding into my mind.

The dumb thing about this was that we weren't much worse off than when we started our journey, and we still began driving by faith. But the difference, as I see now, was that we went without anything we could see to begin with. Once we had resources we could see, my faith crept away from God and towards those resources.

St. Ignatius of Loyola keeps coming to my mind, as do the writings of the Desert Fathers, but St. Ignatius especially. Upon his conversion (for lack of a better word), he gave up all of his wealth and status and went barefoot, wearing only the clothes of the poor. He then resolved to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem taking nothing with him. When he accepted charity from others along the way, he only used what he needed for that day, and then feeling increasingly guilty he immediately gave the rest to the nearest beggar he could find. He wanted to get rid of the earthly resources as quickly as he could. To my earthly mind this seemed incredibly impractical at first. I mean, why not just save what he was given for when he needed it later? But this isn't the way of faith, and he, even in those earlier days, knew it. The way of faith, the path of Jesus Christ, isn't to trust what you have in your hand, but to trust the God who put it there. Jesus demonstrated this in a practical way when he sent out the twelve and told them to take nothing with them but the clothes on their backs.

There is also a lesson in these chapters of Samuel with regards to the sons of Eli. These “priests” had absolutely no respect for the meat which was offered to the Lord. According to the law, the meat which was sacrificed went to feed the priests, but it still belonged to the Lord. Eli's sons acted as though it belonged to them. As a result, when they carried “the box” into battle, they were killed as God had said through Samuel.

I have been impressed time and again on this journey that the money which is donated to us may be for us to use, but it belongs to the Lord. People aren't donating to us, but to Him. When I held on tight to the few dollars I could have given to the man on the street corner, I was acting no better than Eli's sons, and over the next few days the Lord let me know it painfully. He did relent later that night and permit people to donate, and we never went without what we really needed. He only really permitted the terror of being without, not the reality, but I heard His message loud and clear through it.

Today, I looked in my wallet and I still have more money than I did a few days ago. I looked at my gas gauge and it still has more gas in it than it did then. But knowing that I would need far more over the next few days I began to be afraid again, and the fears started to surface again. Even having heard and understood the message, my faith still crept over to my resources rather than the God who supplies them. It's altogether too easy for it to happen. I'm realizing more and more through these things that faith thrives easier when it's all that's in your possession. More than this, and it has to compete with the things you can see.

A Ramble About Courage

“Courage is not the absence of fear...” I've been reflecting a lot on these words lately because, if it was, then I would be about as cowardly as they come. I've been so fearful so often over this past month that my internal “fear alarm” feels like it's actually beginning to wear out. I've had stress headaches, upset stomachs, and bowel problems (let's leave it at that) for weeks. I was watching something on TV last night (Brain Games on NatGeo) that intentionally tried to surprise-scare the viewer to make a point about the fear reaction. My body didn't jump in the slightest. Was I fearless? No. I'm just worn out from it.

Our RV was repaired and released back to us yesterday. With yet more fear and dread I got a ride over to the autoshop's office to receive the bill for the services. It was, as I was afraid, way beyond my ability to pay at the moment. And yet God, in His mercy, put such a kind and generous heart into the owner of the shop, and those around us, that the pastor of Kingman Christian said that the church would cover part of it, and as for the rest I was told, “just pay me when you can.” I do not know when that will be, but I trust that God does and He will make a way.

Another passage that has been going through my mind frequently is Joshua 1:9 which reads:

“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.” (ESV)

This passage was a part of the lectionary readings from months ago just before we left Idaho for Arizona. It stood out at the time, and it continues to do it now as God continuously reminds me of this.

I am now looking forward to the rest of our planned journey. I know that it will not go completely according to my plan, because it hasn't yet gone according my plan. And the truth is that, if this has been the very beginning of it, then what lies ahead truly frightens me. In spite of everything that God has done for us. In spite of all the myriad of ways He has provided for us, sheltered us, protected us, and introduced us to people that have helped to shape and cement our vision into something we can present visually and say, “This is what we're talking about. This is what we want to do.” In spite of every way He has reminded me of His love, faithfulness, and His constant presence, I am still fearful of what is going to happen next. I know it will honor and glorify Him. And just based on what has happened here, I know that He will use our weaknesses (and I in particular have many of them) to demonstrate His glory and strength. We will be leaving Kingman tonight based on His strength, because we have none of our own.

And that is the point of it all. The point isn't to demonstrate how fearless, how good, holy, or righteous I or my family is. The point isn't to magnify ourselves or draw attention to ourselves. God does all these things to draw attention to Him using us and our weaknesses to do it. This is the whole point and “mechanism” of charismata (spiritual gifts), miracles, and demonstrations of His power. Not for my glory, not for people to look at me and say, “He's all that!” No, not in the slightest. God forbid it should be. It's for them to look at what was done and say, “Look, that's impossible for him. Only God could have done that.” It doesn't matter if I'm fearless or terrified through it all, it only matters that I recognize that there is something else more important than my terror and trust Him to see me through it when I make the decision to jump off the (metaphorical... mostly) cliff off which He tells me to jump.

When God tells me to be strong and courageous, there are two things I now must keep in mind. The first is that He means it, because there's going to be stuff happening that only He can deal with, and it's otherwise going to send me into the fetal position. The second is that I'm going to be afraid and I have to come to terms with my fear. As a human being, there isn't much I can do about it unless my “fear alarm” breaks completely. I have to accept that fact and move on with it. Where the crux of the matter lies is in not allowing that fear to keep me from doing what He tells me to do, even knowing the possible kind of trouble obedience is going to get my family and I into. In the book of Acts, obedience got the Apostles into massive amounts of trouble; jail time, beatings, riots, shipwrecks, and executions but they still went and did it, even knowing what would happen if they did. I would like to think that it will get easier the more we obey and see His hand. I know it already has from where I was even a few years ago, but it seems like it's now being taken to the next level and so that fear of the unknown comes creeping back in.

“Courage is not the absence of fear, but the judgment that something else is more important than fear.” God knows we're going to be afraid, and that's ok, as long as we make the judgment that what results from obeying Him is far more important than the fear which grips us.

A Ramble About Weeds, Attachments, and Pruning

In the ancient Church, especially where the Old Testament was concerned, they held that there was a literal reading of the text and a spiritual reading of the text. Between the two, the spiritual reading was held to be the more important for the Church because this was the reading which most applied to us. One way of looking at it would be the literal “interpretation”, and the spiritual “application”. One of the things which has always stuck with me after reading St. Augustine's Confessions is how much St. Ambrose's “spiritual” interpretation of the Scriptures played a part in converting Augustine from Manichaeism, which supposedly only held the “literal” interpretation to be of any importance.

One of the principle parts of the Old Testament which is referred to in the writings of the ancient Church as an application for us in our Christian lives is the invasion of Canaan by Israel, and the orders by God to utterly destroy any idols, places of worship, altars, and anything in general having to do with any other god besides Yahweh:

“These are the statutes and the ordinances which you shall observe to do in the land which Yahweh, the God of your fathers, has given you to possess it, all the days that you live on the earth. You shall surely destroy all the places in which the nations that you shall dispossess served their gods, on the high mountains, and on the hills, and under every green tree. You shall break down their altars, and dash their pillars in pieces, and burn their Asherah poles with fire. You shall cut down the engraved images of their gods. You shall destroy their name out of that place. You shall not do so to Yahweh your God.” Deuteronomy 12:1-4

The analogy used is that of our attachments to anything else besides God Himself. Just as Israel was to utterly destroy any possibility of the worship of foreign gods, so are we to utterly destroy and shed any attachments to anything which could get in the way of our relationship with God through Jesus Christ, and our progression towards union with God through Jesus Christ. This is a constant teaching within the Gospels and the epistles as well:

“If your right eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out and throw it away from you. For it is more profitable for you that one of your members should perish, than for your whole body to be cast into Gehenna. If your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off, and throw it away from you. For it is more profitable for you that one of your members should perish, than for your whole body to be cast into Gehenna.” Matthew 5:29-30

Jesus became very specific in the parable of the sower where it comes to certain attachments and how they affect the “fruitfulness” of a believer:

“What was sown among the thorns, this is he who hears the word, but the cares of this age and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.” Matthew 13:22

“That which fell among the thorns, these are those who have heard, and as they go on their way they are choked with cares, riches, and pleasures of life, and bring no fruit to maturity.” Luke 8:14

Attachments to wealth and sensual pleasures are right at the top of the list of those things which cause a believer to become unfruitful and which stunt their progression towards union with God in Jesus Christ. These kinds of things are compared to weeds which suck all the nutrients and water out of the soil and keep the plant they surround from producing fruit. These kinds of attachments are insidious as well, because they can start innocently enough with just wanting to have “enough” for yourself and your family. But what happens is that the definition of “enough” changes, and the line between “enough” and excess keeps getting pushed back. And, in possessing “enough”, we tend to rely on that “enough” and not on the God who gives it. Possessions themselves are amoral, neither good nor bad, but it is our own insecurity because of the sin disorder which makes us attach to them and which makes them so dangerous to us. We become terrified of not having them because we place all of our security in them and not in God. It is for this reason that Jesus said it was easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a sewing needle than it was for a rich man to inherit the kingdom of God, and why He told the rich man to sell everything he had, and give it to the poor, and then follow Him. The disciples of Jesus understood this teaching very well. It was for this reason that those who had property within the Apostolic Church sold it and gave the proceeds to the Church to distribute to everyone as needed. They understood very well the dangers attachment to possessions could pose to their goal of being like Christ.

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the farmer. Every branch in me that doesn’t bear fruit, he takes away. Every branch that bears fruit, he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. You are already pruned clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I in you. As the branch can’t bear fruit by itself, unless it remains in the vine, so neither can you, unless you remain in me. I am the vine. You are the branches. He who remains in me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If a man doesn’t remain in me, he is thrown out as a branch, and is withered; and they gather them, throw them into the fire, and they are burned. If you remain in me, and my words remain in you, you will ask whatever you desire, and it will be done for you. In this is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit; and so you will be my disciples.” John 15:1-8

It is a known fact in gardening that if you want a plant to produce more fruit, you have to cut away the dead branches and foliage. For the follower of Jesus Christ, this means removing from one's life anything which interferes with remaining in Him. Anything which could draw you away from Him or which you place as more important than Him. Jesus mentioned several things in His teachings: attachments to personal possessions, attachments to family members, attachments to worries and concerns for bodily needs, attachments to one's own personal self and identity, even attachments to religious practices if they were placed as more important than Him. All of these things would need to be put to death and cut away in the pursuit of union with God through Jesus Christ.

“However, what things were gain to me, these have I counted loss for Christ. Yes most certainly, and I count all things to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I suffered the loss of all things, and count them nothing but refuse, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own, that which is of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, becoming conformed to his death; if by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect; but I press on, if it is so that I may take hold of that for which also I was taken hold of by Christ Jesus. Brothers, I don’t regard myself as yet having taken hold, but one thing I do. Forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 3:7-14

In order to move forward in our personal discipleship, we must learn to recognize the attachments we have formed which come between ourselves and our Lord because these are things which keep us from producing fruit. These are the things which keep us from being like Christ. We must also be prepared to cut these attachments away from ourselves and let them go. If we don't allow ourselves to be pruned in this way, we will continue to be filled with dead foliage until finally the whole branch must be thrown out and burned on the fire. Ultimately, we must keep our one goal of Jesus Christ in the forefront of our minds and hearts and be prepared to do anything we need to reach it.

(All Scripture citations taken from the World English Bible which is in the Public Domain)