When Eagles Go Bad
Author: Bryan Lowe
Studying God's Word is my joy. I want you to understand that there is nothing greater than a life given to Him. I'm an ordained pastor who lives in Alaska.
Mending Your Nets
“And going on from there he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and he called them.”
Matthew 4:21, ESV
“And immediately they left their nets and followed him.”
Mark 1:18
To mend nets was tedious but necessary. You would take your net and spread it on the ground in an open space. Every knot would be carefully examined. All holes would be repaired. Nothing was overlooked. Fishing nets were painstakingly maintained. Every day, without fail.
Fish would school, and if your gear was right, and you were in a prime place, you could catch a lot. But simultaneously, you could let hundreds of fish escape through a hole in your net. Each fish that escaped meant money lost.
Jesus walking along the beach surveyed the boats and crews. Since most of these guys had worked through the night, they were tired and maybe a bit “punchy.” Some had gotten somewhat lucky, while others had little to show for working so hard. Most likely the different crews teased each other as they unloaded.
Jesus walked through the bunches of fishermen. He looked at their hauls to see what they had caught. But it wasn’t the catch He was looking at, it was the men. It was from these laboring fishermen that He would choose. These men were rough-and-tumble rednecks. If they had chewing tobacco back then, they would use it.
He stands, looks, and then commands them.
Now if you are looking for disciples– future apostles and leaders, the seashore is not the best place to recruit. They really have a rudimentary education. No theology, and just a meager understanding of Jewish ritual and religion. Essentially there was no time for them to think outside their occupation. Sure there just might be one, or two that possessed more, but that would be the exception.
But Jesus had no desire to interview them, and take the best of the lot. He didn’t have a Human Resources Department, and there were no tests and no forms that had to list references. He simply commanded, and those who understood followed. Only after they left it all did He get their names and addresses. I think that it is the same today.
Will we leave our boat, with your nets? Really, you can keep mending or follow Him– it’s your choice. Most of the time though, decisions have a tendency to be irrevocable. Perhaps you have a moment, an instant of time to decide.
Sometimes mending nets can be back-breaking and tedious. But following the Lord Jesus is an unknown; too many choose to keep fixing. Others are launched into something new, and eternally significant.
The glaring truth is the necessity of obedience to Jesus’ command. There is no other voice we must hear. As a matter of fact, hearing (and really apprehending) is the only foundation we can trust to make our obedience true.
You can keep mending your nets and preparing for another night on the water. That is always your prerogative. But if you decide to follow you will need to leave what you know behind. That is authentic discipleship.
“Rest in this – it is His business to lead, command, impel, send, call or whatever you want to call it. It is your business to obey, follow, move, respond, or what have you.”
-Jim Elliot, missionary to the Auca Indians
Counseling Others
“Rash language cuts and maims, but there is healing in the words of the wise.”
Proverbs 12:18, Message
Lately, I have grown skeptical of my own ability to give out sound counsel. For the most part I have refrained from doing so, lately, I introduce them to the wisdom and love of Jesus. It seems like a it’s a bit like a triangle– Jesus, them and myself–we each have a corner. All I do when I counsel someone is to help them see the Lord. Hopefully, once a dialogue has taken place I step back and let the supernatural happen.
Much of counseling is facilitating or creating an environment that you can gather information. Probably your friend feels that you and your surroundings are “safe” and he/she can open up in that situation. Almost all of the time, a certain level of confidentiality must exist and be understood as being “in place” even among peers.
A key fact is getting permission to counsel.This should happen in order for the counselee to really receive.
Usually when if I meet with someone, I don’t want to sound profound, or wise; I’m still trying to follow Jesus myself. I recognize the Holy Spirit gifts the un-gifted. But I’m also pretty much aware of my own short-comings. (I guess this can make me a better listener and not a talker?)
Remember that Job’s friends were at their best when silently sitting with him in the ash and rubble. At that moment, they were very effective counselors. The problem came when they verbally explain why Job’s personal disaster took place. Very often I find that people have a need to be needed. Some well-meaning believers give counsel so they can feel good about themselves.
I’m afraid there is a lot of Christian counseling out there that is sabotaged by this inherent flaw.
Part of speaking wisely to a friend must include the option that I might be totally off-the-wall! Whatever I say must not be “ex cathedra“, or as truth unchallenged. And just because I’m giving you counsel does not make me superior, wiser or more authoritative. It really should take as much humility to counsel, as it takes to be counseled. I can think of an easy dozen encounters that I’m embarrassed by– and will never be able to retract. Mistakes are made, but we should trust the Holy Spirit to use those missteps. He is sovereign.
Peer-to-peer counseling is very much a blessing. A great need exists in the church for this particular ministry. But to be a source of wisdom to another should be both a sobering, and a clarifying experience. To be a counselor can be quite dangerous, spiritually speaking, and I should not seek this place unless its thrust on me. A good counselor is almost always reluctant.
“If you young fellows were wise, the devil couldn’t do anything to you, but since you aren’t wise, you need us who are old.” Martin Luther
“If you have knowledge, let others light their candles at it.” Thomas Fuller
Good Grief, [Post by James Winsor]
How Depression is a Blessing in Disguise
A darkness creeps into the soul and smothers it. Who knows why, how long it will last, or what will make it go away. You feel like you have nothing left to give to anyone else. You don’t want anyone around, except that one person who knows how to lift the darkness. You can’t and don’t want to explain how you feel. You don’t know why you’re sad, and you feel embarrassed by it because you have a pretty nice life. You can see why hungry, sick or poor people would be sad, but not you.
If you’re up to it, you try to process thoughts about God or words to or from God. This feels impossible. At best, God is distant. He couldn’t care about these stupid, unjustifiable feelings. There are people with real problems; God should be much more concerned about them. At worst, God becomes a very active enemy. He judges you for feeling this way. He wants you to just drop this selfish, self-centered, self pity trip. Doesn’t the Bible command, “Rejoice in the Lord always?” You’re a long way from doing that. Every word of good cheer seems to condemn you more for not being cheery.
As you deal with these feelings, you start to see what’s at the bottom. For the most part, it’s self-loathing. You just can’t stand being around you! Sometimes you can’t see the causes for the self-loathing. It’s just there and it won’t go away. I hate being me, and anyone who really knew me would hate me. The people who love me only do because they don’t know me.
Sometimes the self-loathing turns outward. It explodes into a kind of rage against the world. Now the darkness has covered not only your heart, but your eyes. You can’t see outside of yourself. You have trouble remembering there is an outside world. When you wake up to that fact, you again see the self-centeredness and hate it all the more.
It doesn’t seem possible to break out or for anyone to break into it. Even God doesn’t seem to know how to break inside the darkness. Some of the most spiritually-rich Christians I know experience depression. Some of them medicate it. Some don’t. But it doesn’t make that much difference when it comes to the soul. You can’t medicate the soul.
God is up to something in your depression. There are things God can do for you better when you’re depressed. Someone once said that God empties in order to fill, and kills in order to raise up. God could have made a world where depression is impossible. He could have made a world where sin, death and Satan are not on the scene. But God decided ahead of time that it was better to do things His way. There was something important that He could do with a broken world that He couldn’t do with a perfect world.
In paradise, Adam and Eve did not know God as well as you do. They walked and talked with Him, but were ignorant of what God was really about. God is self-sacrificing, self-giving love. Adam and Eve didn’t have a clue about Good Friday. They didn’t need Good Friday. Do you realize what that means? They didn’t need God’s self-sacrificial love. All they needed was a creator and provider. They didn’t need a Savior.
But that’s what’s best about Him. He saves sinners by dying for them. When Jesus was on the cross, you were loathed enough. God took out all of His holy loathing, and it was over. There is nothing more important in your life than God’s saving love for sinners.
Depression is a cold, gray wind that blows you off the cliff.
You can’t find anything inside yourself to cling to, to hope in, to claim as a basis for God’s acceptance.
All you have is Jesus and His love for sinners.
His resurrection of sinners in Himself. His baptizing of this sinner, you. That’s all you have. You fall into the water and lose yourself. But once you fall in, you can only see the love of God in Christ. A purple robe for mocking. A brown cross. Silver nails. Red blood. A white robe shining forth from the darkness of the tomb.
Have you ever noticed that you can see the farthest at night? In the daytime the most distant object you can see is the sun – a mere 93 million miles away. But at night your eye takes in countless stars and galaxies that are many light years away. Your vision is greatly improved in the darkness.
So it is with depression. When you are having bright days of happy sunshine, you can’t see too much further than your studies, sports, work, friends, family or possessions. A very small world. But in the darkness of depression you begin to see the glistening vast expanse of God’s love in Christ.
And when you are full of self-loathing and darkness, the love of Christ is all you have. And as it turns out, you don’t have Christ at all until all you have is Christ.
The Rev. James Winsor is pastor at Risen Christ Lutheran Church in Arvada, Colorado.
Taken from the Spring 2002 edition of Higher Things magazine. You can write Higher Things at P.O. Box 58011, Pleasant Prairie, WI 53158-8011. http://www.issuesetc.org
Broken Believers 