Water and Fire

I won't be scared of the fire or scared of the water
You're the great overcomer, You're living in me
You are the man in the fire, You walked on the water
You're the great overcomer, Emmanuel!

As we sang this song in my church last Sunday, I was reminded of one of my favorite Scriptures to meditate on during cancer treatment. But my take on it is a little different from the more traditional interpretation... or is it?

In the Bible, "water" typically is used for washing and cleansing. This would be like washing your hands or your feet, washing your clothes, washing food to prepare it, that sort of thing. The waters of the sea were a great food source via fishing. But in the ancient world, the sea also could be a terrifying, dangerous place. There was a time when Jesus' disciples were caught in a storm on the sea that was so bad that they feared for their lives... but then Jesus came to them actually walking ON the water they were so afraid of, and then He exercised authority over it and stopped the storm (Mark 6:45-52).

"Fire", on the other hand, often represents purification - melting down metals to remove impurities, for example, and making animal sacrifices to purify the people of their sins. In one notable story, three faithful Israelites were thrown into a fire to execute them, and God saved them from it - they came out perfectly unharmed (Daniel 3:8-30).

These were likely some of the kinds of thoughts that would have occurred to an ancient reader of this passage from Isaiah 43:1-3:

But now thus says the LORD,
he who created you, O Jacob,
   he who formed you, O Israel:
“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;
when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
   and the flame shall not consume you.
For I am the LORD your God,
   the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.

Let me take a little detour here. When my wife Cat was undergoing cancer treatment, her experience was this: first, they did chemotherapy treatments on her to reduce the size of the cancer tumor. Basically, chemotherapy involves sitting in a comfy chair for hours at a time while they pump various medicines into you through an IV. Once they decided that the many chemo treatments had had the effect they wanted, they sent her in for radiation treatments. In those they send radiation into your body in such a way that it basically burns up the cancer cells. They are very accurate with radiation treatments these days, but just like with sun radiation at the beach, you can sometimes get burns even on your skin. I understand that chemo and then radiation is a common way to treat many cancers. (I don't know yet if I will ever undergo radiation treatments - stay tuned!)

So when I read that passage and it says "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you," it reminds me of the hours of liquid medicine during chemotherapy. And when I read "when you walk through fire you shall not be burned," I'm reminded of the burning effects of radiation therapy. I choose to take this prophecy, in my own life, as a promise that whatever of those therapies I happen to be doing at the time, God is with me, protecting me from any harm that they could inadvertently do!

I won't be scared of the fire or scared of the water
You're the great overcomer, You're living in me
You are the man in the fire, You walked on the water
You're the great overcomer, Emmanuel!

Sins of a Nation

Most of my friends don't care for Barack Obama.

Let me rephrase that: most of my friends strongly disagree with many of President Obama's policy decisions. Sometimes this turns into outright dislike for the man himself (even though they haven't actually met him), and occasionally it causes some of them to teeter over into the zone where people believe that he is not a legitimate President because of where they think he was born, or that he is a militant Muslim of some kind trying to overthrow freedom of religion, or some other difficult-to-prove but inflammatory viewpoint. Most of my friends seem to be quite indignant at any suggestion that gun control is a good idea. They are angry when they perceive the President and members of Congress using tragedies as a way to promote what could be seen as a reduction in freedoms. They are incensed if someone says "...one nation..." and does not follow it up with "...under God...". They dislike Obama's foreign policies and his domestic policies. They were quite disappointed when he was elected again, although as I mentioned right after the election, I was quite proud of their response afterward.

I don't mean to distance myself from their viewpoints... as is often the case among friends, I share some of their concerns. What I am trying to do is paint a quick picture of the mindset of the Christian who is also politically right-leaning. Based on things I see on Facebook, comments posted on YouTube videos of political nature, responses to online news articles, and that sort of thing, there seem to be a lot of Christians who think that sin is dragging this country to its grave. And they are pointing their fingers at the "sinners" (Congressmen, abortionists, gun-control activists, Obama supporters, etc.) who they believe are the cause of it.

Last night I was reading the book of Daniel, and I came to a place where Daniel began to pray. Daniel was in forced exile from his country of Israel, but he knew that the reason for his exile was the sin of the Jewish nation, and Daniel began to pray for his country. I invite you to take a look at his prayer in Daniel 9:3-19 to see what he said.

Do you know what I noticed last night as I read it? Although Daniel was one of the most righteous among his people (remember, he was the guy who wound up getting thrown to the lions because he refused to betray God and pray to the king), Daniel did not pray to confess the sins of others. He confessed and asked for forgiveness of the sins of his country, including himself. He did not differentiate between idolaters back home dancing around on the hilltops making sacrifices to Baal, and himself, stuck in Babylon but praying three times a day facing Jerusalem. "We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land," he prayed, despite the fact that his prayer was in response to his own reverent reading of the writings of the prophet Jeremiah. He included himself among the ranks of those who "...have rebelled against [God] and have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God by walking in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets," despite the fact that Daniel was so careful to follow God's Law that years earlier when he was brought to Babylon in captivity, Daniel had "...resolved that he would not defile himself with the king's food, or with the wine that he drank," risking his life in the process. Although Daniel appears to have been quite a meticulous follower of God, certainly not someone we would look on as a "transgressor", he prayed as though he were. Because he knew that he was a member of God's people, and a member of his country, and he knew that they would live or die as a unit.

"United we stand, divided we fall." That's a good motto. If we point at someone else as the one who is messing everything up, we divide ourselves from others around us... we become a divided country. That sort of thing is what caused the awful "Civil War" that nearly destroyed us once. The United States of America is not quite like Israel... a nation primarily of one ethnicity and chosen specifically by God to be His people. I don't think the United States is chosen to be God's nation; I think the Church (meaning all Christians across the world) is now ultimately God's nation, His "Kingdom." But I do think that Christians should take a play out of Daniel's playbook and call out to God for forgiveness of the sins we have committed as an earthly nation, humbling ourselves as though we are among the transgressors. Because really, we are. Every time an official or governing body we have elected to represent us makes an ungodly decision, we have made that decision by proxy. And "I didn't vote for him" is no excuse. United we stand; divided we fall.

I personally don't think that we (the United States) will ever be able to right every wrong that we have committed or will commit as a country; I'm not sure that is even possible for any country. But if we seek God's face as His people and pray for the cleansing of our country, I think God will honor our prayers and we will see change for the better. And if we take the attitude that we are all Americans and dispose of the "us vs. them" mentality which has plagued us for the past few decades, it's possible that maybe some of "them" might come to Jesus and become "us". Or, we may find that although we may disagree on some of the details of politics, some of "them" actually turn out to be some of "us" already. But whether we all come to a consensus on political, ideological, or religious ideas (fat chance!) or not, we are all "us". We are all America. The UNITED States. If we become divided because we disagree, we risk failure. If we remain united, we as a nation can remain strong.

Election Results and the Christian

I've been pretty quiet here all through the U.S. election season. This blog isn't intended as a place for me to espouse or even share my political views; it's not a politics blog and I don't want it to turn into one, and that's been a big part of what's been on my mind. Certainly it is part of my "life" as a "Christian" (see the blog's title!) but I just don't want to go there on this platform... because I don't think that you should use your Christianity as the reason for your politics. I don't mean by that that you shouldn't vote for the person who you believe will provide the most Godly leadership out of all of the candidates, no matter what the office, but I don't think that you should hang your Christianity on your political party. Politics by its nature is divisive, but Jesus by His nature seeks to draw everyone to Himself. If I say "I'm a Republican because I'm a Christian," what are people who are not Christians but who have strong opinions which contradict the Republican platform supposed to think? That they aren't allowed in the "Christian" club because they are members of the "Democrat" club? I just don't think that's a good path to follow. Jesus loves and accepts political liberals, moderates, conservatives, and whatever - all the same - and does not require them to change their political ideas except in any areas that contradict God's Word. And those ways are often fewer than we think.

Anyway, now that the elections are over, I do have a few thoughts to share... with my Christian friends, mostly. The ones who wanted Mitt Romney to win. I will start with full disclosure: I didn't want President Obama to win again. I don't think he's done the job that needed to be done, and I wanted to give the other guy a crack at it. That said, I have something to say to my Christian friends who agree with me on that.

My message to my Christian friends is this: RELAX.

Let's back up for a second. I live in Oklahoma, which is as red of a state as you are going to find. I grew up in Louisiana and Texas, which are also very red Southern states. And most of my friends are thoroughly Republican Christians. Overall I think they (we?) are pretty disappointed that Obama won a second term. But I don't believe that a second four years for a President who may have failed to accomplish what needed to be accomplished is the end of the world for Christianity or Christians, or even the end of the United States of America. I think God is present in America today the same as He was present yesterday, in the hearts and lives of His people.

I'm going to take the devil's advocate for a moment and argue from the assumption that Obama is the worst of what conspiracy theorists and wild-eyed alarmists think he is: evil incarnate, bent on ruining this country by turning it into something it has never been before and should never be, and lacking the common sense to do even the simplest things for the actual good of the country. (This is not my own view; I don't think the President is an evil man. But let's assume for the moment that he is.) What precedents do we have in the Word of God for a ruler like that?

Let's think about the life of Joseph. Joseph was sold into slavery into the land of a pagan king. Once he was there, God brought Joseph such success that not only did he prosper personally, but he brought his whole extended family in to enjoy the prosperity, and ultimately that family grew so large that 400+ years later, a future pagan king felt threatened by their presence. Now THAT is prosperity under an unrighteous ruler.

What about Daniel? He was a prisoner of war, brought into the court of yet another pagan king who not only tried to get him to do things that contradicted his religious convictions, but after Daniel and his friends proved their value to the king and became trusted advisors, the king stupidly and more than once was talked into executing them (God saved them each time, Daniel from the lions and his three friends from death by burning in a furnace). Not only was Daniel made a top advisor to that king, but he outlived two or three more kings, becoming a top adviser in turn to each of them. How's THAT for a lifetime of prospering under unrighteous leadership?

And let's take Esther. Forced to marry the king and become the queen (forced to become the queen?) she was able to save her whole people group when she exposed a situation that the king was stupid enough to let his adviser talk him into, condemning to death not only her, but a man who had just a few days earlier saved the king's life. A pagan king? Yes. Unrighteous? Yes (forcing women to marry you is not a righteous act). Dumb? Yes (not thinking through policies that are presented by your advisers is dumb leadership). Did Esther and the people of God survive and prosper?

Yes they did.

Even Jesus Himself came into the world during the reign of a pagan oppressor (Rome), but Jesus did not seek to correct any of the political problems of His day. Our situation is a bit different in the 21st century United States, of course, and we have the privilege/right/responsibility to take part in the political process by the mechanisms the Constitution gives us. But my point is that God does not always see fit to immediately remove rulers who are not Godly or even not that smart. In the end, the only thing in the Bible that ever caused God's people to ultimately not prosper is not their leadership: it is their own unrighteousness. God's people failed to prosper not when their leaders were bad, but when they chose not to maintain their own relationship with God.*

Now, let's get back to reality. President Obama may be a bad President. Or, he may be a good President. We may, in future years, reap benefits as a nation from the work he's done for the past four years and the work he will do in the next four, or we may suffer the consequences. Sometimes historical hindsight reveals a forest we were unable to see for the trees at the time. But as individual children of God, we can trust that He will make all things, even President Obama, work together for our good.  God's power is greater than the power of any other ruler, and if you don't agree with that statement, perhaps you're not thinking of the same god I'm thinking of. The Kingdom of God is not the United States of America; the Kingdom of God exists within His people. And God will take care of His people. We will not be destroyed.

So quit the pouting. It's all going to be okay. :)



Still freaking out a little bit? Take a look at this blog post which a friend of mine linked to on Facebook yesterday.

Don't miss Part 2 and Part 3 of this impromptu series!

Excited about Isaiah!

Last night I finished Song of Solomon, which means that I've finally reached a part of the Bible that was one of the major reasons I started this project: the prophetic books! I've read some of them already... Jonah of course, and I've always been a big fan of the book of Daniel... but I'm so excited to get into Isaiah, which I believe is the Old Testament book most quoted by the New Testament and which contains MAJOR prophecies about the time in which it was written in addition to the time of the Messiah. (I actually started Isaiah once before I started my whole-Bible project, but I didn't get very far.) But I really hope to gain a working knowledge of all of the OT prophetic books. It's a part of the Bible in which I've spent very little time (I suspect I'm in the company of most Christians in the regard), and if "All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work," (2 Timothy 3:16-17 ESV, emphasis mine) then I want to be familiar with all of it if I can.

I'm so excited!

Prequel

It was spring of 2005, and we were planning my son's fifth birthday party.

He (and every other little boy, apparently) was "into" Star Wars that year, so we were planning a knock-down-drag-out Star Wars party for him. And it also turned out that he was the luckiest kid alive that year, because his birthday happened roughly a month before the final prequel movie, Episode III - Revenge of the Sith, was coming out. Why did that make him lucky? Because a week or so before his birthday, which we had themed around the movies, the new toy line based on Sith came out! By the end of the day he was absolutely drowning in Star Wars toys. I even dressed up like a Wookiee for one part of the party. It was epic!

But we weren't quite sure if we would be able to let him see the movie itself at his age. We knew that at some point, Anakin, who we had watched grow from an innocent little boy into an angsty, troubled teenager in the other movies, was going to get burned beyond recognition, and we weren't sure how violent those images were going to be. So when the movie came out, my wife and I left him with Grandma and went to see it without him to preview it.

My reaction to the movie was unexpected. I knew basically what was going to happen. Anakin was turning bad... really bad. He was going to turn against the Jedi order and have the Jedi all executed. He was going to battle with Obi-Wan and lose. He was going to catch on fire somehow and be left for dead. Then, of course, Palpatine was going to somehow install him into that iconic black suit by the end of the movie. What I was unprepared for was the rush of genuine emotion that was going to occur in me as the movie filled in some of the blanks that had been left by the original trilogy, finally connecting the dots. So this is what turned Anakin into Darth Vader. This is how innocence is twisted into evil... by tainting genuine love with selfishness. Many fans of the original trilogy dislike the prequels very much, but I was genuinely moved by the final chapter in the story of Anakin Skywalker.

That's how I've felt at several times this year as I've been reading straight through the Old Testament for the first time. I already knew the main stories, of course... Adam & Eve, Noah's Ark, David & Goliath, Samson & Delilah, Ruth, Esther, Jonah, and dozens more. I've even read considerable portions of the Old Testament before, including all of Genesis and Exodus, Psalms & Proverbs, and big hunks of other books like Joshua and Judges. What I didn't know was how it all fit together. I had no concept of the length of time between, say, Moses and David, or what exactly happened to make it so that Daniel was in Babylon. The full arc of Old Testament Israelite history had eluded me. The dots weren't connected.

But now many of them are! I understand things about the Old Testament that I never understood before. I understand things about familiar Bible characters that I never understood before. I'm still a long way from being finished, but I'm through the historical books and I think I've got a basic grasp of how the ancient history of the Hebrew people goes.

But the most important part of this whole exercise is that it's not just the history of the Hebrew people... it's the history of God's people. People of faith. Christianity, after all, did spring from the Jewish religion. Jesus and His disciples were all Jewish, as were most everybody around them. And the people of Jesus' day, as I understand it, had a knowledge of the Scriptures that today would be considered quite scholarly. How can we even begin to understand the things that those people said or did in the New Testament without the context of the Old Testament? How can we have a genuine understanding of Jesus' teachings unless we understand the teachings of Moses? When Jesus in the Gospels says "it is written" or even "you have heard that it is said," or when Paul quotes from Psalms or Isaiah, unless you understand something about the way they understood those passages, you can't fully understand the New Testament passage, either.

Now when I watch Darth Vader die in Return of the Jedi, I understand something I didn't before. I understand his love for his wife and family, masked for all those years by rage and hatred. I understand that Darth Vader is a tragic figure, a victim, although he has also been a perpetrator of evil all those years. When the original movies came out, seeing Darth Vader without his helmet was a shock. There really was a human man in there all along! The Anakin that we saw in that brief death scene is actually the return of the Anakin we later met in the prequels. Now we know that. And now that I've gotten familiar with the beginning of the story that is completed in the Gospels, I understand all kinds of things about Jesus' life and death, and the behavior of His followers during His life and after His resurrection.

Until you've read the "prequel," don't assume you understand the "movie"!