The Second Opinion

Last week’s column talked about the picture the apostle Paul paints of us as jars of clay -- earthen containers capable of containing an eternal treasure – the Holy Spirit.  Ponder that thought for a moment, God in us.  Imagine the power and comfort of knowing that He is for you and will never forsake you.  

Jesus personally promoted this promise to his disciples.  The Gospel of John records Jesus’ teaching this way, “If you love me, keep my commands. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth… you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you...”   One night, while he was eating with them, he gave them this command: “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about.  For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.”  

Here’s how Paul explained this fact to the fledgling community of Christians in Corinth, “Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in your midst?”    Later in that same letter, Paul reinforced this premise by asking these comparatively new followers of Christ about the promise this way, “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?”  So there it is.  God’s plan is to be in us.

We all know that nature abhors a vacuum.  We’ll either be full of Him, ourselves, or something even worse.  Jesus explains the predicament we face this way, “When an impure spirit comes out of a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it.  Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’ When it arrives, it finds the house unoccupied, swept clean and put in order.  Then it goes and takes with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that person is worse than the first. That is how it will be with this wicked generation.”   Thus the need to be filled with the Spirit – it’s the next best thing to hanging out a “no vacancy” sign.

I vividly recall an event in the early days of the war in Afghanistan – I had walked into our medical facility in Kandahar to find a young Afghan man strapped to a gurney -- hands and legs all securely restrained.  He had no shirt and a mask over his face to keep him from spitting.  I asked our even younger medic what was wrong with the Afghani.  He said he didn’t know, but that the Division Psychiatrist had been called.  

Almost as soon he’d said that, the Doc walked in with a large syringe.  I told the Doc that the drugs in that syringe would indeed put him down, but they could not cure the problem.   I said, “I’ll tell you what’s wrong with him. The guy has demons.”  Despite the Doc’s skepticism of my diagnosis, in my mind, there was no doubt.  As Providence would have it, a couple of minutes later our Afghan translator walks in to the room. I asked Ahmed, “What’s wrong with this guy?” Ahmed says, “How do you say in English? He has spirits.”   At that I said. “Doc, there’s your second opinion!’”  

Jesus had a similar encounter.  “They brought him a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute.  Jesus healed him, so that he could both talk and see... the Pharisees said, ‘It is only by Beelzebul, the prince of demons, that this fellow drives out demons’.”  Jesus refuted this with His famous “house divided argument.”  But more pertinent was His prescription for unadulterated freedom, “if the Spirit of God drives out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.”

Jesus goes on to describe the protection offered by the Holy Spirit, “how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can plunder his house.”   Don’t doubt the need to keep our temple full with His all-powerful Spirit. 

Why? “Because greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world.”

Cleansing and the Coffee Cup

As I was in church this past Sunday morning, I was contemplating just how much I was in need of cleansing.  Not externally, but internally.  The Bible describes us as vessels, earthen vessel and even jars of clay.  Now we have a pretty good dishwasher, but sometimes if the cup is really dirty it requires soaking or even pre-cleaning in order for the dishwasher to be successful.  

Paul the apostle described the typical types of vessels and their purposes to his disciple Timothy: ^“But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay, some for honor and some for dishonor.  Therefore if anyone cleanses himself from the latter, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified and useful for the Master, prepared for every good work.”  Paul also told Timothy about the relationship between the vessel’s cleanliness and its utility to the Master.  

This brought to mind a story that my Dad had recounted to me about his interchange with a crusty old mess sergeant.  Well over a half century ago my Dad was a young Army lieutenant with the additional duty of mess officer.  His duty would normally entail looking over the ordering of rations, accounting for funds, sanitary conditions of the facilities, managing manpower, and lastly (and the very least) monitoring the quality and tastiness of the chow.  It would also require regular visits to the chow hall.

As the story goes, my Dad went into the chow hall early one morning, grabbed a coffee mug from the dish rack and was preparing to fill it with good old GI mud.  Right at this point my Dad said the standard-issue aforementioned crusty old mess sergeant seized said mug from the unsuspecting and green lieutenant and began screaming, “YOU SEE THIS LIEUTENANT, YOU SEE THIS?”  “See what?” my Dad asked.  The mess sergeant answered, “This mug is cracked lieutenant, it’s cracked!”  “But it still works” protested the young lieutenant.  “It doesn’t matter” barked the mess sergeant, “those cracks harbor disease that even the dishwasher can’t kill!”  And with that the mess sergeant smashed the mug by hurling it into the mess hall floor.

Needless to say, that story made quite an impression on that young lieutenant.  So much that it has been passed on to his son, and subsequently his grandson, both of whom have served in that same Army.  

So what’s the point?  It’s two fold.  First, there is a point where something is no longer able to function for its intended purpose. Not that it has outlived its usefulness or that it is merely beyond economic repair, but that it is beyond being fixed.  Such that not even all the king’s horses or even all the king’s  men can make that mug useful again.  

As I look at our modern political system I see two parties postured against the people. I am forced to ponder the distinct possibility that the system has simply reached the point that there is no dishwasher capable of removing the mess.   It seems to me and millions of others we’ve reached the point that Mess Sergeant Trump looks like he’s got the answer – smash it! 

Our Founders foresaw the possibility of it coming to this point.  In our Declaration of Independence they reserved the right for destruction when they wrote, “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness…it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”

Are we there yet?  I hope not.  But I do think that Mark Twain was on to something when he said, “Loyalty to the country always. Loyalty to the government when it deserves it.”  Maybe even more so when he said, “Politicians and diapers must be changed often, and for the same reason.”   Either way, something’s got to give.

And the second point, there is good news for those vessels seeking to be sanctified.  An old hymn holds the answer, “What can wash away my sin?  Nothing but the blood of Jesus!”

Daniel in the Lions Den

It was Sunday morning, I had just checked my iPhone for messages, made coffee, and sat down in front of my laptop when my mind began thinking of all the changes (technological, geopolitical, moral, and social) that have taken place in just the last few years.  As I was obsessed with that thought I went to look at my laptop – I was greeted with a page wanting me to share the fact that me and my wife have been “friends” on Facebook for six years that day.  The fact that our oldest child is three times that old tells me that we’ve been “friends” for more than six years and that this social media “friendship” thing is a fairly new advent.

 At this point, to show just how much the world has changed, it would seem useful to shamelessly steal one of those comparisons lists graduation speakers use to illustrate change in the life span of the graduating class.  Through the power of the internet I’ve excerpted a June 2015 Pennsylvania high school commencement speech by Stephen Vehslage, an Ivy League lawyer turned teacher who describes the changes since the students started school: 

“…how your world has changed – since you were a toddler…. Back then the United States was running a budget surplus; our presidents had all been white men and gay marriage was barely even on the radar. People still went to video stores; the twin towers were still gracing the New York skyline, no one had ever heard of Facebook, and there were a billion fewer people on the planet... it took twelve-and-a-half minutes to download a song on a 56k modem. Internet Explorer had a 95 percent market share – it was a different world.”

Vehslage continued by contrasting that to the present, “Now fast-forward 13 years, the number of global internet users has mushroomed from under 600 million to almost three billion. Facebook alone has 1.4 billion users. The total number of websites jumped from less than four million to over a billion, and a new website is created every second of every day. The iPhone was introduced in 2007 and the word ‘app’ quickly became part of the modern lexicon...”

The prophet Daniel foretold of a time coming that seems to fit our present age.  He was told to seal up his writing until a time when it could be understood.  The King James translation of Daniel’s writing (which is nearly  400 years old now) describes it this way, “ But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.”   The Living Bible (copyright 1971) translates it this way, “But Daniel, keep this prophecy a secret; seal it up so that it will not be understood until the end times, when travel and education shall be vastly increased!”

So what could we gain by opening Daniel’s book today?  

The first lesson might be the same one that has been imparted to millions of children through the years.  Put simply, when forced with a choice of bowing down to Government or God – choose God.    After making that choice, expect to be punished by that same government. And lastly, expect God’s help, even to the point of shutting the mouths of lions.

The second lesson is similar to the first.  Daniel’s friends Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego faced a similar fate for failing to neither serve the Government’s gods nor worship its image of gold.   Although in this case, rather than lions, their future was a blazing furnace.  But like Daniel, they too emerged unscathed, not even so much as smelling of smoke.  In this instance God did not just see these three through – He was with them in the fire.

Finally, we should learn to pray like Daniel, “Lord, you are righteous, but this day we are covered with shame…because of our unfaithfulness to you. We and our kings, our princes and our ancestors are covered with shame, Lord, because we have sinned against you… We do not make requests of you because we are righteous, but because of your great mercy. Lord, listen! Lord, forgive! Lord, hear and act! For your sake, my God, do not delay, because your city and your people bear your Name.”

 But even if He does delay, or does not deliver us, these appear to be the days to be prepared to face the lions or feel the fire.  

Even so…