Archive for October, 2010

An Encounter with a Witchdoctor

Thursday, October 28th, 2010

Do not be afraid of those who can kill the body but cannot kill the soul.

Matthew 10:28

Igor was thrilled to go to Cameroon on a mission trip. He loved to preach the gospel; it didn’t matter to him where. All he knew about Cameroon, however, was there were witchdoctors there. Igor very much wanted to see a witchdoctor. After two weeks of preaching in remote villages, he got his wish. A procession of witchdoctors came right through the center of the village. Off the side, as if he was supervising, stood the biggest and fiercest-looking one. Igor surreptitiously tried to take his picture.

The subject of his photo saw him and didn’t like it. He raised his nine-foot long spear and charged at Igor and one of his friends. They had only seconds to make a decision. If they ran, it would negate all the preaching they had done, preaching that explained that Jesus is more powerful than the witchdoctors. But a very angry man with a very long spear was running their way. All they could think of to do was shout “Jesus is Lord” and wait to see what happened. Maybe the witchdoctor would kill them, but they knew they couldn’t run away.

“Jesus is Lord!” they shouted. The witchdoctor kept running. “Jesus is Lord!” The witchdoctor ran even faster, shaking his spear. He was almost on top of Igor and his friend. “Jesus is Lord!” The witchdoctor fell to the ground and started twitching. Igor and his friend saw this as a good time to join the rest of their group in the van and drive away.

We say Jesus is Lord, but we don’t always act as if we believe it. We hear news of financial crashes, terrorist threats, or government actions we find threatening. We become fearful and anxious, worrying about our safety, our future, and our lives.

If Jesus is Lord, than He is more powerful than any government, more powerful than any terrorist, more powerful than any fear. We need not be afraid of all of these; our Lord is Lord of all.

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A Limping Cat and an Assassination Plot

Tuesday, October 26th, 2010

I took my limping cat to the vet on Saturday. The vet didn’t see any broken bones, so she sent us home with some kitty pain killers. By the end of the day there was no sign of a limp. Was it a wasted trip, or did the medicine relieve the pain of a soft tissue injury? I’ll never know.

Recently I read of the failed assassination plot against Adolf Hitler. The tyrant survived, the conspirators were found and put to death. Was it a failure?

Hard to say. Anne Frank wrote in her diary how she and the other Jews in hiding with her heard the news of the plot and took heart. Maybe, they thought, if Hitler was being attacked by high-ranking military officers, the Nazi regime was failing from within. Did the news of the failed plot encourage the Allied forces, resistance fighters, and the occupied civilians?

We can never know what would have been. What we can know is that God does, and He is in control.

So many times I get caught up in second-guessing myself, wondering what I should have done, what would have happened. Usually this leads to frustration and guilt. Eventually I come around to remembering the most important thing: I am not in control. God is. Whether my own mistakes or major world events, He works for good in all of them.

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Instead of a Camel, I Rode the Bus

Friday, October 22nd, 2010

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.

Psalm 119:105

Igor decided it was time he was married. Fearful of making a mistake, he wanted God to make the choice for him; he didn’t want to trust his own judgment in such an important matter. When he read the story of Isaac and Rebekah, Igor knew that was just the way to find a wife. He determined to follow the story exactly. He would allow God to lead him to the right woman. And just as Isaac knew nothing about Rebekah, Igor would trust God and not try to find out anything about her. Once the choice was made, he would approach her father for permission to ask the girl to marry him.

Igor even thought through some of the minor details of the story. “Since I had no camels, I had to ride the bus,” he explained. “And since I didn’t have any servants to send, I had to go myself.”

An unusual way to apply Scripture, but I can relate to Igor’s desire to know God’s will and to be obedient to it, as well as his fear of making a mistake and going down the wrong path. Just how can we know if we are living in the center of God’s will? How do we know how to apply His Word?

When we drink daily from God’s word and pray over it, meditate on it, and listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit, God gradually makes us over to be more like His Son. Our minds become conformed to His; we gain wisdom and discernment, and understand how He wants us to live. If we make a concerted effort to behave in ways that are pleasing to Christ, that demonstrate His love for a fallen world, we more closely mirror His image. If we understand how He wants us to live in this world, the answers to the specific questions of what and where become clearer.

Sometimes we make mistakes in our application of Scripture, not considering the whole counsel of God’s word. But God can see into our hearts. Although Igor’s approach was unconventional, God honored his desire to be obedient and to do everything in a way that pleased his Lord, and Igor and the bride he found following Genesis 24 have been happily married 26 years.

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Gratitude for a Prank Phone Call

Monday, October 18th, 2010

I was minding my own business the other night, lying on the couch, petting the cat. My husband was nearby, playing with his blackberry. The ringing telephone interrupted this peaceful scene. Into the kitchen I went to answer it. I didn’t recognize the number on the caller ID, but it was from a local area code. So I picked up the receiver.

“Hello, hello, is Tony home?” asked a male voice with a thick Indian accent.

“May I tell him who’s calling?”

“This is Arvind, I want to talk with Tony.” Arvind is a good friend of my husband’s.

I brought the phone to my husband. “Who is it?” he asked.

“I think it’s Arvind.” I was a little puzzled, as Arvind is usually one of the most polite people I know.

Tony took the phone from me and started laughing uncontrollably. “You didn’t recognize your own husband!” he said in his normal voice.

It turns out my husband, the technology enthusiast, had set up a Google Voice number, which he could use from his cell phone. I had no idea such a thing existed, let alone that Tony had one.

We, but mostly he, had a good laugh over this one. That I fell for a prank phone call from my own husband was an endless source of mirth for him over the next two days.

While I was a little irked over this incident, in the end I saw it as a reason to be thankful. Thankful that in the midst of busyness, at the end of a difficult and sometimes frustrating week, my husband found the time for a joke, to bring some silliness into our lives that can sometimes be too serious.

Sometimes we all need a little laughter, even if it is at our own expense.

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Do You Think You Can Swim through Life like a Fish?

Thursday, October 14th, 2010

Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you.

I Peter 4:12

After a particularly hard day at school, Lena came home in tears. Her teacher often teased Lena for her faith, but this time her mocking words seemed to crush and crack Lena’s bones.

“Stand up, Lena,” her teacher had said. “Lena, have you thought about when you will be in heaven? You will look down on us frying in hell. Will you put salt and pepper on us?”

Lena’s mother was sympathetic, offering tea, cake and a listening ear. Lena was her third child, and this wasn’t the first time one of her children came home from school suffering from the taunts of teachers or the other children. After all, this was the Soviet Union, and only the ignorant clung to their superstitious belief in God, so the leaders said.

Being a wise woman, Lena’s mother never let her children drown in self-pity. She and her husband would listen, sympathize, and pray with them. But in the end, they would point out that being teased was something that came from being part of a Christian family in the Soviet Union. When Lena said she didn’t want to go back to school again, her mother responded, “Do you think you can swim through life like a fish, diving down deep when the storms come? Think about Moses at the Red Sea. He didn’t know how God would save them, only that He would.”

Words spoken lovingly to a child decades ago convict me today. When trials come my way, I often feel as though somehow life isn’t being fair to me. Then I think of Lena and her family, and others who have overcome much more. Trials will come; we shouldn’t think of them as punishment or something unusual. God will be with us. Just as He did for Moses, He will make a way out.

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A Good End to a Bad Day

Tuesday, October 12th, 2010

Had to clean the house and didn’t feel like it. The cat nipped me. Went to the grocery store to get supplies for my niece’s birthday. Got home and started baking. Forgot the eggs. Back to the store. Home again. Resume baking. Missing another ingredient. Third trip to the store. Exasperated, I began to think of all the other things in my life that were frustrating, that I didn’t like, that I didn’t think were fair. I was convinced that life was completely going against me.

After I got myself fairly worked up, I realized this was not how God would have me live. And really, did I really want to live all stewed up over an annoying delay? It wasn’t like I had to hitch a horse to a wagon and drive 12 miles to the nearest town.

I also was showing a great lack of trust in God. He promises to be with us in our trials, big and small, horrific and petty.

An hour or so later, I was truly humbled. I got some news that a situation I was concerned about was resolved. God had done His work in that trial without me knowing it. All my worrying over that one was for nothing; He had it under control.

The same with my current trial. In spite of the delays caused by my own rushing through the store and not checking my list carefully, everything got done. I would have saved myself some emotional energy had I just trusted God in the beginning, and remained grateful to Him for the blessings He had given me.

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Joy is Fed by Gratitude

Thursday, October 7th, 2010

Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. ..Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; and give thanks to Him and praise His name.

Psalm 100:1, 4

“The first thing I’m going to do when I get to heaven is get on my knees before Jesus and thank Him for all the KGB agents and the communist officials who made my life so difficult through all those years. Without them, I never would have had such a close relationship with God.”

Alexei Brynza made this statement several times in his life. Instead of focusing on what he lost during the years of communism and how he suffered, he looked at what God had done for Him, and the joy he found in the intimate fellowship with Jesus.

Those who have spent time with people enduring horrible persecution for their faith comment that they seem to have a joy that we in the west don’t have. What gives them that joy when they endure threats and beatings, loss of home, livelihood, and family members, and even live in fear of torture or death?

Like Alexei, they have learned that joy is fed by gratitude. They thank God for every meal, every day or hour spent with their families, for the presence of God in all their trials, the healing and restoration God brings to them in this life, the forgiveness of sin Jesus bought for them, and the promises of glorious eternal life, which make all that we see in this life seem dull and worthless.

To cultivate this habit of giving thanks and praise helps us to fix our thoughts on Jesus, to remember our call to die to self, to live for Christ, and to be grateful for the blessings we do have. The next time I feel a lack of joy in my life, I pray that I will consider if there is also a lack of gratitude.

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What am I willing to Risk for the Gospel?

Monday, October 4th, 2010

“I am not afraid of going back to prison,” the Uzbek pastor told Voice of the Martyrs. Following his release from one of his numerous times in jail, he went right back to preaching. For two days he preached in his empty church, empty because the church members were afraid to come. He labored for some time to re-gather the members of his church, and now meets secretly in the desert with other men from the church for prayer and worship.

I hear stories like this pastor, of people with amazing perseverance, who doggedly press on to share the gospel and advance God’s kingdom. Like the people praised by the author of Hebrews, they joyfully accept loss of possessions, reputation, jobs, freedom, even their lives, looking forward to the treasure they have in heaven.

These are people who have dug the wells of their faith deep, praying their way through every day. Their priority is advancing God’s kingdom, not protecting their dreams for their own lives. Persecution and trials don’t stop them. They have risked all for the gospel. What I am willing to risk?

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Why don’t I feel like a new creation?

Friday, October 1st, 2010

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, He is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

2 Corinthians 5:17

“This isn’t working out,” Yakov told his father. “I’ve accepted Christ and I truly want to serve God. So why am I so angry? I thought everything would get easier.”

Yakov knew that as a Christian, he was a new creation. But why couldn’t he act like one? Even when he didn’t want to get angry at his co-workers for taunting him about his faith, his anger still boiled within.

I’ve felt the same way. I struggle with my own sin, whether a quick temper or slothful leanings, and wonder why all my good intentions seem to collapse like spider webs in a strong breeze. I’m frustrated that I’m not the person I want to be.

While we are new creations, life in our fallen world has damaged us. When we receive Christ, it’s like we’ve entered his repair shop where there is a 100% guarantee: the One doing the repairs will fix us to be the men and women we were created to be.

The repair process, however, isn’t a matter of a second. Slowly, gently, Jesus removes the stains and scars of the sin in our life. At times we might feel like our cars when we take them in for service. During the repair, the mechanics remove parts. The nuts and bolts might groan and protest at being unfastened; some may even break. But it is all necessary in order for the car to run the way the manufacturer intended.

So it is with the repairs Jesus does in our life. Sometimes it is a painful process; sometimes we feel an immediate deliverance. True, we are still broken people, but we are in the hands of our Maker, and can trust him.

We will be in the repair shop as long as we live in this life. While a car can be fixed in one day, God will work on us for a lifetime. As God works on us we are also out on the road, on the journey He’s given us. One day He will call us home, and then we will truly be new creations.

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