I love illustrations used in sermons and teachings… the funny ones, the touching ones… even the sad ones when they’re used strategically (but not gratuitously). They add dimension and understanding to what a preacher/teacher is hoping to get across in a way that reaches us like no other.
This week, however, I became the star in one of God’s objection lessons… that changes things around dramatically… and though I know I’ll appreciate the use of the illustration later on… this up close, personal, and “in living color” vantage point isn’t necessarily easy nor enjoyable… but I will never be able to deny that it was memorable. Let me see if I can tell this in a way that will make sense…
I wasn’t aware on Monday of anything in particular that would or could go wrong. Early morning found me at a favorite spot near the ocean reading, praying, doing my normal morning routine.
There was some tension, but it wasn’t anything new… just that feeling of having a lot to do and my current project… working on a personal goal of cultivating greater self-control. I even read a snippet of something that said that peace is the fruit of self-control. It seemed too illusive at that moment to take in… but it was one of those thoughts that stayed with me all the way through the week.
The day changed pace when I got to the office as it always does. Mondays in a church office aren’t much peppier than they are in any other office around town. There’s always that sense of getting going again from a weekend where a lot of energy has been spent. Things were already in full gear by the time I got there.
There were some ups and downs… some predictable… some not so much… and I did feel my own tension rising somewhat… but nothing serious at this point.
Tuesday started about the same except that I’d awakened earlier than usual and read for a while before the alarm went off… then… same little spot by the sea… and the first touch of “cool” I’d noticed
since the heat of the summer.
There’s a stillness that I enjoy just before the sun is visibly rising… then the walkers, dog walkers, joggers, cyclists, those who stop by momentarily to look at the water before driving on to their appointed spots, and the whole array of humanity moving out and into the day. I couldn’t help notice that “the tension” was still with me. There were things I would definitely need to handle on this day.
Were there bells ringing? Were there red flags flying that I should’ve noticed? I don’t know. I just know that before I could walk into the office… something took over… I was in the grip… there was a lot of talking and carrying on and blurring… and wait… it was me! What just happened? I really wasn’t sure… well, I knew what… I just didn’t know how or exactly why.
I’m not even going to give you the exact details… but you’ll know what I mean if I just remind you about times when you said or did something and felt the pit of your stomach rise up in your throat, but you couldn’t stop… like a freight train out of control and you’re the only one that can’t see it. Why? Why was this happening?
The day ended at last… there was really nothing else that could be done… it had no other choice… I was exhausted, miserable, and guilt-ridden.
There was fear on Wednesday but also some reprieve… some mercy … then there was Thursday… a fiasco of miscommunication and the final drain of every bit of strength and emotion left within me. Total defeat… that’s what it felt like. It’s certainly overly dramatic, I know… but, yes, it did feel like the end had come crashing in among us and chosen me to sit on.
Then, by Friday morning… miraculously… everything was clear again… the burden was lifted… the gloom and the darkness. It felt like it does after a major storm has raged… crisp, clean… I felt like myself again. I thought it must’ve been physiological… some great shift of balance from within that had been put right once more. As suddenly as the squall line of storms had moved through, there was peace and calm again… there was self-control.
By Saturday morning understanding was also beginning to unfold. Early mornings just as I am waking… those twilight moments just before full consciousness resumes after a sleep… the Lord sometimes drops truth or understanding or revelation into my thoughts… maybe those are the moments when I am least resistant to them.
This hadn’t been a physiological event… this had been a well orchestrated series of events with specific purposes. It was one, major, teaching event. I was the student. Did I get the message? Would we have to do a make-up test? I prayed, “No, please, never again.”
It wasn’t evil that had been at work this week. It was the Spirit of God doing what He alone can do in our lives once we’re His… He was driving the bus.
The ground for this particular teaching exercise had been tilled for three years… it had been prepared… it had been nurtured… my heart was ready. It could not be small, however. This was a big lesson and it will have to last now… even though there may be small reminders or even momentary temptations in the future… the point now made is intended to last a lifetime. Self-control really does bring peace. I must choose.
God’s best for me and you is peace… but it means the disciplining of our own spirits. It means saying “no” to the instant gratifications of impatience and all choices and traits that are not facets of love.
How do I know that this wasn’t an evil attempt to take me down? Because anytime we’ve come in contact with real evil, a purpose of destruction is eventually revealed. The revelation of these days is choice made possible by an example working for good. I am given now the choice of how I will live… with self-control… or always running just ahead of a freight train.
My Pastor/Teacher had drilled me for three years… “you must learn to respond, not to react.” This was the object lesson. Really take our self-control away and chaos is the nightmare we will be relegated to live within. Granted the lesson wasn’t taken to an extreme with me… but it was taken far enough for me to realize that I wasn’t in the driver’s seat any longer. It was an awful state… far, far away from peace. At last, I could make the connection.
There was another point… about trust. I was put in positions where I was helplessly dependent on how the people around me would react or respond… on how they have made their choices.
Each of us knows many of the details of Jesus’ death on the cross. We know about sacrifice. We know that it was the worst in humankind aligned with evil that put Him there… and we know that He allowed it to happen and why.
We can’t know, however, what is happening to another person when we have contact with them. We can’t necessarily know right away if they are in the grip of evil or the lead character in an object lesson that God is teaching them.
We still must choose to respond according to the lessons we have learned and the choices that we have made in our own journey. We do not live according to the whims of a moment. We live with lives surrendered to Christ in all that that means.
We live with the desire and will to come as close to that ideal as is possible on any given day. We have accepted life in Christ and He has received us. We also know and accept that we will miss the
mark at times and that God’s grace is enough to be sufficient. We must live in that same posture… that there is grace enough to extend whether we know what is happening or not. We dare not judge.
That leads, at last, to a final point in all of this. When anger or angst or striving or jealousies or entitlements or gossip or any other divisive sentiment colors our words… we can know that we are not about to speak the truth in love… and we must stop right there.
To speak the truth in love requires integrity. There the weight on us is to be willing “to endure discomfort for the sake of truth.” Dr. Scott Peck wrote those words in his book, The Road Less Traveled and Beyond. These filters must be in place before we write or say anything to any other human being. We dare not make exceptions.
I have learned in a graphic way… in a transforming way this week… that to respond carefully, respectfully, and lovingly is always the choice to make when talking with or about others.
I have learned that I cannot know what throes another person is in… whether it is some evil reaching out to take hold of them… or a good God loving them through a hard lesson… I must trust that I have been put in good hands… or work to be the good hands that another person has been entrusted to… regardless of what is said… I am to speak the truth in love.
I see now why it is that peace can be the fruit of self-control… and I see the challenge clearly set before me.
I have been loved through my difficulties this week because I was entrusted to people who have chosen to respond as they believe… not according to the circumstances that were presented. Though they had the human right to make that distinction, they endured and spoke, instead, in love.
The path is narrow… it is twisting and steep in places… it is a path that curves so severely that there are times we literally don’t know what is ahead. We know that we are not alone. We do know that we are accepted. We also know that every single grace extended to us must absolutely be given away by extending them to others. This is love and we have claimed it as life.
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