“If my heart has been led…”

       I was reading through the Gospel of John when an unusual cross-reference brought me to Job 31:7— “If my heart has been led by my eyes…then may others eat what I have sown.” Job wanted to live righteously. In order to treat people fairly and justly, he had to search deeper than the obvious, or what just appeared to his “sight”.

        This was the very problem the Jews had in Jesus’ day. In just two chapters, John records at least four times when, by “sight” so to speak, they thought they knew all about Jesus. In 6:35, their eyes saw the physical bread he had multiplied for them; in 6:42, they “knew” his father was Joseph; in 6:60, they were repulsed by the thought of eating his body and blood; in 7:41, they “knew” that no prophet could come out of Galilee. But Jesus was right there in front of them, showing them all kinds of signs. Why not believe him? Why not follow him? Sadly, as our verse says, their hearts were following their eyes. This all reminds me of the character in John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress: “There was a man that could look no way but downwards, with a muck-rake in his hand. There stood also one over his head, with a celestial crown in his hand, and proffered to give him that crown for his muckrake.”

        I recently heard a preacher describe some of the defining moments in the life of Elisabeth Elliot:— a year’s worth of translation work stolen; getting a unique translator into one of the South American Indian languages, only to find him murdered; her husband losing all his translation notes in a flood; then losing her husband, Jim Elliot, to Auca spears after only 27 months of marriage; losing her second husband to painful cancer. None of these events showed the love of God to her; they seemed so pointless. What kept her going, through all these years? She never let her “heart be led by her eyes”. She had confidence in what she hoped for and assurance about what she did not see. (Heb.11:1) She trusted in God’s love for her and that kept her strong.

        And so it is for us. Prayers answered? Maybe. Maybe not. Is God good all the time? Yes, we know He is—it is one of His attributes! (But don’t force me to say it if my heart is broken with the loss of my house, or someone’s child!)

        Let’s go back to those examples from John’s Gospel. In 6:35, we see that Jesus is the true bread; if they ate of him they would live forever. In 6:42, Joseph was only the “step-father”, His true Father is God. In 6:60, there was no intention of “eating His body”, but trusting Jesus would give eternal nourishment and life. And finally, in 7:41, Jesus was from Galilee, but He was also from Bethlehem (as the prophecy required). They misunderstood Jesus on every count.

        To put our verse into simpler, harsher, less poetic language, it might read, “If my attitude is guided only by shallow first impressions and presumptions, I deserve to suffer for my stupidity.” Let’s strive for honesty in our dealings with others. Let’s go for justice and truth and mercy. These are things the Lord Himself never got much of while He was here on earth. Let’s be like Job, and work at understanding people, and especially understanding the Lord. Otherwise, “What will I do when God confronts me? What will I answer when called to account?” (Job 31:14)

The fruit of the Spirit is…gentleness

     The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, 

peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, 

faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. 

Against such things there is no law.

Galatians 5:22, 23. NIV

        “Gentleness”—Who comes to your mind when that word comes up? For me, I would probably say my father-in-law, Bill Spencer. He couldn’t pass a hitchhiker or a broken-down car without offering help. His name was on the church sign as being the main contact and only heaven knows how many meals and hundreds of cans of Campbells soup he gave away to the needy who called. He was always ready with a word of encouragement, and any assembly could call him even on Saturday evening, and he would graciously agree to preach the Gospel there next evening.      

        Gentleness, my dictionary tells me, is kindliness, serenity, patience, but not harshness or any kind of roughness. W.E.Vine’s Bible Dictionary suggests fairness or moderation, or even meekness; “not insisting on the letter of the law.”

        When we turn to the Scriptures for examples, probably the first is Moses. What he had to deal with, in Egypt and throughout the exodus, would push any man to the brink. But what does the Bible say? “The man Moses was very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.” Numbers 12:3. But there was One Who was gentler and meeker, and He says about Himself, “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Matthew 11:29. With Jesus’ yoke upon us, we can see, and experience, and learn that gentleness, and at last we can rest.

Believers Hymn Book Songwriters.

  

      For all you statisticians, here is a chart compiled from the Believers Hymn Book, showing every hymn writer with three or more songs to their credit. If you want to go even deeper, there is a chart available that shows individual hymn numbers. Finally, there is an Excel file available that lists all writers and all hymn numbers. Contact the editor for copies.

“Theodicy”

        My father was in the Canadian Navy during World War 2, and one of the men he respected as a seaman and officer was Lieutenant-Commander Nicholas Monsarrat, the author of The Cruel Sea, H.M.Corvette, The Tribe That Lost Its Head, and other books. Monsarrat lived and worked in Ottawa for fourteen years after the war, then returned to England. Maclean’s Magazine interviewed him in December, 1966, and I was very disappointed to read, “I haven’t believed in God for 35 years.” His reason? “It doesn’t make sense to me, with the world in such a mess, that there can be any planning person or planning entity behind the direction of the world.”

        Then I remembered reading a similar interview with Stephen Fry, from February, 2015: “Asked what he would say if he was confronted by God at the pearly gates of heaven, Fry replied: “I’d say, bone cancer in children? What’s that about? How dare you? How dare you create a world in which there is such misery that is not our fault. It’s not right…”

        From a Christian viewpoint, “the defense of God’s goodness and omnipotence in view of the existence of evil” is “theodicy”.

        Obviously Monsarrat and Fry are not convinced and, after all these years, what new arguments might come up?

        Two recent books seem to give the best presentations. The first is Christianity: Opium or Truth?, by David Gooding and John Lennox. They divide the discussion into two main areas: (1) the problem of evil and (2) the problem of pain.

        Gooding and Lennox relate the first to free will. Why doesn’t God stop and judge the Hitlers, Stalins and Pol Pots of the world? “Well suppose he did…Where in fairness would he stop?...What would God have to say to each one of us?” Because all have sinned (Romans 3:23)        With regard to the problem of pain (the other source of suffering), these authors give a long list: “earthquakes, volcanoes, tidal waves…congenital deformities and personality-destroying diseases…for which…man is not immediately responsible”. As Gooding and Lennox say, “intellectual answers to the problem of pain are necessary and helpful. But the thing that soothes the heart of believers and gives them the courage themselves to face whatever sufferings God may allow them to encounter is the fact that God has not remained aloof…the Son of God has himself suffered…God has given his Son to die.”

        The answer, in the end, is simply, “Jesus”. This is not simplistic; this is not a cop-out. Everything that Jesus is and does, he pours into his own people. “He learned obedience from what he suffered.” (Hebrews 5:8).

        We have found no better answer. Looking back at freedom of choice, it will, if given free reign, lead to every imaginable wrong. Likewise, a free, unrestricted universe will “do its thing” and assuredly result in so-called natural disasters, disease and pain. Certainly, this aspect of pain is the hardest to accept—pain and suffering in innocent people, especially the child with cancer, as Fry cries out.

        To proceed further with Fry’s great problem, look at The Case for Faith, by Lee Strobel. He investigates “theodicy” in an interview with Peter Kreeft (p.70), a philosopher and theologian at Boston University. This professor comes to the same conclusion as Gooding and Lennox—words and intellectual explanations are never enough for someone in the depths of suffering and pain. Let his dialog with Strobel finish our discussion:—

     “The answer, then, to suffering,” I said in trying to sum up where we’ve come, “is not an answer at all.”

     “Correct,” he emphasized, leaning forward as he pleaded his case. “It’s the Answerer. It’s Jesus himself. It’s not a bunch of words, it’s the Word. It’s not a tightly woven philosophical argument; it’s a person. The Person. The answer to suffering cannot just be an abstract idea, because this isn’t an abstract issue; it’s a personal issue. It requires a personal response. The answer must be someone, not just something, because the issue involves someone—God, where are you?”

     That question almost echoed in his small office. It demanded a response. To Kreeft, there is one—a very real one. A living One.

     “Jesus is there, sitting beside us in the lowest places of our lives,” he said. “Are we broken? He was broken, like bread, for us. Are we despised? He was despised and rejected of men…Does he descend into all of our hells? Yes, he does.”

The fruit of the Spirit is…faithfulness

     The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Galatians 5:22, 23. NIV

        Merriam-Webster says faithfulness is “having or showing true and constant support or loyalty.” We always like to go a little deeper just to be sure of what the original Greek word meant (in this case, “pistis”, Strong’s #4102). W.E.Vine tells us that this Greek word is used in both a passive and an active sense. The passive is “to be trusted, reliable”; the active is “believing, trusting, relying”.

        Who might your first Scripture choice be to illustrate “faithfulness”? Mary’s husband, Joseph, was “faithful to the law” (Mat.1:19), Timothy was “faithful in the Lord” (1 Cor.4:17), the believers in Colossae were “faithful in Christ” (Col.1:2), Epaphras was a “faithful minister of Christ”, (Col.1:7). So were Tychicus (Eph.6:21; Col.4:7), Onesimus (Col.4:9), Paul (1 Tim.2:7), and Antipas (“my faithful witness”, Rev.2:13).

Genesis 24:27.God is faithful to Abraham.

         From the Old Testament we have Enoch (Gen.5:22, 24), Abraham (Gen.24:40), Sarah (Heb.11:11), Moses (Num.12:7; Heb.3:5), David (1 Kings 3:6), and Hezekiah (2 Chr.31:20).

        But, above all these, we find early on (Genesis 24:27) that “faithfulness” describes God Himself—in Sarah’s time God is the faithful One, Who keeps his promises (Heb.11:11). Then one of the last occurrences is in Revelation 19:11, where it is Jesus, and His very name is “Faithful and True”.

        Look up some of these references; read their stories. What was the key component of their faithfulness?— They tried to keep everything open before God—would he be pleased, would he approve? With many of these believers Scripture adds these qualifications: They were faithful “in the Lord”, faithful “in Christ”, faithful “with God”, faithful “before God”, faithful “to God”.

        Hebrews 11 is known as the “chapter of faith”. Wouldn’t it be great one day to come across a book in heaven, flip open a few pages, and there read your own name! Another “chapter of faith”—with additions!

                     Strive, man, to win that glory;

                         Toil, man, to gain that light;

                      Send hope before to grasp it,

                         Till hope be lost in sight.

The Celestial Country

Bernard of Cluny

Commentary on Growing Old (Aging)

Why do we grow old and die? Is it really a curse, as most people seem to think? Maybe not...

Childhood

        Every child wants to get older so they can ride a two-wheeler or stay up later or walk home from school by themselves. Every one of us has said, "When I grow up I want to..." But then we do grow up.

        Relevant Scriptures:

• Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.  Proverbs 22:6.

Career and Marriage

We leave high school and go to college or get a job, and discover that responsibilities are starting to press in from every side. We get married and maybe have children---the responsibilities increase a hundredfold. As our children grow, we do everything we can to help them in school, in sports, physically, socially, emotionally, and spiritually.

        Relevant Scriptures:

• He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the Lord.  Proverbs 18:22.
• Sons are a heritage from the Lord, children a reward from him.  Psalm 127:3.

Middle Age

        Suddenly, we discover that our children are grown and married. We may even be grandparents. Our responsibilities may decrease but now we get to enjoy our grandchildren in a way we never had time to enjoy our children. Now we can read them that "one more chapter, please"! But behind this looms our own mortality. The end may be in view on the most distant horizon and we have to take it into account.

        Relevant Scriptures:

• Teach the older men to be temperate, worthy of respect, self-controlled, and sound in faith, in love and in endurance.  Titus 2:2.
• Do not rebuke an older man harshly, but exhort him as if he were your father.  1 Timothy 5:1.

Growing Old

        This page isn't really about growing up and maturing. These seem to be natural things and we can easily take them in stride. This page is about "aging", that is, growing OLD! Again, remember that it is only the body that grows old. Lucy Spencer said that however old we get on the outside, we never age inside. I think that, in spirit, we are all about 30! God has truly "set eternity in our hearts [our inner being]".

        Relevant Scriptures:

• We do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.  2 Corinthian 4:16-18.
• Remember your Creator...before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars grow dark, and the clouds return after the rain; when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men stoop, when the grinders cease because they are few, and those looking through the windows grow dim...  Ecclesiastes 12:1-3.
• By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.  Genesis 3:19.

What happens when we grow old?

        Some things make good fodder for jokes:

• We gain weight
• We need glasses and hearing aids and false teeth
• We start to forget things (or forget to start things)
• We at last get to retire
• We can't keep up with our sons on backpacking trips any more.
• Our daughters can now outlast us on any shopping trip.
• We crouch for a book or a dish on the bottom shelf and our knees will hardly bring us back up again.
• Etc., etc., etc.

What is our mental approach to growing old?

        We may try to push it right out of our mind by thinking or reading or watching movies about the exploits o youth in romance, or adventure, or war. To quote Dorothy Sayers, The Whimsical Christian, "from the relentless reality of age, they seek to escape into a fantasy of youth---their own or other people's." We may submit to or resist or resent growing older. We may courageously "foresee the event and endure it." "Paradoxical as it may seem, to believe in youth is to look backward; to look forward, we must believe in age."

        Relevant Scriptures:

• I was young and now I am old, yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread.  Psalm 37:25
• Even to your old age and gray hairs, I am he, I am he who will sustain you.  Isaiah 46:4
• Gray hair is a crown of splendor; it is attained by a righteous life.  Proverbs 16:31.
• 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.  Psalm 90:10
• The dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.  Ecclesiastes 12:14.

Can God sympathize with our problems of age?

        To bring this whole discussion into God's light, I quote again, "...for whatever reason God chose to make man as he is---limited and suffering and subject to sorrows and death---he (God) had the honesty and the courage to take his own medicine. Whatever game his is playing with his creation, he has kept his own rules and played fair. He can exact nothing from man that he has not exacted from himself. He has himself gone through the whole human experience, from the trivial irritations of family life and the cramping restrictions of hard work and lack of money to the worst horrors of pain and humiliation, defeat, despair, and death. When he was a man, he played the man. He was born in poverty and died in disgrace and thought it well worthwhile."

        Although Jesus obviously never experienced old age, he certainly experienced the factors that we fear in old age---"pain and humiliation, defeat, despair and death."

        Aging does bring deterioration of most of our five senses---there's no denying it. But for the Christian, it's like a metamorphosis; it's what we go through to get something better. The illustration of the butterfly is apt---The caterpillar crawls around on the ground, eating leaves and grass; then it builds its chrysalis and sleeps. In the spring it breaks out of its old life and soars. We too can soar one day!

        Relevant Scriptures:

• We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are---yet was without sin.  Hebrews 4:15
• The time has come for my departure. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me...  2 Timothy 4:6-8.
• Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.  Revelation 22:17.

Commentary on Statements of Faith: Salvation

        The obvious question here is, do we need salvation? And if so, why? The obvious answer is, because we have all sinned, and one sin is all it takes to merit death.

        Some people refer to "original sin" and point at Adam and Eve in Eden. As our physical DNA would be traceable to them, so would our spiritual or soulish "DNA" because it comes from them as well. Proof of this would seem fairly easy---in a physical way, red hair or aquiline noses or blue eyes tend to run in families. In another sense, spiritual or soulish characteristics seem to run in families---things like determination to succeed, love for music and rhythm, facility in language or rhetoric, etcetera, etcetera.

        All of mankind is thus related both physically and spiritually through a single ancestor. [As an aside, it seems that the angels and demons are different, each is a "one-off", one of a kind.]

        This is why the Bible says, "The first Adam became a living being", in contrast to "the last Adam [Jesus], a life-giving spirit." (1 Corinthians 15:45) To save the family of man, Jesus had to participate in humanity.