Category: Fredzone

Then the Lord relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.
Exodus 32:14

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When I was in second grade, I took judo lessons at the local YMCA. Once a week we donned our white judogis to practice flips and falls. I’ve never been much of a fighter, so I didn’t exactly enjoy the sport, but I did learn how to leverage my opponent’s weight and momentum against him and fling him to the mat. At recess one day, a big third-grader began to bully me to impress his gang. My smaller pack timidly stepped back to observe my humiliation. I have no idea how it happened, but as the thug came to shove me, I grabbed his arm, thrust out my hip, and slammed him to the dirt. The onlookers were as shocked as I was, but I looked down at my vanquished foe and said, in the levelest voice I could muster, “I know judo.” The third-graders never bothered me again.

I don’t know if Jacob employed any martial arts when he wrestled the angel, but he held his own and was able to force a capitulation from the superior (and no doubt irritated) heavenly being. That’s one way it can go with God. Prayer can sometimes be a straight-up David and Goliath thing. The lowly human faces off against the Almighty with no more than a dance belt and a tube of Chapstick and attempts to muscle a concession out of him. God actually loves a good fight. He stands in the ring and calls out, “Is there anybody here who will go toe-to-toe with me?” The crazy thing is that sometimes a foolhardy human actually wins. For all his might and sweeping sovereignty, every so often God can be made to cry uncle.

Sometimes God just has to be told no. It’s not that he’s wrong; God is always right. As the psalmist writes, The Lord is righteous in all his ways. But sometimes he has to be reminded of what’s in his best interest. For example, while Moses is hanging out with God on Mount Sinai, Aaron and the gang at the bottom decide to forge a golden calf and party down. God is not happy. “I have seen these people,” he tells Moses. “They are a stiff-necked people. Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation.” Moses (probably mindful of what a pain having his own nation would be) replies, “Why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on your people.” God decides that Odd Moe has a point and calls off the massacre. Whether that ultimately turned out to be a good thing is still open to discussion. But that’s a different story.

King David also had to tell God to chill. In one of the weirdest of many weird accounts of the Old Testament, we are told that God incited David to take a census of Israel and Judah. (In the later Chronicles culpability is shifted over to Satan to avoid an awkward conflict of interest.) And so, against the counsel of his military chief, David counts the fighting men of his kingdom. This arouses God’s anger—go figure—and he offers David a multiple-choice punishment. David opts for three days of plague in the land, and God sends an angel to administrate the outbreak. After 70,000 innocent people have died, David finally appeals to the Lord. “I have sinned,” he points out. “These are but sheep. What have they done? Let your hand fall on me and my family.” David builds an altar on which he offers sacrifice, and the Lord pulls the plug on the plague. It appears that sometimes God can actually take no for an answer.

The Moses and David incidents point to the astonishing—and sobering—power that prayer has to alter the course of judgment. Divine justice rewards the righteous and punishes the wicked. It is, by definition, both impartial and inexorable. God neither punishes the innocent nor lets the guilty go free. The fact that God is just is fundamental to his character. As Paul writes to Timothy, he cannot disown himself. For him to withhold either reward from the righteous or punishment from the wicked would be unjust and would call into question God’s very nature and character. In other words, it is impossible for the true God to forgo the dictates born of his being.

Which brings into sharp focus the blasphemous privilege and power of intercession. To the prophet Ezekiel God laments, “I looked for someone among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found no one.” This is one of the most poignant confessions in all of scripture; it reveals the unbearable problem of a God who is both just and loving. God is compelled by his infinite justice to destroy the land and its inhabitants, but he does not want to. He searches for someone who will stand between himself and himself, to advocate both for the land and argue against punishment. What is remarkable is that God himself seeks to be resisted. The tragedy is that resistance was not then to be found.

Of course, the perfect advocate did come, the Son who is sent into the world. As Isaiah declares, He saw that there was no one, he was appalled that there was no one to intervene; so his own arm achieved salvation for him, and his own righteousness sustained him. The Cross is the crux of God’s advocacy against himself. Jesus is the supreme mediator between a just God and humankind. But in Christ the saints are awarded the same audacious power to stay the hand of inexorable judgment. We, too, are awarded the privilege of altering the unalterable. God does not show favoritism, Paul asserts, but as James reminds us, the prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. Through prayer the saints can stand between divine intention and execution, challenge the sovereign God, and perhaps, just perhaps, change the course of destiny.

Engine against th’ Almighty, sinner’s tow’r,
Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear
from “Prayer” by George Herbert

“Get yourself ready! Stand up and say to them whatever I command you. Do not be terrified by them, or I will terrify you before them.”
Jeremiah 1:17

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God is not above employing coercion to get what he wants. When he told Isaiah, “My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please,” he meant it. I pity the fool who thinks otherwise. And that goes for friend and foe alike.

The road to the Promised Land is littered with the carcasses of those who thought they had a better idea. If the Exodus teaches us anything, it’s that you don’t ever just say “no” to the Almighty. Even Job, one of God’s special favorites, learns this the hard way. “No purpose of yours can be thwarted,” Job stammers, the last of his self-righteousness dribbling from him like a guy with a swollen prostate.

Things get especially interesting, however, when the squeeze to comply comes from within. When God annexes you, he downloads a third-party program that infects your soul and overrides all your previous command authorizations. Jeremiah recounts it this way: The Lord reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, “I have put my words in your mouth.” Ezekiel has a strikingly similar experience: He said to me, “Son of man, eat what is before you, eat this scroll; then go and speak to the people of Israel.” So I opened my mouth, and he gave me the scroll to eat. Then he said to me, “Son of man, eat this scroll I am giving you and fill your stomach with it.” You may like the menu options or you may not, but you’re going to eat what you’re served.

And that’s when the real trouble begins. Once the download is complete, once the Word and Spirit are embedded in your soul, you are not your own. You are God’s property and an instrument for his purposes. In Ezekiel’s case, the mandate came immediately after the scroll entrée. So I ate it, he recounts. He then said to me: “Son of man, go now to the people of Israel and speak my words to them.” As if this command wasn’t forceful enough, God adds, “You must speak my words to them, whether they listen or fail to listen.” Ezekiel has been called, culled, consecrated, and commanded. And when God plucks and programs you for his purposes, resistance is futile.

Although many have tried. King David gave it a shot: I will put a muzzle on my mouth while in the presence of the wicked, he vows. So I remained utterly silent, not even saying anything good. Apparently this doesn’t go so well. He quickly adds, But my anguish increased; my heart grew hot within me. While I meditated, the fire burned. Then I spoke with my tongue. Jeremiah reports a virtually identical experience: But if I say, “I will not mention his word or speak anymore in his name,” his word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. The inner pressure becomes intolerable. I am weary of holding it in, confesses the prophet. Indeed, I cannot. When you gotta go, you gotta go.

This experience isn’t limited to the Old Testament boys. The death and resurrection of Jesus made Mount Sinai look like a backyard barbecue. The apostles are literally beside themselves as the newly unleashed Holy Ghost transforms them from uneducated oafs and pietistic prunes into God-smacked, radioactive oracles. When Peter and John are ordered to stop speaking of the risen Jesus, they reply, “Which is right in God’s eyes: to listen to you, or to him? You be the judges! As for us, we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.” Paul confesses the same thing. I am compelled to preach, he declares. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel. Let it flow or you’re gonna blow.

None of this makes much sense to those for whom God is a vague notion or faith is an add-on. How can you explain spiritual compulsion to the religiously content? Many years ago, I was a part of a small prayer meeting. After a series of tame, sapless prayers, I earnestly expressed to the group a dissatisfaction with our spiritual sleepiness and my desire for a consuming visitation. One of the participants, a visiting pastor, looked at me, incredulous, and exclaimed, “What do you want, to glow in the dark?” Most Christians wouldn’t be as blunt, but sometimes I wonder if they have ever experienced—or would even want to experience—hardcore spiritual annexation.

I myself am not sure what to make of all this. My default setting seems to be discontent, not in the sense that I’m dissatisfied with what I have so freely been given, but rather that I feel distressingly underutilized. God has poured more into me than I am pouring out, and the pressure behind the dam—whether it be impatience, ignorance, or disobedience—is at critical levels. I know that there are winters of discontent as we wait for God’s timing, but I’m getting tired of treading the pilgrim way in snowshoes.

What brings me a modicum of comfort is knowing that mine is not a singular malady. For 2000 years Christians have grappled with a God who chooses men and women to display his glory. And who is equal to such a task? asks Paul. To this end, he writes, I strenuously contend with all the energy Christ so powerfully works in me. And this is also my comfort—though a scant one. This inward pressure that is consuming me is a good thing. As Paul reassures us, it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose. God is my problem.

Take heart, O agitated soul. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it. Just don’t get in his way.

Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
Galatians 5:25

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The Holy Ghost is one crazy bird. Unpredictable, line smudging, doctrine shrugging, shape shifting—he’s the renegade of the Godhead, a scofflaw, the mind-bending wildfire of the divine concoction. Just when you think you’ve got him pegged he pulls a one-eighty on you, leaving you and your comfortable theology in the dust.

The Bird is God’s improvisation master. The Father slaps down the back beat; the Son builds the syncopated motif; and the Bird careens up and down the scale like he’s possessed. The Bird doesn’t have to play any one note at any one time or place. His only rule is that it makes music. The Father and Son trust him implicitly. They’ve been playing together for a long time and know how it goes. The Bird knows what the boys want; they want him to fly, because when he flies they fly with him.

And the Bird, he feels every beat of the Father’s heart like it was his own. And the Bird tunes his pipes to the Son’s harmonics which hold the ache and joy of the whole world in them. And the Bird lets himself be possessed by the Father and Son, and in that surrender he becomes them and they become him. And when they become each other the Bird is free, free from notation, free from even the music itself. And the Bird soars, wails, growls, screams, bubbles, rumbles, simmers, stabs, and caresses. And as the Bird twists and plummets and veers, heedless of all but the song, the Father and Son are caught up in his fathomless flight and rise with him, raptured into self-transcending glory.

This is the way it’s been from the before the beginning. The Father, the Son, and the Ghost. Theirs is the music of the spheres that folks used to hear a long time ago, the soundtrack of the universe. But then the theorists moved in and turned it into Tin Pan Alley, jingles by number. The explanations came. The how-to books were written and the floor was pasted with colored diagrams. And even to those who still wanted to dance it felt like calisthenics to the plunk of an out-of-tune piano.

But the Bird’s still crazy after all these years, baby. He’s still breaking the rules and making music with the YHWH Trio. They mostly play transitional venues now, but every once in a while they’ll do a surprise gig in the big houses. You can catch them if you watch for them. But the Bird is a free spirit so you’ll have to keep on your toes if you want to hear him play.

Just remember, if you happen to catch a gig, the Bird takes requests only from the Father and his right-hand man.

In the last days scoffers will come . . . They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.”
2 Peter 3:3-4

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Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day.

So it seems.

But they again reset the doomsday clock. It’s now 89 seconds to midnight, one second closer than before. It’s the closest the clock has been to midnight in its 78-year history. The new clock time, we are told, signals that the world is on a course of unprecedented risk, and that continuing on the current path is a form of madness.

One second madder.

Yes, but we shall barrel on, white knuckled, our souls shrill with maniacal fervor. We can’t help ourselves. We pluck the plastic fruits from trees cultivated from that one whose first harvest inevitably led us here, to this broad avenue of the world

which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new

believing—because we must—that this is the everlasting kingdom, our hands clamped over our ears to silence the voice that cries

“All flesh is grass
And all its glory is like the flower of the field”

hoping against hope that tomorrow follows tomorrow without end and praying against the shadow that haunts us, that one day, perhaps soon,

tomorrow will never come.

I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory.
Psalm 63:2

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Thomas Aquinas was one of the greatest thinkers of thirteenth-century Europe. An Italian Dominican, he was the foremost figure in Scholastic philosophy and theology. His prodigious work championed both faith and reason. In terms of influence, he ranks with Augustine and Luther. Aquinas was a heavyweight of spiritual commitment and intellectual force.

But something happened that upended his life. Alban Butler’s Lives of the Saints relates the account:

On the feast of St. Nicholas [in 1273, Aquinas] was celebrating Mass when he received a revelation that so affected him that he wrote and dictated no more, leaving his great work the Summa Theologiae unfinished. To Brother Reginald’s (his secretary and friend) expostulations he replied, “The end of my labors has come. All that I have written appears to be as so much straw after the things that have been revealed to me.” When later asked by Reginald to return to writing, Aquinas said, “I can write no more. I have seen things that make my writings like straw.”

Aquinas discovers what many intelligent people discover about God: encounter obliterates analysis. Philosophy, theology, and doctrine—even if true—collapse in the face of divine presence. Job finds this out and exclaims, “I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.” The Apostle Paul (another intellectual powerhouse) learns this for himself on the road to Damascus and later writes: Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? Paul dismisses  even the Mosaic law—of which he was an expert—as a mere shadow of the things to come. The reality, he now insists, is Christ. Everything else is chaff.

This is a lesson some of us are slow to learn. We can think of the gospel as a collection of bullet points to be made or that the power of the good news is in superior arguments or reasonable conclusions. But no one encounters God through debate or doctrine. The scriptures themselves are devoid of divine presence. As Jesus tells the Jewish leaders, “You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and These are the very scriptures that testify about me.” The presence of God shows everything else for what it is: just so much straw.

The only thing that Christians have to offer the world is our testimonies. It’s not sound arguments or the four spiritual laws but, as John tells us, what we have seen and heard. It’s fine for us to share what we believe, but the power is in sharing what we have actually experienced. The world needs our actual witness not our biblical hearsay.

This is, of course, exactly what God has always had in mind. “You are my witnesses,” declares the Lord through Isaiah, “that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he.” Upon his resurrection, Jesus reminds his disciples of all that has transpired, then tells them, “You are witnesses of these things.” And just before his ascension, he promises his assembled followers, “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses.” Paul understands his whole ministry as a testimony, that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. Paul is a witness because he himself has experienced reconciliation with God through Jesus, whom, by the way, Paul had previously been persecuting. Demonstration disarms dogma.

Whether or not others believe our testimony is a different matter. They have a testimony too. Their experiences are just as real and they are witnesses just as Christians are. The prophet Isaiah actually invites them to testify: All the nations gather together and the peoples assemble . . . Let them bring in their witnesses to prove they were right, so that others may hear and say, “It is true.” This is not about who has the strongest argument, but about who has seen and heard the truth.

Sometimes the testimony about Jesus is welcome, sometimes not. The world may distort the facts of the gospel in order to refute it (the straw man fallacy) and often may attempt to discredit or silence the testimony altogether. But those, like Aquinas, who have experienced the presence of the living God will be his witnesses, confirmed by the Holy Spirit, and vindicated upon the return of Christ. The rest of it, including our own lives, is but straw.

“I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.”
John 1:34

“Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they were created.”
Revelation 4:11

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Most people of a certain age remember Rube Goldberg’s drawings of delightfully convoluted mechanisms. Goldberg designed ridiculous contraptions to accomplish the simplest of tasks. His machines consist of a series of simple devices, each triggering the next, which eventually achieve a goal. Our delight is not in their efficiency but in their silliness. Goldberg’s machines are outlandish and unnecessary, but that’s the whole point. That’s why we like them.

The scientific mind has little sense of humor. Its mandate is to explain, and so it flounders without reasonable explanations. The scientist assumes that everything is necessary (cause/effect) and that the great task is to figure out why. It would be scientific blasphemy to admit flapdoodle into the system. For science there is no such thing as true impracticality or absurdity; there are only undiscovered justifications. Ironically, this rather pinched perspective has led scientists to create a number of their own Goldberg variations.

The evidence, however, overwhelmingly suggests that God is a Rube—or at least moonlights as one on his day off. Within the universe’s meticulous latticework of interdependence, there are countless cases of sheer creative excess. Of course, it would be impossible to point them all out, but divine frivolity could be organized into a few general categories.

Beauty is the greatest enigma. Science has tried to make it a utilitarian feature, but in most cases beauty is not a functional necessity. The physics of a sunset do not depend on whether or not we find the phenomenon pleasing. A world without Van Gogh or Beethoven would no doubt be a poorer place, but we would be hard pressed to explain in scientific terms exactly why. The profusion of flowers in a meadow may attract bees, but that’s not what makes them lovely. We may be able to describe certain features that make something beautiful to us (variation, symmetry, etc.) but explaining why those features appeal to us in the first place is another matter. Beauty is about beholding, not comprehending. The poet W. H. Auden acknowledges the frivolous nature of the beaux-arts when he confesses, Poetry makes nothing happen. Or to quote the slightly less polished Rolling Stones, I know it’s only rock and roll, but I like it. Utility is a transaction. Beauty is a bonus.

Another category is the just plain ostentatious. If beauty aims for proportion, ostentation goes for overkill. It’s the crazy aunt who wears too much lipstick and jewelry. There are so many examples of frivolity in the natural order it’s almost commonplace. There’s the peacock with his pimping tail and his spiky aquatic counterpart, the lionfish. There are the mesmerizing murmurations of starlings or the lyrebird of southeastern Australia that can mimic the sounds of all the other birds he hears around him—and the sounds of chainsaws and camera shutters too. And the mandrill with its prismatic proboscis. And the flamboyant cuttlefish whose morphing patterns would be at home in Times Square. Here’s to the showoffs of the world whose mantra is Look at me! Look at me! Look at me! When it comes to fashion, attitude is everything.

Sometimes the frivolous takes the form of the quirky. In these instances it seems that the creator is either doing some beta testing or he’s simply trying to use up extra parts. The electric eel is a good example. It’s like God put an 800-volt battery in a sock then threw it in the water to see what would happen. And no list of the peculiar would be complete without mentioning the platypus. There is absolutely no excuse for the platypus. Even God can’t explain this one, which means he’s not even going to try.

A subcategory of the quirky is the starkly alien. Whereas the quirky are odd combinations of otherwise familiar elements, the alien are so foreign to our sensibilities as to seem otherworldly. The tiny tardigrade is nearly invincible, able to survive extreme temperatures, extreme pressures, air deprivation, radiation, dehydration, and starvation—that would kill other forms of life. The earth’s oceans are home to some of the most alien creatures of all. The very intelligent octopus who has a central brain and smaller brains in each of its eight legs. The most otherworldly creature of all may be the jellyfish. What to make of such an exotic being? As Hamlet said, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” Yes, indeed.

Perhaps the most astonishing frivolity of all, however, is the incomprehensible vastness of space. No one knows the extent of the physical universe, and what we do know defies meaningful context. The Milky Way, our home galaxy, is about 100,000 lightyears across and contains at least 100 billion stars. The size of the entire universe is unknown, but the observable universe contains an estimated 2 trillion galaxies. Some calculations suggest that there could be around 10,000 stars for every single grain of sand on earth. This has led some to insist that there must be other intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, that it would be the height of human arrogance to think that we are unique in such a vast place. But why not? The average house in America is 2,300 square feet. Does a family need that much space to survive? The entire population of the world—8.2 billion—could fit (with room enough for each person to spin around with their arms extended) in an area the size of the big island of Hawaii. Does this mean that the earth is too big for us?

What it does mean, as do all these other examples, is that we are surrounded by the frivolous acts of God. In fact, since necessity did not compel God to make anything at all, that he did so for the sheer delight of creating itself, it would not be too much of a stretch to say that everything that exists, from the amoeba to the angel, reflects the gaiety of God. Humankind matters, not because God had to make us, but precisely because he didn’t.

I, for one, am glad he did.

We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard
so that you also may have fellowship with us.
1 John 1:3

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The heavenly throne room is a crowded place. At the very center, of course, is God, who is so blindingly resplendent that John can only describe him as the one seated on the throne. Next to him is the risen Son, depicted as a Lamb looking as if it had been slain, standing at the center of the throne. Near the center of the throne hover the terrifying four living creatures with their strange personas, numerous eyes, and multiple wings. Circling these creatures are twenty-four elders whose main job, it seems, is to throw off their crowns and fall down in worship whenever God does something cool (which is a lot). Around them are a sea of angels, numbering thousands upon thousands, and ten thousand times ten thousand. And surrounding all these is a great multitude that no one can count, from every nation, tribe, people and language. It’s a packed house for the ongoing premiere of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Kind.

The scriptures are emphatic that God’s desire is for a people. And although occasional superstars arise when the situation calls for it, it’s the team that matters. Redemption is about bringing the exiles home. As the psalmist notes, God sets the lonely in families. The singular becomes plural; the me becomes the we.

This is more than simple club membership. Jesus tells his anxious disciples, “It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the helper will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.” The gift of the Holy Spirit to believers is not simply a seal of salvation or the presence of Christ in each redeemed heart, it is the antidote to existential loneliness. Unlike unbelievers who are fundamentally isolated as individual beings, all Christians share the very same Spirit. Paul writes, We were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. The Holy Spirit realizes the purpose of Jesus “that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one.” The kingdom of God is community.

Which is why it seems strange that prayer is often a lonely experience for me. I’m referring now to private times, of which Jesus speaks: “When you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret.” I have found that when I am visiting the Holy of Holies—where I am bidden to come—that I can experience loneliness. How, I have wondered, can being in the very presence of God provoke a sense of detachment and even lack? Shouldn’t it be precisely the opposite? In God’s presence should I not experience utter completeness?

Only recently I have begun to understand the problem—or, rather, to understand my problem—which is, quite simply, a misunderstanding of the gospel. I was born (again) into a distinctly American gospel which champions a personal relationship with Christ. To be saved, I was told, all I need to do is ask Jesus into my life as my personal Lord and savior. He will download into my soul all that is necessary for salvation. And although I may find encouragement among other Christians, I do not need them to be saved. As far as my salvation goes, fellowship with the saints is optional. With the American gospel, each believer gets his own personal pan Jesus.

The late Harold Bloom, whom I have mentioned before, begins his study The American Religion with the following observation:

Freedom, in the context of the American Religion, means being alone with God or with Jesus, the American God or the American Christ. In social reality, this translates as solitude, at least in the inmost sense. The soul stands apart—free to be utterly alone with a God who is also quite separate and solitary.

This deep-seated assumption has been the source of my spiritual disquiet. I have been coming to the throne room expecting my personal relationship with God to be sufficient, only to discover how much I need the saints. I need the fellowship of believers to know God as I long to know him—to know him as he wants me to know him. Intimacy with God does not mean solitude; intimacy with God means a crowd.

And it’s not just our current Christian neighbors. My spiritual loneliness will not be completely healed until all the saints of history join together (that great multitude that no one can count) in one everlasting celebration. Our saintly forebears, too, await that great day. These were all commended for their faith, the book of Hebrews tells us, yet none of them received what had been promised, since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made complete. We’re talking the mother of all reunions.

I’m learning that intimacy with God is not about solitude. Intimacy with God is a jubilant, jabbering, jam-packed, Jesus jamboree.

(I hope we get a few quiet times, though.)

Get wisdom; get insight; do not forget.
Proverbs 4:5

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I remember my name. I remember my address. I remember my kids’ birthdays. I remember my anniversary. I remember my phone number. I remember where I live. I remember to pay my bills. I remember to turn off the lights when I leave a room. I remember Elvis. I remember how to spell Mississippi. I even remember the Alamo.

Like everybody else, I can space things out, but those things are usually transient or trivial. Rarely do I forget the truly important stuff.

Except when I do. I can forget the most important things of all, and more often than I’d like to admit. Recently, the scriptures reminded me of something that I already knew very well—but had forgotten. (It’s funny how that works.) That triggered an avalanche of other spiritual realities that I tend to forget. Here are my top ten:

1 The battle is not against flesh and blood.

I keep thinking that if I could just call down fire on those idiots then everything would be fine, but firing on the wrong target accomplishes nothing except making me look like the idiot they think I am.

2 God does not judge by appearances.

I do it all the time. But as God told Samuel, “The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”There’s no Botox for the heart.

3 Everything comes down to God’s mercy.

Paul reminds the Romans: It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. Why do I always assume that the secret to bearing fruit is my spiritual zeal and work ethic? God is the I AM not IBM.

4 Truth is not consensus.

According to the proverb, there is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death. As a general rule, the majority is probably wrong. Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. There is truth and there is everything else.

5 Nothing is impossible for God.

For the one who believes, there is no such thing as a lost cause. Even a lost cause isn’t a lost cause. In fact, it’s never too late to pray, even if it’s too late. If he has to, God can change the past. Note to self: God is GOD.

6 God forgives.

Yes, I am a repetitious transgressor. Yes, I know better. Yes, I often choose unrighteousness for entertainment purposes. It is an inexcusable disdain for the sacrifice of Jesus and deserves death. But even more outrageous is this promise: If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. All the time; every time.

7 All things work for good.

In the words of the Bob Marley song, Don’t worry about a thing. Every little thing is gonna be all right. Marley may have been stoned out of his mind most of the time, but he got that one right. God concurs. “I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” The shiitake may hit the fan, but there’s a creamy risotto on its way.

8 God hears prayer.

David wrote the most earth-shattering lyric of all time: The Lord hears when I call to him. The fact that the holy God, the righteous creator of all things, who lives in unapproachable light, actually listens to us is mind-boggling. The Lord says so himself: “Call to me, and I will answer you.” He may not always go with my suggestions, but whether I’m worshipping or whining, he never ignores me.

9 The wicked will not triumph.

Sometimes it’s hard to watch the beautiful people and glitzy mobsters run roughshod over the righteous and the good. They mock the saints, pervert justice, and take all the best stuff for themselves—and with seeming impunity. When I tried to understand all this, confessed David, it troubled me deeply. But we are told plainly: Fret not yourself because of evildoers, and be not envious of the wicked, for the evil man has no future; the lamp of the wicked will be put out. The lowly saints definitely have got the better deal.

10 Christians have the cheat code.

The rules of the game can seem stacked against the saints. The Revelation informs us that there will be a time when the team in the white hats (and robes) is actually going to lose. The Beast will be allowed to wage war on the saints and to conquer them. But here’s the thing: believers don’t play like the world plays. We cheat. The game designer is our Lord and has given us an unfair advantage. It’s simple. If God is for us, who can be against us? Nobody. The answer is nobody.

Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds;
tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.
Deuteronomy 11:18

“I wish what every addict wishes for: that what we love is good for us.”

the late David Lynch on cigarettes

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Righteousness is an acquired taste. But I get ahead of myself.

Years ago, on one of my many trips to India, I and one of my ministry directors were the guests of honor at a private home in a rural area. In order to get there, we had to hike along dirt paths that meandered across muddy patches occupied by scrawny goats and despondent cows tethered in place. As we came over a low hill, our destination came into view. It was a humble abode with the patina of mildew common to the area, but not unwelcoming. Unfortunately, in order to get there we would have to ford a wide flooded field, whose brackish waters reeked of bovine byproducts. My partner and I exchanged glances, removed our sandals, rolled up our pant legs, and gingerly waded through the foul broth.

We were heartily welcomed and after rinsing our feet under a hand pump near the door, we were ushered into the small dining space. The table was dressed with an aged, formerly white table cloth and a collection of dinnerware that was clearly their very best. We sat and enjoyed tea as the fare was brought from the kitchen to the table. Back then I was a vegetarian, which meant that India was one of my favorite stops. Since beef was generally off the menu, I settled easily into the flavorful cuisine of the region.

The dishes kept coming, and we ate until we were full. Just as we thought that the feast had come to a blissful (but welcome) end, a large bowl was ceremonially brought to the table. In it was a heap of what looked like meatballs. The faces of our hosts glowed with pride. This was clearly meant to be the showpiece of the meal, a luxurious dish worthy of august visitors such as we. I didn’t want to dishonor my hosts, and recalling Paul’s instructions to eat whatever is put before you, I determined to try one of the meatballs. Our host proudly announced that these were fresh fried goat hearts as he dropped three huge cardio-balls on my plate.

I locked eyes with my partner who was sitting next to me. A former Army Ranger and trained to eat anything, he saw my panic and subtly nodded. As soon as our hosts were distracted with serving duties, I slipped the goat hearts to his plate. When they returned, I sighed deeply, smiled, and pushed away my empty plate (with a few morsels strategically remaining). Delighted, my host lunged to serve me a few more goat hearts, but I quickly—maybe a bit too quickly—declined. I found out later that my partner wasn’t all that thrilled with the goat hearts either, but, being a literal trooper, he politely swallowed his aversion (and mine too) and saved us from committing an unforgivable cultural sin. I still owe him.

As a rule, we tend to like our native cuisines, amusements, and customs—those broad cultural aesthetics we grew up with. We also tend to pull back from what is foreign to our sensibilities. Even the adventurous among us, who like to try new things, assess their experiences through the filters of an already ingrained disposition. According to the health proverb, we are what we eat. With regard to our inclinations, however, it’s the inverse: we eat what we are—and shun what we aren’t.

Consider goodness and its biblical analog righteousness. Most people, religious or not, would insist that we all fundamentally desire the good and that problems are simply the result of competing ideas of what the good is. This is not how the scriptures view it. John’s gospel summarizes the situation this way: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. The world loves darkness because darkness is its own nature. In his psalm, David bluntly indicts the wicked: You love evil more than good. Some 250 years later, the prophet Micah levels an even harsher charge: You hate the good and love the evil. Evil is not only a moral abyss; it is an object of profound desire.

The prophet Amos offers a simple solution: Hate evil and love good. Simple, yes; but not so easy. The apostle Paul often writes of the conflict of desires between the new man and old man, and Peter speaks of sinful desires which wage war against your soul. The upshot is clear: There are things that we love that we should not and things that we do not love that we should.

Learning to love righteousness, of course, begins with Jesus who did it himself. The Father testifies of his son, “You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness.” In him is birthed the new man created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. This new nature is animated by the Holy Spirit who inclines the believer toward righteousness. Those who live in accordance with the Spirit, says Paul, have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. Christ gives us his own nature whose native soil is righteousness; the Spirit gives us the innate desire for righteousness.

To become a gourmet of the good, however, demands deliberate engagement. Many Christians seem satisfied to be saved but appear uninterested in righteousness as a way of life. It shows. We have to practice loving righteousness and hating evil. We must train our affections to joy in what is good and be repulsed by all unrighteousness. As the writer of Hebrews notes, anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. They are the connoisseurs of the Kingdom.

Cheers.

And when the seven thunders had sounded, I was about to write, but I heard a voice from heaven saying, “Seal up what the seven thunders have said, and do not write it down.”

Revelation 10:4

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Dealing with a god can be notoriously tricky. No matter how many cards you hold, the god always seems to have one more tucked up his sleeve. Apollo, the Greek god of prophecy, was especially cagey. One story tells of the Cumaean Sibyl, a prophetess and favorite of the god. Apollo offers the Sibyl a wish, and she asks to live for as many years as the number of grains of sand that she can hold in her hand. She forgets, however, to ask for eternal youth. Apollo (for once playing the literalist) grants her wish. Unfortunately, as she ages, her body withers to a detestable husk. When she is asked what she desires most in her old age, she replies, “I want to die.”

Apollo could be downright vindictive too. To win the favor of the beautiful Cassandra, he grants her the ability to see the future. But when she later spurns him, he curses her so that no one will believe her predictions. This had disastrous consequences. Cassandra’s prophecies foretell the fall of Troy to the Greeks—which nobody heeds, and in the process she herself is captured and killed. She didn’t even get the meager satisfaction of an “I told you so.”

There is no job as fraught with peril and frustration quite like that of the prophet. The biblical prophets had more headaches than even their mythological counterparts. Ostracism, persecution, and retribution were part and parcel of the prophet’s experience. If that weren’t bad enough, the task sometimes required outlandish antics which stretched the prophet’s compliance to the breaking point. This is not to mention the sheer terror of being employed by a deity who often was not in the best of moods.

Of course, there are certain perks that come with prophethood. One is a measured approval from your employer, which, it might be noted, appears somewhat dependent on job performance. As long as you’re doing what you’re told, you get to keep your camel hair suit. Another perk is an uneasy courtesy from the few who recognize your shiny badge. You’re not likely to be invited to the neighborhood kegger, but they’ll respectfully quiet down as you walk by to pick up your mail.

The biggest prophetic perk is access to inside information. The prophet often knows what’s coming down before it comes down. As Amos tells us, “The Lord God does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets.” This privilege comes with status. The prophet gets to be the distributor of esoteric knowledge. Others will hold you in mild awe as you offer nuggets dug from mines deeper than they can plumb. Granted, most of them won’t actually listen to you; it’s more a matter of entertainment. You’re a song and dance man. Even so, a little applause is kind of nice.

Things get interesting when the prophet becomes privy to things that he cannot share. Sometimes it’s merely a translation issue: there simply are no words to convey the experience. Peter, for example, speaks of a joy inexpressible, and Paul tells us that the Spirit intercedes for us with groans that cannot be uttered. Even Jesus struggled to find ways to communicate spiritual realities. “What is the kingdom of God like?” he asked. “What shall I compare it to?” The fact that he once settled on a mustard seed to make his case gives you an idea of how challenging it can be. One can only imagine how much confusion might have been prevented if, instead of describing his wheels within wheels, Ezekiel had just shrugged and called it a day. Sometimes a picture is worth no words at all.

Then there are those things revealed to the prophet that come without the necessary access key. As in the case of Daniel, sometimes the meaning of a vision is withheld. “Go your way, Daniel, for the words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end.” Daniel is shown the cards but not what the game is. In such cases the prophet may feel as clueless as the non-prophet gallery. Among other things, this situation makes it difficult to write an effective newsletter.

But the big ticket conundrum is when the prophet learns something that he is expressly forbidden to disclose. An event of John’s revelation is a most tantalizing instance. John beholds a mighty angel who straddles both land and sea. The angel loudly calls out and is answered by what John refers to as the seven thunders. John prepares to record what the seven thunders said but hears a voice from heaven command, “Seal up what the seven thunders have said, and do not write it down.” Clearly, John understood what the thunders said (or he wouldn’t have attempted to write it down) but he was ordered not to. The prohibition comes without explanation, and the cosmic vision moves on without pause. The seven thunders—and what they said—are never referred to again. What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.

Perhaps that’s all there is to it. Apparently, whatever the thunders said is unessential for us to know in order to overcome at the end. Maybe the thunders gave utterance to the wordless cry of the angel. Maybe their voices set in motion some vital mechanism that operates far beneath the surfaces of judgment, not unlike the inner-workings of a watch or the invisible lines of code that bring these very words to your eyes. Perhaps we will never know.

I wonder, though. Among the many unimaginable things that John beheld in his vision on the island of Patmos, I wonder if he ever brooded over what the seven thunders said. I wonder if he regretted not being allowed to write it down, knowing that this knowledge would pass from the world with him. And I wonder, too, if I could ever be trusted to keep such a secret.