I’m really sad today. There are just too much hurts, too many casualties, too many victims. Job’s own reflection was that “man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward” [not really sure I know what the last part means, but the first part is perfectly clear].
We are all citizens of this fallen world. It seems we go through life like a bull in a china shop.We don’t move very gracefully and we break a lot of things just trying to move through it. No matter how hard we try we always make a mess of it. I’d like to think of it as moving through life sideways. We go through life crashing and smashing.
There is no place in the Bible where God promises us a “trouble-free” journey to heaven, a journey without pains, hassles and the problems of life. If you are hearing anything else, I strongly suggest finding another voice to listen to.
“Accepting the reality of our broken, flawed lives is the beginning of spirituality not because the spiritual life will remove our flaws but because we let go of seeking perfection and, instead, seek God, the one who is present in the tangledness of our lives.”
— Michael Yaconelli
We all have flawed lives. Everything gets tangled up and really messy. This is the normal life of being in ministry of some kind.
Our very best efforts give us little hope at resolving these things. We are agitated by our personal failure and we often feel God is angry with us. The really hard part is the incessant voices from the sidelines that announce our failures and flaws to everyone. Satan has a cruel and a vicious ministry of hate targeted at you.
Yet these terrible things are redeemed by the Holy Spirit. He loves failures and weaklings. When we finally realize we are flawed, he then places something real into our hearts. In our weakness we finally become strong. We become authentic. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted”(Matthew 5:4).
Be kind to everyone today, to each person you meet. For all of us are fighting a difficult battle. Please, be kind out there.
“Has the Lord redeemed you? Then speak out! Tell others he has redeemed you from your enemies. For he has gathered the exiles from many lands, from east and west, from north and south.
Some wandered in the wilderness, lost and homeless. Hungry and thirsty, they nearly died. “Lord, help!” they cried in their trouble, and he rescued them from their distress.”
Psalms 107:2-6
Recently watched the new release of the movie “Pilgrim’s Progress” and I have to say, it’s remarkably close to the book, which often is not the case when a movie is based upon a book. In his book, Pilgrim’s Progress, John Bunyan has written one of the most beautiful allegories about the journey we all travel as a believers.
The book describes the hero, Christian, and his journey from the City of Destruction to his heavenly destination, the Celestial City. Now there’s one part of Pilgrim’s Progress that I want to focus on today –walking througH (or sinking into) the Swamp of Despondency!
At one point during their travels, Christian and his companion suddenly find themselves there….into this particular swamp. Still bearing a burden, Christian begins to quickly sink in the mire. His traveling companion manages to get out, but he returns to the City of Destruction without giving aid to Christian. Christian is left all alone and sinking even deeper in the mire, until Help, the allegorical figure for the Holy Spirit, pulls him free from the muck.
Christian then asks Help why this dangerous plot of land has not been mended so that poor travelers might go safely to the Celestial City. Help replies, “This miry slough is such a place that cannot be mended.”
How true it is in real life! As hard as we try to avoid them, whether young in the Lord, or spiritually mature…swamps of despondency seem inevitable, and we must struggle through them!
Charles Spurgeon once wrote to his students in the book, “Lectures to my Students”,
“Fits of depression come over most of us. Usually cheerful as we may be, we must at intervals be cast down.
The strong are not always vigorous, the wise not always ready, the brave not always courageous, and the joyous not always happy.
There may be here and there men of iron…but surely the rust frets even these.”
There are times in our lives when we will struggle through the swamps of despondency — but praise God that He has provided us a helper for those times of need! We need to press through, seeking and trusting the power of the Holy Spirit to pull us out of those nasty swamps, and set our feet back upon the Rock of our salvation.
Let’s also look around us to see our brethren who may be struggling in the swamps of despondency, so that, rather than abandoning them, we might give them a hand on their journey to “the Celestial city”!
“But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the surpassing greatness of the power may be of God and not from ourselves; we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing”
2 Corinthians 4:7-8 (NASB).
Paul speaks of treasure, or of something of tremendous worth. We seldom place value on things with the same intensity that God does. Its obvious that as a culture our values aren’t really biblical. Paul understands this overriding principle of the eternal over the temporary. God’s power–treasured. Our weakness– accepted.
The rationale for this “making room” for the power must be understood. Its only when we grasp this holy ‘mechanism’ can we sparkle and shine as believers. It is of God, not of ourselves. Paul says that we are afflicted in everyway imaginable. From disease, to injury, to difficult relationships, to a simple toothache. Believers run the full gamut of affliction.
It all is significant, it all means something!
As a former Army medic, some of the worst injuries were “crushing” ones. The human body experiences things that are so heavy that they simply collapse. At times like these it seems the best you can do is make a pile. To be crushed is a terrible thing.
God’s Rubik’s Cube
He says that we are “perplexed”. The word means, “to feel completely baffled by.” It’s when something is so complicated that we can’t figure it out. Have you ever been given a ‘Rubik’s Cube?’ You twist and turn, trying to get the same colors on the same side. Every move affects the outcome. And you just can’t seem to get it right. (I once peeled of all the colored stickers off and re-stuck them, but I was having “ego problems” that day.)
God gives His children a spiritual ‘Rubik’s Cube.’
It maybe a family crisis, or a medical issue. You could be trying to figure out your spouse. But the problem is that it totally baffles you. There is no rhyme or reason that you can see. Everyday you try again and again.
There are some things that so confuse and mystify that we begin to doubt everything we have been taught. But, we are not to despair. Despair is not for the believer. We may not understand, we are baffled by the present circumstances. We may come close, but we can not despair. God has promised that he will use this time of affliction, and its outcome will be glorious.
“And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.”
Romans 8:38
In the KJV of Romans 8:38, the phrase used is “nor things present.” What is your present predicament? It cannot separate you from the love of God. He cares for you, even if the moment is hard and miserable. God often tests His real friends more severely then the lukewarm ones.
At the end, God will not look you over for medals, or diplomas, He will look you over for scars.
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.38 This is the great and first commandment.39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
Matt. 22:37-39
Love is the ultimate response God is looking for from us. It is the currency of Heaven. The Kingdom’s economy is ‘the gold standard’ of love. It’s the way business gets done in eternity. Love! Without love ruling our lives now, we will arrive there as paupers and beggars. We will disobey Jesus as well.
God is our primary target to love. And the quality of it can be appreciated from its ‘source point’. Heart. Soul. Mind. These are the starting places for our affection. The caliber of our worship is summed up by the word, “all.” That word has a totality, and a significance to it. It further intensifies love to the only acceptable place. Love indeed is the perfect “make-up.” We’re never more beautiful then when we love God or another person.
As disciples who are indeed flawed and broken, we can still find a place where we can minister from. I can’t do a lot anymore, but I can love. Loving God is something I can do, even with my issues. I can always love. I can always give my all, my heart to someone else. I can always love!
And actually, this disability strips my discipleship to a simpler and basic level. At the “lowest common denominator” my faith is still valid and vital. I love Jesus, even when I can’t be a senior pastor or teach at my Bible School anymore. I accept this. I can even rejoice in this new “inadequacy.”
Loving Him and following Him can be done, even with a limp.
Fifteen years ago I sat waiting for my bus, at King’s Cross in London, England. I was all alone, and I felt it. There was also a strong sense of brokenness that encircled me, I was painfully aware of my disability. I was coming a bit unglued at the enormity of my mental illness. I sat staring at the floor just in front of me. I could do nothing else. All I could do is stare. Stare some more.
But suddenly, in my field of vision, just in front of me, hopped a bird with a crippled foot. Something had damaged him. The thing that profoundly spoke to me was that bird was not at all devastated, not at all. And the Lord spoke to me about that bird, and His comfort pumped right through to my veins. I felt I was right where I was supposed to be. I had become the ‘broken sparrow,’ and amazingly I could still follow. Maybe, even better now, because of my ‘limp’.
Broken Believers 