Dan Olinger

"If the Bible is true, then none of our fears are legitimate, none of our frustrations are permanent, and none of our opposition is significant."

Dan Olinger

 

Retired Bible Professor,

Bob Jones University

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On Danger, Fear, and God’s Care

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We all face challenges. Some people face genuine dangers from genuine enemies. And most of them face fear. 

God doesn’t experience any of these things. He faces nothing that could be described as a challenge to his omnipotence, and though he has powerful enemies, he is greater than them all, and their defeat is sure. And consequently, he is never afraid. 

So how does someone like that respond to someone like us? Does he understand challenge, and enemies, and fear? Does he care? 

King David, who had plenty of challenges and enemies and fears, had some thoughts on that in many of his writings. Today I choose to consider Psalm 6. 

David is facing a fearsome trial. He mentions physical issues (Ps 6.2), but I’m inclined to think his real concern is “enemies” (Ps 6.7). He clearly thinks his life is in danger (Ps. 6.5). 

And so he meditates and writes out his thoughts. 

The Psalm has three sections. He begins by presenting his appeal to God (Ps 6.1-5); then he lays out the anguish that his situation is causing (Ps 6.6-7); and then he finishes by describing the assurance he has in God’s care and deliverance (Ps 6.8-10). 

Appeal (Ps 6.1-5) 

David begins by admitting—implicitly—that God has reason to be angry with him (Ps 6.1). He doesn’t go into detail. Here we see someone who is in the same situation we are: we need deliverance by God’s hand, but we know we don’t come to him from a position of strength. We need grace; we need mercy (Ps 6.2). 

David’s situation is desperate; he expresses himself in broken phrases, in grunts (Ps 6.3). Interestingly, Jesus appears to use David’s words as he prays in the Garden of Gethsemane (Jn 12.27) before his arrest, trial, and crucifixion. 

David asks God to “turn” to him, as if he had turned away for some reason (Ps 6.4). The Hebrew word is shub, a word commonly used for turning from sin in repentance (e.g. Is 30.15; 44.22; 55.7). David asks God to change his mind. 

He cites two motivations for God to deliver him: God’s “mercies” (Ps 6.4), or hesed, and his glory (Ps 6.5)—that is, the thanksgiving he will receive for acting to deliver. 

Is that an appeal to some selfish motive in God? I don’t think so. First, God’s glory, unlike ours, is something actually deserved and appropriate; God is not like his limited creatures. And second, is there anything wrong with enjoying being thanked? Don’t we like to be thanked when we do something for someone we love? Is it selfish to revel in someone else’s joy? 

Anguish (Ps 6.6-7) 

David lays out the evidences of his anguish, which in turn is evidence of the seriousness of the danger he faces. 

  • He is exhausted by the constant pressure of the situation (Ps 6.6a). 
  • He weeps through the night (Ps 6.6b) 
  • His perspective is colored—poisoned—by the stress of the situation (Ps 6.7). 

Assurance (Ps 6.8-10)  

During his prayer, David receives assurance that the Lord has heard him and will answer (Ps 6.8-9). We don’t know exactly how this worked; it may be as simple as his believing God’s earlier promises to hear the prayers of his people (Ex 22.27), or knowing God’s character well enough to anticipate similar future promises (Is 65.24; Zec 13.9). 

For whatever reason, David knows. And so he begins to address his enemies directly, and he flips the situation against them. At the beginning of his prayer, he is the one who is deeply troubled (Ps 6.2); but now, his enemies find themselves in that situation (Ps 6.10). Earlier, he has asked God to turn, to change (Ps. 6.4); but now, he calls on his enemies to turn and change (Ps 6.10), with the same verb he used of God earlier. 

So what do we see here? 

  • God’s people call on him when they are afraid. 
  • He hears, even when they don’t “deserve” it. 
  • And he answers by reversing the situation, judging his enemies, and protecting his people. 

Timely advice whenever we’re afraid. 

Photo by Alexandra Gorn on Unsplash

On Labor Day

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Today is Labor Day. These days it’s pretty much lost its original meaning and serves for our culture as just a day off that signals the end of summer. And so we have the irony of calling a day off “Labor Day.” 

The kids must wonder about that. 

Originally, of course, it was a fruit of the labor-union movement in the United States, a celebration of and a recognition of the importance of the work done by “laborers,” or what we’ve come today to call “blue-collar workers.”  

Much has been written from a Christian perspective on the importance of work, and particularly of all work; work is a sacred calling, a “vocation,” directed by a wise and loving God. Any obedience to that God has value and meaning. Some people are paid more than others for their work, and some kinds of work are seen as more “respectable,” but theologically speaking, all honest work is a virtue and contributes to the overall good of society and the furtherance of God’s plan. 

I’d like to meditate on the topic from another angle, one of my favorite theological concepts. 

As I think back over my working life, I realize that is filled with good things, great blessings—but things that I didn’t recognize as good at the time. 

At first I wanted to be a pilot. But that costs money, so I thought I’d let the government pay for it. Set out for an Air Force ROTC scholarship; I thought I’d get it, because I had good SAT scores. But I flunked the flight physical—bad hearing from a childhood ear injury—and that was the end of that. I remember riding the Greyhound bus home from Otis Air Force Base, wondering at the age of 16 what on earth I was going to do with my life. (I still get wistful in airports.) 

Well, maybe I can be an aerospace engineer. Applied to UMass Boston and was rejected. Good grades, in-state resident, financial need. No dice. Why? 

Hmmm. Must have applied too late. Reapplied immediately for the next year and worked in a sandwich shop. 

Rejected again. UMass just plain didn’t want me. 

I had applied to BJU to get my Dad off my back, and wouldn’t you know it, they accepted me. Drat. 

Off to college, where within hours I was confronted by my spiritual need and challenged to get serious about life. Everything changed. 

Maybe I should be a pastor. Nope. It became clear that I was not gifted or inclined to what that work entailed. 

OK, maybe I should be a Bible teacher. My senior year I applied to be a Greek GA—had a Greek minor and high grades. Nope. 

After graduation I returned home to Boston and got a job to save for grad school. Midsummer BJU offered me a GA in English. I took it. 

So they paid for the terminal degree—that was handy—and I learned a lot about English grammar and writing style. 

Any chance I could join the Bible faculty? Nope. Those guys are as stable as they come, and since they don’t smoke or drink or drive over the speed limit, they tend to live a long time. 

But with the English skills, I could get a job as an editor at the Press. Maybe I can work there until a spot opens on the faculty. 

A decade later I realized that if no such spot ever opened, I’d be content to work there for the rest of my life. I liked my bosses, my coworkers, the customers, the creativity, the business of navigating the industry’s change from analog to digital. 

A decade after that, I got restless. I could be doing more with the PhD. Maybe I should get a teaching position somewhere else. 

And then one of my Seminary profs stopped me in the Dining Common and asked if I’d like to teach. 

That was 25 years ago, and I’ve been deliriously happy ever since. 

What about that boyhood dream of flying? 

I realized later that, first, I don’t have the kind of personality that keeps pilots alive for any appreciable length of time, and second, I’d have been entering the job market just as all those high-time pilots were coming back from Viet Nam. 

God led differently. 

And, to no surprise, his leading has been good, and fulfilling, and perfect for how he designed me. 

Just saw a headline in the Wall Street Journal: “America’s Teachers Are Burned Out.” 

Not this one. 

Happy Labor Day. 

Photo by Scott Blake on Unsplash

On Widows in the Church 

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In the Bible James notes that taking care of widows and orphans is at the very heart of true religion (Jam 1.27). Later Paul, in a letter to his protégé Timothy, gives details on how the church should see to that duty (1Ti 5.3-16). His words are perhaps unexpectedly lengthy and detailed; he wants this done right. 

Widows with family, he says, should be cared for by their family (1Ti 5.4, 16). That’s sensible. Further, the widow needs to be at least 60 (1Ti 5.9)—presumably because a younger woman would have a reasonable chance of getting married again (1Ti 5.11)—and have lived in a way that demonstrates the genuineness of her faith (1Ti 5.9-10), something that would obligate the church to see to her care. 

How does this work in our culture? I’d like to share a story from my experience. 

In a church where I was on the elder board, one of the elders got a burden for the widows, something he just couldn’t get out of his mind. We put him in charge of putting something together that would bring some discipline to our approach, particularly so that no one would fall through the cracks of our care. 

Soon we had a list of all the widows in the church. There were 35. I was surprised at how many there were. Then an elder and a deacon interviewed each one: how are you doing? What do you need? How can we help? 

We were all surprised at what we learned. 

We expected to find financial need; that was certainly a primary concern in Paul’s day. There may have been a concern or two in our congregation, but for the most part that was not a problem. They told us that their husbands had had life insurance, and they had enough to live on. Some, in fact, were in better shape financially than they had been when their husbands were alive. 

But that is not to say there were no needs. You know what they told us? 

“We need purpose. We need to be needed. We need something to do, a reason to get up in the morning. We need to belong.” 

Wow. 

Two thoughts struck me immediately. 

First, we were completely uninformed, misinformed, on the situation in our own church. It was nothing like we thought. 

And second, how could we have missed such a serious need? 

We took immediate action. We asked the widows to come up with ideas on how they could organize and serve. That would address both the need to belong and the need to be needed. 

And their first idea surprised us. They suggested that they clean the houses of new mothers. 

I’ll confess that I wasn’t too keen on that idea. Widows are often, um, older than the population median, and were they up to it? Physical labor? 

Well, it turns out that living that long helps give a person good sense, and they were wise enough not to take on tasks that would be too much for them. And their time with the new moms gave them opportunity to share mothering wisdom with the first-timers, and they delighted in the chance to hold the newborns and marvel over their little fingers and toes. 

It was a win all around. Listening to people, and trusting their good sense and creativity, is a good thing. 

I suspect that widows’ ministry will look a little different in every church, but we can be sure that we will give account to whether we have attended to that need. 

Do you know what happened next? 

That elder? The one with the burden? He died, and his wife became a widow. And she stepped right into a ministry that was ready to help her with grief support, and a need to be needed. Eventually she became the de facto leader of that widows’ ministry, until she remarried some years later. 

Isn’t providence good? 

Photo by Free Walking Tour Salzburg on Unsplash

A Theology of a Morning Walk, Part 2: The Theology 

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Part 1: The Walk 

The previous post described a walk on the beach. 

What was I thinking about during that time? 

Let me tell you. 

God’s Power and Faithfulness 

The first thing you notice while walking on the beach is of course the ocean. It’s active, with the waves crashing a (reasonably) steady drumbeat on the sand. And it extends over the horizon, all the way to someplace far away. As I noted, this thing goes all the way to Perth. It’s unimaginably immense. 

And God says to it, “Thus far you shall come, but no farther; and here shall your proud waves stop” (Job 38.11). 

I see the moon, thousands of miles away, shining with the albedo of the reflected sun, even farther away, and Jupiter, farther yet, also reflecting the sun’s light, and a host of stars, exponentially farther. In a dark sky, a few of those “stars” would actually be galaxies, comprising millions of stars themselves. 

In the understatement of all time, Moses writes, “He made the stars also” (Ge 1.16). 

And this massive system runs like a clock. Or rather, our clocks attempt to run like it. We mark our years, and months, and days because God has created a system that is faithful, down to the second. So I knew before I started out that high tide was at 8:55 and sunrise at 6:38. Sure enough. 

God’s faithfulness is also evident in his provision for his creatures: air, and water, and food, and warmth. Life is everywhere, from the microscopic on up, and it thrives because God is faithful. 

Beauty 

The wisest man who ever lived said that God “has made everything beautiful in his time” (Ec 3.11). You see that beauty everywhere—in the sunrise, in the cloud formations, in the iridescence of the seashells, in the astonishing variety of size and color in just the scallop shells, in the sea oats holding the dunes together, in the people walking and running and cycling. And that beauty resonates with us humans, because we are made in God’s image; I’m not the only one out at the jetty to watch the sunrise. 

Human Stewardship 

God has given us the responsibility—and the privilege—to take the raw elements of creation and develop them effectively and wisely. I see that everywhere on my walk, from the ships on the horizon to the waterfront houses to the rock jetty—it’s not a natural formation—to the little signs asking passersby to please be careful of the turtle nests, and to the dog owners who have trained their best-friend canines not to go potty on the beach. I see it in the parking lot in all those cars that have come all those miles with gas-powered explosions in their engines and not breaking down while it all happens. I see it in the websites I consulted about the tides and the sunrise and the weather. (And thanks to those meteorologists, I knew to get off the island 4 days before Hurricane Debby showed up and flooded the place.) 

Brokenness 

Speaking of young Debby, my walk reminded me that my pleasant and enjoyable experience wasn’t actually in the world that the powerful and faithful God had created—or rather, that this world, which he did indeed create, is not the same as it was when he rested on the seventh day. It’s broken. 

I see evidences of natural death all around me: those horseshoe crab carapaces, and the little tiny holes in pretty much every bivalve shell, where a predator has overcome the poor creature’s defense system and made a meal of him. I’m not a fan of Jack London or of Darwin, but when the former describes nature—what the latter suggested operates for “the survival of the fittest”—as “red in tooth and claw,” he’s right. 

And those Marine recruits over on Parris Island are engaging in wise preparation because humans are broken, and they do bad things, sometimes on a global scale. 

But outshining all the evil is the greatness and goodness of God. 

That was a great walk. 

Photo by Hari Perisetla on Unsplash

A Theology of a Morning Walk, Part 1: The Walk 

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While vacationing on Hilton Head Island recently, I got up early one morning to do one of my favorite things. Up at 5, I headed out to the beach to walk a couple of miles to a favorite location for watching the sunrise. 

Leaving my beach shoes at the end of the boardwalk, I turn left to head northeast along the beach. On my right, still invisible in the early morning darkness, lies the Atlantic Ocean, but I can hear it “flushing and flushing,” as one child once said. Out on the horizon I can see the lights of 5 different ships, and to my left, a few lights in resort hotels and multimillion-dollar houses fronting the ocean. (I wonder what they pay for flood insurance?) 

Most people standing on a beach in the eastern US assume that straight in front of them is Europe, or maybe North Africa. Actually, from here it’s the eastern tip of Brazil, and the next landfall, believe it or not, is in Western Australia. 

I know the tide is still coming in—high tide is 5:55 am—so I keep to my left to give the water room to crawl up the beach, but down the beach enough to have packed sand, which I find easier to walk on. 

Above and slightly ahead of me, just on my right, I can see the moon, in waning crescent phase, with Capella at its ten o’clock and Jupiter at its two. There’s a long ridge of clouds to the northeast, at first reaching high enough to blur the moon, but within a few minutes the height of the ridge begins to recede. 

In those dark hours you’re typically alone on the beach, and the waves provide the only sound. But when I’m a mile or so down the beach, there’s a slight lightening of the sky in the southeast, and I begin to hear the calls of the sea birds, up and looking for breakfast. They soar, seemingly effortlessly, occasionally rising a few feet and then turning to dive straight down into the chop, aiming for a fish. Sometimes they get it; sometimes they don’t. 

I begin to see the rock jetty, dimly at first, but as I get closer, and the light increases, it comes plainly into view. And out come the other beach walkers, some for the exercise, others combing for seashells, yet others riding bicycles with fat, relatively low-pressure tires to maneuver well on the sand. 

When I arrive at the jetty, the cloud ridge is still obscuring the horizon, so I won’t be able to see the sun break the horizon and then rise to full glory. But I know exactly when it happens—6:38 am—because observers of the sky tell us these things. 

Sometimes I see Christians reading their Bibles out on the jetty, and others—perhaps New Agers, perhaps not—facing the rising sun with various poses, welcoming the new day. There’s none of that this morning; just walkers—some with coffee cup in hand—and bicyclists. 

I move beyond the jetty, following the shoreline to the left as it begins to turn the north end of the island. There are often horseshoe crabs here, and while I don’t see any live ones, I do come across four carapaces, one of them disarticulated. I also come across a good-sized sand crab, also disarticulated; I assume he made a tasty meal for some predator. 

Then further around the north end, to where I can see the low-lying Parris Island, where I assume the latest class of Marine recruits is having a far more strenuous morning than I am. I appreciate their willingness to do hard things for honorable purposes. And I find that I feel no irony in being thankful that their rigors are not those of this old, growingly creaky guy. God bless them. 

With that, it’s time to turn around. I like to time the turning point at sunrise, so I’m not squinting into the sun on the way back. 

After 7 am, the beach is getting busy. I see the beach patrol cart moving along the high beach as the staff check on the turtle nests; at one point they stop and deliver an impromptu teaching session to interested passersby. Several folks are fishing—I watch one young man pull in a 9-inch something-or-other as I’m walking by—and others are setting up tents and coolers and wagons full of folding chairs and beach toys in preparation for a full day on the beach, as the lifeguards are setting up chairs and umbrellas for the paying guests. Others are bringing their canine friends out for an early morning run, some tossing balls into the water for them to fetch. Dogs and beaches have a special relationship. 

Back at the boardwalk at 8; time to rinse off the sand and walk across the parking lot to the condo, passing cars from pretty much every state in the Southeast, as well as Ohio, Pennsylvania, Iowa, Texas, Kansas, and even Montana. And Ontario. 

Now, what about the theology? 

Next time. 

Photo by Hari Perisetla on Unsplash

On Discipline, Part 5: Mentors 

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Part 1: Perspective | Part 2: Action | Part 3: Dependence | Part 4: Thought 

One more item in Paul’s list of areas we should give attention to and discipline: 

Those things, which ye have both learned, and received, and heard, and seen in me, do: and the God of peace shall be with you (Php 4.9). 

He encourages the believers in Philippi—a church that he planted—to imitate his example, to follow his practices. These days we call such a person a mentor, and those who imitate him proteges. 

Some people might find this surprising. Isn’t this arrogant of Paul—especially since Christ is the only perfect example? 

Good point. And as it happens, Paul says that himself elsewhere: 

Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ (1Co 11.1). 

He’s clearly not placing his value as an example above that of Christ. 

I’ll note that Paul’s exhortation here indicates that he has been careful to set the kind of example that the Philippians should follow. He’s been helped in that, certainly by the fact that he’s an apostle, guided by the Spirit into all truth (Jn 16.13).  

Slight sidetrack: Many interpreters would apply Jn 16.13 to all believers. I don’t, because I know that I’m not guided into all truth, and as I tell my students, I have written documentation in a file cabinet in my office that they are not guided into all truth either. I think this is a promise to the apostles that they would be inerrant in their reporting of Jesus’ life and teachings—their proclamation of the gospel. This of course would come to us through the New Testament. But since only three men in the room in John 16 wrote any New Testament, I’m also inclined to believe that the rest of the apostles, though not sinless (Ga 2.11), were inerrant in their preaching—which makes Luke’s description of the Bereans all the more remarkable (Ac 17.11; but cf 1Th 2.13). 

But to return. 

Paul here encourages the Philippians to imitate his example. 

Might this exhortation have broader significance? Should we, two millennia after Paul’s death, imitate him too? It occurs to me that we’ll have a harder time doing so, since we can’t see Paul’s example in his day-to-day life, as the Philippians did. But there are certainly a good many things we can know about him, and those things we can imitate. 

But to go a step further. Can we take Paul’s words as a general endorsement of the concept of mentorship? There are a good many Christian books on discipleship that do just that, and I don’t see a reason to disagree with them. Paul’s teaching on spiritual gifts seems to imply strongly that all believers should sit under gifted teachers and should live exemplary lives before their church assemblies. 

So, I would suggest, we can all benefit from following the examples of exemplary believers. (The apparent redundancy there is intentional and is not actually redundant.) And Paul’s words here in verse 9 indicate that we should be careful whom we choose. 

I suppose it could go without saying that we should choose as models those who follow Christ well, consistently, carefully, graciously. We should choose them not because they’re popular, or good-looking, or socially adept. We should recognize something of the character of Christ in them and then seek to integrate that character trait into our own thinking and lifestyle. We should ask them questions, and we should listen to the answers. 

I suppose it’s worthwhile to insert a caution here. 

You and I are not called to be anybody else. God has made us all different, and he has gifted us to serve in ways that are the sum of our DNA, our upbringing, our experiences, our sanctification, and yes, our gifting. I’ve known Christians who want desperately to be just like somebody they admire, and those efforts always end in disappointment. We’re called to be ourselves, remade in the image of Christ. 

But we ought to follow examples, carefully chosen, in our lifelong journey to be like Christ. 

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On Discipline, Part 4: Thought 

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Part 1: Perspective | Part 2: Action | Part 3: Dependence 

The next area of discipline in Paul’s list is likely the toughest one for many people. 

 Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things (Php 4.8). 

Here Paul calls for mental discipline: controlling what you think about. 

This is tough. 

We’re not used to that in our culture, and in recent years it’s only getting more difficult. We naturally tend to think about whatever pops into our head. Most often those things pop in from our daily circumstances—conversations, assigned tasks, and so on. Many of those things we don’t control; they just show up, and we think about them. 

But with the rise of social media, we’re being conditioned against mental discipline. Social media posts scroll by, and we think about them for 5 or 10 seconds, and we move on. We’re passive consumers of mental stimulation; it’s all up to the algorithms, and our thoughtful choices have nothing to do with what’s being poured into our brain bucket. There’s no discipline or self-control whatsoever; it’s just random dopamine hits. 

Yikes. 

But it gets worse. Neurological research indicates that the more we engage in this kind of media surfing, the less thinking we’re able to do; our brain rewires itself for “fast-twitch” thinking rather than long-form consideration of more complex ideas. If a paragraph consists of more than 9 or 10 lines, we’re not going to consume it thoughtfully; eventually we’ll just skip it altogether. (How many of the issues that we deal with in modern society can we think through in 5 or 10 seconds? We’re being conditioned against wisdom.) 

For more information on this concept, I highly recommend Nicholas Carr’s The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains. He brings serious research to the question. 

In this pervasively “fast-twitch” environment, we’re going to find it harder than ever to follow Paul’s admonition. In a culture where many people have no mental discipline, directing your thought anywhere in particular, let alone to specific areas, is going to seem strange and foreign. 

I’d suggest some practical things: 

  • Read, regularly and repeatedly. Of course, believers should read their Bibles as their primary source of spiritual nutrition. But any long-form reading will strengthen your mental discipline. (And no, the closed captions on movies are not long-form reading.) 
  • Memorize Scripture. Memorization requires repeated review (I have a system, and I hope you do too), which will enable you to bring to mind biblical content whenever you have some mental free time—while driving, walking, standing in line, and so on. 
  • Approach casual conversations thoughtfully. Sure, small talk has its place; but if your conversations at church are all about football or politics, they could use some discipline. Direct conversations to substantial things. “How can I pray for you?” is one way to start. 
  • Use “down time” thoughtfully. While you’re waiting to fall asleep at night, direct your thoughts. 

Paul includes here a list of things to think about. I’m not sure detailed word studies on each term are what he’s after; the list could be more of a random collection of examples than a to-do list. I doubt that once you’ve thought about his list of 8 things, he’d say you’re done. Think about anything excellent; think about anything praiseworthy. Think on purpose. 

Again, this is hard. We like to let our thoughts go wherever they take us. But they do take us places, and while “the power of positive thinking” isn’t a magical formula for personal success—“if you can believe it, you can achieve it!”—the way we think does make a difference in the progress and outcome of our living. It certainly makes a difference in our spiritual success, our sanctification. 

Think on these things. 

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On Discipline, Part 3: Dependence 

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Part 1: Perspective | Part 2: Action

Paul now turns to a third area where we need discipline:

6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus (Php 4.6-7).

People come in all varieties. Some are pretty self-confident; they think they can deal with whatever comes down the pike. Don’t need any help, thanks. I got this.

But if the truth be known, even those people worry. They think about how they’re going to deal with this issue or that, and even though they don’t want to ask anybody else for help, they still spend time on the mental merry-go-round, trying to figure out the next step.

And for others, it’s even more difficult. Worry becomes anxiety, and fear dominates their thinking.

This is the human condition.

And if we humans are merely the peak of evolutionary development, with no one higher to look to, then we’re doomed to a lifetime of anxiety.

But we’re not, and we’re not.

There is a higher throne. And Paul points us there.

Don’t worry about anything, he says.

What? Don’t worry about where the rent’s coming from? About progressive degenerative disease? About broken relationships? About societal ills? About nuclear holocaust?

That’s just crazy.

No, my friend. It’s crazy only if we’re all there is.

But there is a God, and he is infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. And further, he loves us, and he invites us to bring our anxieties to him and leave them there.

He can provide the rent money, and grace to face the physical ravages of time, and relational healing, and societal peace. And he can prevent nuclear holocaust, in his good will.

Bring your requests.

I note that Paul returns to his earlier theme of thanksgiving, or rejoicing. How can we be thankful even as we recount our troubles at the throne?

Because God hears, and he responds, and always in a way that is good and wise, wiser even than the “solutions” we can suggest to him. Beyond all that we can ask or think.

Paul follows his imperative with a promise. If we’ll do what he says, then God will bring peace to our troubled hearts—peace, he says, that surpasses all understanding.

I used to think that that meant that it’s so wonderful that we can’t understand it. But I don’t think that’s it. It surpasses understanding; when our understanding has taken us as far as it can, and it runs out of gas, the peace of God takes over and keeps us going, as far as we need to go. We find that we don’t need to know it all, to understand everything that God is doing. We know him, we trust him, and we just keep going.

Paul adds one last thought. This peace he says, is not passive; it’s active. And the verb he chooses is instructive: it guards our hearts and minds. You know, that place where the anxiety comes from? The wellspring of all our fears? The peace of God stands as a sentinel at the door, muscular and armed, and it denies entry to the dangerous stuff.

So we have a choice.

We can give in to the anxiety, trying to work things out for ourselves, despite the fact that there are all kinds of things that we don’t know and can’t do.

Or we can trust the sentinel standing outside the door of our hearts, as we work diligently and wisely during the day and sleep well at night.

That shouldn’t be a difficult decision.

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On Discipline, Part 2: Action 

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Part 1: Perspective 

Here in Philippians 4, we’re surveying a list of areas that we ought to discipline as we live out our faith in Christ. In the previous post, we noted that we should discipline our perspective to be joyful, rejoicing in whatever comes our way (Php 4.4). We turn now to the second Item in Paul’s list. 

 Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand (Php 4.5). 

You may know that the KJV renders the key word “moderation.” There’s great breadth in the various reliable versions: “gentle spirit” (NASB), “graciousness” (CSB), “gentleness” (NIV). The standard Greek lexicon (BDAG) suggests “yielding, gentle, kind, courteous, tolerant.” I think we get the idea. There seems to be general idea of others-centeredness, of unselfishness, of lesser concern with one’s own rights than for the rights or needs—or even desires—of others. 

Paul says this characteristic of ours should “be known to everyone.” How does that happen? Well, practically speaking, it can happen only when this is our default—whatever we do, in whatever circumstances, with whatever kinds of people, we’re gentle, kind, courteous, tolerant. This is just the way we always act. 

That’s a tough order. It’s easy for most of us to be kind and cordial with people we like, or those who are first kind to us. But the situation is very different when someone is rude, or hostile, or childish, or self-centered. It is not my inclination, or yours, to be kind or courteous in those situations. 

How often do we see that kind of spirit in operation in our culture? How often, rather, do we see some people mocking those they disagree with—“libtards” or “snowflakes” or “RINOs” or “MAGAs”? How often do we ourselves engage in that kind of mocking and ridicule? 

Oh, but in my case it’s justified, you see, because that idiot deserved it, because he was rude to me first, or he’s a tool of the deep state, or he’s a threat to democracy. Or he’s just stupid.

Oh, no, my friend. Let your gentle default mode of action be known to everyone. There are no riders or qualifiers there. 

Let me suggest that our current polarized culture presents us with a rare opportunity to have our calm, gentle, kindness stand out from the angry, pugilistic, chaotic background of polarization and rage. When everyone is running to and fro, the one who’s sitting calmly amidst the chaos reading a book stands out; he’s impossible to miss. And in our culture the simplest act of kindness, the slightest evidence of care and attention, screams louder than all the surrounding noise. 

What a way to make a difference. What a way to be an ambassador. 

Paul’s seals the importance of this discipline with a terse observation: “The Lord is near.” 

To what is he referring here? 

The word near here is a common word, one that can refer to either time or space. 

  • Is he saying that the Lord is spatially near, as in omnipresent? “O be careful little mouth what you say”? 
  • Or that he is temporally near: coming back soon? “O, can we say we are ready, brother”? 

In his epistles Paul uses the word in both senses (Ep 2.13; Ro 13.11). In Jesus’ teaching he tends to use the word temporally, mostly because he’s frequently teaching about the nearness of his Coming. But when he says, “The Kingdom of God is at hand,” is it possible that he means to imply both? 

I don’t see a reason to restrict the word here to either sense; either or both can serve as motivation for us to do better at this.  

  • The Lord is indeed near us, both as a deterrent to sin and as a source of power for victory. In ourselves we cannot live this way consistently, but our God is near to us. 
  • The Lord is indeed coming soon, to deliver us from all the frustrations that so vex us now. That means that as vexing as these confrontations are, they are temporary; and knowing that can relieve us of much of the pressure to collapse. 

Live out grace, kindness, courtesy. By default. To everybody—especially to the really challenging everybodies. 

Photo by Dave Lowe on Unsplash

On Discipline, Part 1: Perspective 

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No, I’m not referring to child-rearing, but to how we discipline ourselves. It’s a truism that if you aim at nothing, you’ll certainly hit it. Pretty much everybody understands that you have to set goals, and then persist in pursuing them, in order to accomplish anything worthwhile. 

There’s a whole industry of advisors, people who are happy to coach you on making the best of life—whether on the secular side or on the spiritual. Reading these works discerningly and thoughtfully can be highly profitable. 

More reliably, though, the Scripture addresses this topic extensively. A series of blog posts is not the place for a comprehensive survey of the biblical theology of personal discipline, but it’s reasonable to focus on a single passage that concentrates on the idea. 

I find such a passage in Philippians 4. It’s a concise presentation, and a familiar one; many Christians have memorized the passage, or at least parts of it. In verses 4-9, I find a list of five aspects of our lifestyle—what the King James translators called “conversation”—that we ought to discipline in certain ways. Lord willing, I’ll devote a post to each of the five. 

The section opens with Paul’s goal for his (and our) perspective: 

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice (Php 4.4). 

Our view of things, he says, should be consistently joyful. 

Several things to note about that. 

First, this is Paul writing. He has not had an easy life; as he has already noted in this short epistle, he has sacrificed early professional success to follow Jesus (Php 3.4-11), and a few years earlier he has listed for the church in Corinth a litany of hardship (2Co 11.23-29). Even as he writes these words, he is under house arrest in Rome, waiting for a hearing before Caesar that threatens capital punishment. He is not speaking platitudes. 

Second, he is writing to Philippi, a church founded out of a night in prison, an earthquake, and government opposition (Ac 16.13-40). He is about to say that this church has already given sacrificially to support his ministry from a distance (Php 4.16). There is nothing flippant or casual about what he is asking them to do. 

Rejoice, he says. No, I really mean it, he repeats. 

And furthermore, rejoice all the time. 

Rejoice in the good times; rejoice in the bad. Rejoice in success; rejoice in failure. 

Rejoice in house arrest. Rejoice in the inner prison. 

Interestingly, Paul lives that out. He has already written here that his arrest has yielded good things (Php 1.12-14), and he will go on to say that there are now saints in Caesar’s household (Php 4.22)—though we don’t know whether they became saints as a direct result of his appeal to Caesar. 

Now for the fifty-dollar question—how does he do it? How does Paul rejoice in the midst of suffering and injustice greater than you (probably) or I have ever experienced? And by extension, how are we to “rejoice … always”? 

The ellipsis provides the answer: “rejoice in the Lord always.” 

There’s a lot packed into that tiny prepositional phrase. 

What does it mean to “rejoice in the Lord”? 

At its purest, it means simply to rejoice in God himself—who he is, and what he does. Meditation on him brings great delight. 

But God knows that we are dust, and he understands that we are consistently motivated by self-interest. He graciously works benefits to us, in which we can then rejoice. The blessings of salvation are profitable topics for meditation, as are answers to prayer. (Sidebar: if you don’t pray much, or at all, you’re depriving yourself of the joy that comes from seeing prayers answered.) The confidence that comes from following his will, even through valleys (Ps 23.4), is reason to rejoice. It’s a great gift to know that, really, everything’s going to be OK, and the hard times will eventuate in great good. 

So our first step of discipline, according to this passage, is in our perspective: we discipline ourselves to see all things as causes for rejoicing. 

This is life-changing. 

More next time. 

Photo by Dave Lowe on Unsplash