When You Pass through the Waters

When You Pass through the Waters.  WhatsApp chirped at me yesterday at 11:30 AM with new messages from my contact in Tete, Mozambique. Pastor Bowman typed, “How can we savaive with this?no any help” and included 22 photos from his mobile phone. How can we survive this? There is no help.

Cyclone Freddy, a historic storm that meteorologists have classified as “the most energetic ever recorded” (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-64928093), continues to carve a path of destruction through Bowman’s community, as well as the entire length of Mozambique, now Malawi, and toward Zambia and Zimbabwe, too. In terms of this storm, the slower it goes, the worse the flooding gets. Freddy is barely inching north.

Over the last few weeks, Bowman and I have been exchanging messages ahead of our Bible Institute in mid-April. But understandably, today most of the cultural niceties fell away. His English might be rudimentary, but it is far better than my Portuguese! Yet it doesn’t take Google Translate to pick up Bowman’s meaning or his fear.

When he says, “no any help,” he means no any help – no fire departments, no policemen, no community shelters, no choppers, no inflatable rafts, no federal relief programs, and no power because the hydro-electric power grid had to be deactivated to prevent its total collapse from the floods. Bowman used some of his precious phone battery to ask for prayer.

I replied immediately with the first Bible verse that popped into my mind. “We are praying Isaiah 43:1-2 for you and for all Mozambique – ‘Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you’ – in Jesus’ name. Amen.” Bowman signed off with, “Amen pastor god bless you for  encouragement.”

With no new news since, no any help still occupies a space in my mind like a lump. Though there may be no any help from humans, with God there is always help. “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life” ... Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God” (John 6:63, 68-69).

My trip to Mozambique may, literally, be washed out but God’s help is never diluted.

Seventy Times Seven

Seventy times seven.  Occasionally, a line in a book or a sermon stops me in my tracks. This week there were two. “In an age in which everything is permitted, and nothing is forgiven,” Tim Keller writes, “forgiveness is a form of voluntary suffering. In forgiving, rather than retaliating, you make a choice to bear the cost” (Forgive: Why Should I and How Can I?, p. 6). Ooof! Alistair Begg lands a similar punch, “We’ve become experts at asking forgiveness for things we had nothing to do with 200 years ago, and we fail to ask forgiveness for what we did 20 minutes ago.” Ouch!

As I mull over the words by these two modern communicators, it is Jesus who occupies the premier position for surgically dividing truth from opinion. During a contentious age, typified by rabbinical teachers, forgiving someone once was considered extraordinarily pious. But Jesus turned the opinion of piety completely upside down with the truth. “Then Peter came up and said to him, ‘Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven’” (Matt. 18:21-22). Peter’s insertion of seven times is generous in his own right; seven times forgiven is unthinkably often. But Jesus shatters all comparative examples of piety when he assigns seventy times seven, basically an unlimited number, to forgiveness.

Seventy times seven was uttered once before. After Cain killed his brother, Abel, God exiled Cain but kindly marked him and vowed to protect him, murderer though he was. “If anyone kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold” (Gen. 4:15). Yet, seven generations after Cain, Lamech vowed seventy times seven, an unlimited number, to his vengeance as a fist in God’s face. “I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for striking me. If Cain's revenge is sevenfold, then Lamech's is seventy-sevenfold” (Gen. 4:23-24). When Jesus speaks of unlimited forgiveness, he taps a reservoir of generosity that neither Cain nor Lamech nor we (in our flesh) could conceive—for only God is unlimited in his forgiveness. That’s the point. Only God is unlimited in forgiveness. We have asked him to forgive us unlimitedly: “and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors (Matt. 6:12). We who have been forgiven have been also transformed by the God who forgives to such a degree that a disconnect with forgiveness is likely a symptom of a disconnect with God. “As the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive” (Col. 3:13).

For Everything There Is a Season

For Everything There Is a Season.  Although the marquee outside the Parks and Recreation Building still reads, “Happy Fall, Y’all!” and although it is only March 1^st, it is basically springtime. The daffodils are now sharing space with the tulips. A yellow-green dusting of pollen covers everything, even my eyeballs. An ice storm, if one were to kick up in March, would kill or maim everything botanical in its path. But for now, March is marvelous.

It is as true this year as in any year, “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven” (Eccles. 3:1). Apparently, in addition to a season for tulips, there is also a season for war. Not merely the unpredictable oscillation between “a time for war, and a time and peace” (vs. 8), but war has a predictable season, too. March means the beginning of war season for the ancients, as regular as tax season for the moderns, as anticipated as tulip season for the horticulturalists.

For the most part, ancient men would plant their fields, kiss their wives, sharpen their weapons, and march to war every March. They would fight the enemies until October when they (also the enemies) would return home, kiss their wives, store their weapons, bring in the harvest, and take a long-winter’s nap. For some reason, the regularity of war season is mildly humorous, like the dogs and the cats in the old cartoons, punching their timecards side-by-side in the morning, fighting tooth-and-nail all day until it was time to clock out again in the evening when they would wish each other a good night. See you later, Hal. You, too, Frank.

It is not a coincidence that March honors Mars, the Roman god of war, enshrined in the third month’s very name. It is also not a coincidence that Russia and Ukraine, having taken a break from war for the winter, are back at it again this March.

Ironically, the ones who divert from the war path as easily get churned up in war’s machinery. “In the spring of the year, the time when kings go out to battle, David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel … but David remained at Jerusalem” (2 Sam. 11:1). King David, curiously, declined to follow the war calendar and quickly fell into serious trouble with his lieutenant’s wife, Bathsheba (2 Sam. 11:4)—since all the other men were at war.

But before David’s infamous departure from the well-established season of war, apparently before he was coronated but after he was anointed as Israel’s king, he wrote about war and peace from a different point of view. He wrote about some people who not only went to war but who developed an appetite for war. “Too long have I had my dwelling among those who hate peace. I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war” (Psa. 120:6-7). Declaring for the side of peace, David had to go frequently into war. Though his hands were bloody out of necessity, his heart was ever eager for peace.

So, March marches in as it ever has, but Mars is not in command, nor has he ever been. This is not the season of war anymore. This is the season of redemption now. We follow a different Warrior to a better battlefield. The cross was the war that really will end all wars.

Times or Seasons

Not for You to Know Times or Seasons.  In north-central Ohio, where we lived for five considerably (physically) cold years, there was a local saying: “Three more snows after the forsythia blooms.” Before we learned that discouraging proverb partway through our tenure there, it had been so encouraging to see the forsythia bloom. Its friendly yellow flower was not so encouraging after we learned it! Through what seemed like four consecutive months of cold, the forsythia emerged only to say: “Don’t put your big coat away for another month!”

So, twenty years later, we are still apprehensive to trust the forsythia. Even now, as it is smiling at me through the window, I wonder: is this a devilish smirk or an angelic grin? With temperatures in the 80s tomorrow, I think I will risk a little springtime hope. But I will not put my big coat away, just out of an abundance of caution.

Severely, even annually flawed, the forsythia is still a far better meteorologist than the human. We don’t know the times or seasons, nor should we attempt to map out God’s next move, because Jesus directly told us to resist the urge: "It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority” (Acts 1:7). With the earthquakes in Turkey, the 24/7 worship service at Asbury University, the first anniversary of Russia’s unprovoked invasion into Ukraine, the anarchy in Haiti, the homicide rates in Chicago and New Orleans, the microplastics in the ocean, and the reminder to schedule that next screening with the doctor—we don’t know the future. Either we lack the capacity to know or we lack the wisdom to handle such knowledge, or both, but Jesus’ point is clear: we don’t need to know. The Father knows sufficiently well and we know the Father. Instead of giving us data points about the future (beyond all the data already given in the Scriptures), Jesus gives us purpose: “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth" (Acts 1:8).

Oh, right. That! Why do we so easily forget about that in our attempts to interpret forsythias and when it is time to pack away the big coat for another nine months? I don’t know, but the Lord knows! So, whether the Lord returns tomorrow or in ten thousand tomorrows, the task is clear: do what you have been remade to be, witness.

Subjected to Futility

Subjected to Futility.  God is uniquely, intriguingly called the Father of lights and accurately described as abundantly generous and impeccably pure. “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change” (James 1:17). One of his good and perfect gifts—which suitably fits his good and perfect attributes—is also unique and intriguing, but is it generous? God gave the whole world the gift of futility. Thanks? “For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope” (Rom 8:20). To call this divine act of subjection a gift is commentary more than explanation, but it is nevertheless on target. Our present futility is a gift in the long view. The creation, both its human and non-human parts, will be staggeringly and everlastingly better-off having been temporarily subjected to futility (which is the same word that translates the favorite word of the book of Ecclesiastes: vanity).

Subjection is the task of lowering or subordinating. It is a royal dominion word. We are subjects under our divine King’s sovereign rule; his decrees are binding upon and across his creation with no vote or consent necessary. His orders bring order. That is why it is ultra-important to know that God is good as well as perfect. His character guides his leadership. What did God do by royal decree? He subjected the entire creation to futility because he placed all things under the feet of his representative agents, namely Adam and Eve (Gen. 1:26-30; Psa. 8:6). Because they preferred futility over intimacy, God subjected the entire creation to follow their co-regents into futility and broken intimacy. That is why the ground refused to cooperate with Adam’s cultivation after the curse—producing thorns and thistles (Gen. 3:19)—because God allowed the ramifications of Adam’s sin to play out in Adam’s sphere of responsibility, which was the entire creation. God did not immediately swoop in and clean up Adam’s mess, he subjected all creation to a futility that matched Adam’s futile choice. Creation follows humanity in unbreakable lockstep for good or evil.

Here one can imagine a grin on the face of God; he knows something that we do not know. Because Adam sinned, and even before Adam sinned (Rev. 13:8), God was prepared to send his only begotten Son to succeed where Adam failed. Jesus is the Last Adam (1 Cor. 15:45), the Second Man (1 Cor. 15:47), whose victory extends far beyond the first Adam’s failure (1 Cor. 15:48-49). Because creation followed the first human into futility, a principle of responsibility that God upheld at the garden, then creation will follow the best human into eternity, a principle of substitution that God accomplished at the cross. That is why the creation waits (Rom. 8:19), hopes (Rom. 8:20), and groans (Rom. 8:22) for the day of restoration when the adoption of the children of God will be finalized physically in glory as it has been ratified spiritually in salvation (Rom. 8:21). In that sense, futility is a gift because it reminds us with every lament, every groan of a broken world, and every unfulfilled longing that the end will be better than the beginning! Only faith in Christ can see his invisible trajectory that is already binding upon everything and everyone in his dominion. Hallelujah!

Impossible to Prepare for This

Impossible to Prepare for This.  Turkish President Erdogan, as he toured the affected regions this morning following Monday’s earthquakes, said: “It is not possible to be prepared for a disaster this big.” The devastation has killed 11,000 people, and the death toll will invariably rise as the search and clean-up continues. The rubble and, grimly, also the white, vinyl body bags lining the scant, remaining open spaces of the cities in southern Turkey and northern Syria are visible in satellite footage. As rescue workers, hampered by rain, snow, and cold, look for survivors, the larger story (as reported by the BBC) involves local criticism of the president’s slow speed at responding to the disaster.

Death is a stern yet effective teacher, whether the learner is actively religious or passively secular, passively religious or actively secular, Muslim, Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, or Atheist. When death grabs every international headline, no one can look away from the carnage. What lesson does death teach? We are all, every one of us, mortal.

Denying our mortality is the epitome of foolishness, as Solomon forcefully argued throughout his sermon which we call Ecclesiastes. “No man has power to retain the spirit, or power over the day of death” (Eccles. 8:8). “For man does not know his time. Like fish that are taken in an evil net, and like birds that are caught in a snare, so the children of man are snared at an evil time, when it suddenly falls upon them” (Eccles. 9:12). After Monday, the Turkish and Syrian people need no further help envisioning what it looks like when calamity “suddenly falls upon them.” We, the collective world looking in from the outside, can either (wisely) join in on their lesson about our inescapable mortality by reconciling to God now or (unwisely) wait for our own turn at the chalkboard without reconciliation with God. The wise person will learn from the lessons that others have had to learn the hard way. This week in Turkey and Syria, the people have had nothing but learning the hard way. May the Lord truly visit them in their time of great need!

We can only adequately prepare for our impending death by reconciling to God through faith in Jesus Christ, who uniquely and successfully mediated one way for sinners to find peace with God by his death and resurrection. Turkey and Syria’s tragedy adds fuel and faces to our ministry—the church has been given the task of unified proclamation and fellowship in the gospel of grace, "that the world may believe that you sent me” (John 17:21).

Your Gentleness Made Me Great

Your Gentleness Made Me Great.  King David had been named king but hadn’t become king until this occasion: his coronation (Psalm 18). Not merely because Jerusalem, which David established as the seat of his new government, was several thousand feet up in elevation, his coronation was an uphill battle in every sense of the word for him to assume the throne of the unified nation of Israel. He had to conquer Jerusalem. He had to conquer Saul’s tribe and allies. But mostly David had to conquer himself before he was ready to become king, a battle he would famously, and in some ways repeatedly, fight. He theoretically ought to have been the first one to know about being one’s own worst enemy.

For the lion’s share of a decade, he ran from King Saul. Although David was clearly revealed by the prophet and openly revered by the people as the Lord’s chosen king, he wouldn’t dispose of the Lord’s outgoing king by his own doing. He could have but would not. In contrast to the two times when Saul attempted to pin David to the wall of the palace with his spear (1 Sam. 18:11; 19:10), twice David had Saul in his grasp and twice he let Saul go, saying: “I would not put out my hand against the Lord's anointed” (1 Sam. 26:23, see also 1 Sam. 24:10). Yet both times, David’s men did not understand David’s great humility, misinterpreting it as David’s great folly for forfeiting a potentially God-provided windfall. But David approached humility, or gentleness, from the other direction. Gentleness was (and is) the mark of greatness instead of the absence of greatness or a hurdle to accomplishing it.

We often repeat the same mistake of David’s men and David’s predecessor when we step on the neck of gentleness in our greedy grasp for greatness. I can still hear one accuser scoff at me while figuratively stepping on my neck, “You are too ethical to succeed” (direct quote). But he, like we all, got it horribly backward. (Yet, it is a relief to know that God will sort the goats from the sheep.) Gentleness/humility is success, not the price of doing business.

Strikingly but not surprisingly, David spoke more of God at his own coronation than himself. “Your gentleness made me great” (Psa. 18:35). Wouldn’t we like to say to our enemies, when we finally are vindicated, some version of: how do you like me now? Paradoxically, God’s gentleness/humility was what made David rise, not God’s greatness that made David humble (i.e., forced compliance). Voluntary gentleness/humility is the essence of greatness in God’s kingdom. “Many who are first will be last, and the last first” (Matt. 19:30).

After Saul fell, after all of Saul’s allies dispersed, and after all of Saul’s sons (except for one grandson, Mephibosheth [2 Sam. 4:4]) were removed from Israel, David might have concluded that his need for gentleness/humility had also expired. But that was simply not true! He needed even more humility sitting on the throne than slinking through the caves.