Purity?

 "Sanctify them in your truth; your Word is truth". John 17:17.

So, here we are, stepping into another Spring, filled with life renewed and, no doubt, many hopes of seeing some remnant of what was normal life perhaps resumed as the over-bearing of authority may begin to ease. As Easter approaches, many Christians go through lent aiming to draw closer to the Lord who offered Himself up to become our propitiation and justifier before God's righteous requirements, perhaps giving up something in this activity (though, this year, it well may be case of promising, at least, to take some things back at the earliest opportunity!). This can help focus the attention on the key historical events that bring us to God (1 Corinthians 15:1-11), but we must be careful that they draw us towards God's reconciling work in Christ and not to some supposedly pietistic ability in ourselves.

Holiness and especially Sanctification is one of those subjects we can easily 'do wrong', and when we do, the ramifications can be atrocious and devastating. It's with that concern that I'm delighted to share Chad Bird's latest reflection on this very subject. There is much wisdom here, not only concerning sanctification itself, but the very manner of our seeking to be pastoral to God's flock - something, alas, that has become quite neglected during this present crisis.

Enjoy, and rejoice in the astonishing work of His great mercy and grace.

Elsewhere...

 "Your old men will dream dreams". Joel 2:28.

I want to share a passage from a book I'm currently reading at the moment. Many of us have been without church in the way we knew it for a long time now, and I think this excerpt certainly touches on something that we need to ponder as that manner of 'distance' still continues in various ways.

"We host worship on Sundays - but not every week. We take off some weeks because we need time off or because we want to join someone else for their gathering...

One Sunday, I asked all the staff members to choose a church in the city to visit. We all made a list of churches with good reputations and we each took one. My hope was that we would learn something from the experience... that each would bring back something to strengthen or even correct our own work.

The church I chose was pretty big... As I joined the throng of people making their way in, I felt a glowing excitement... I had this unmistakable feeling of expectation... that walk triggered memories of when I was a kid. I had the feeling that something important was going to happen.

The sense was beautiful as it was fleeting.

The place was sprawling. Not one person talked to me. I sat too far from the front to feel any connection to anyone 'on stage'. What I witnessed felt contrived and lifeless. People were sure trying to make it something - the incongruence between the indomitable smiles of the worship teaming the lifeless worshippers was hard to reconcile. I am sure they were genuine people but... not one bit of it seemed real to me.

We were then subject to a sermon before the sermon - on offerings - but I still had hopes for the sermon, which was fine. Solid. 

Still, in the end, my experience fell far short of my yearning.

(Brian Sanders - Underground Church).

This week over on his 1517 "talks" video, Dr Rod Rosenbladt spoke of how he recalls a particular parishioner who would arrive at the exact same moment for Sunday morning service - just before confession, absolution, and the Lord's Supper, and would leave straight after. Rod went on to note that he genuinely understood where the man was coming from - he needed Christ, His sins forgiven, and that was why he needed to attend - and that was that.

Brian goes on to note that his own experience before starting a church focused on fully participant ministry was one of managing disappointment.

After the last twelve months, I must confess that I too understand both the need and the attitude of the one who 'stands at the edge' to meet with God, because as Brian (founder of a network of mission churches where all members are encouraged to be using their gifts in full time service) notes above, the goal and experience of 'church' can so easily become detached from its true purpose, especially, as in our case, when that manner of detachment has become so total.

The real problem at the moment in what's happened is that due to our conformity, there just isn't room for a "Jesus in the wheat field" in our activities.

You recall the incident?

It was a sabbath, and Jesus and His disciples were enjoying a 'holy' walk across a wheat field, when, in a leisurely fashion, some of them began to pull ears of corn and enjoy eating them. The 'teachers of the law' (who were so infuriated with this "teacher" that they had taken to following Him pretty much everywhere), pounced on the action - "there! these men are breaking sabbath law, 'working' on the day - see, He and His have no respect for God's truth'.

Jesus quickly and easily puts them in their place, recalling an incident from the life of David, but do you see what happened there? ANY transgression of what was deemed pious and thereby required was to be repudiated and admonished without clemency. The law is relentless.

Where would such a Jesus be in our churches right now? Would He equally be condemned if He in effect showed us the limits, the trouble, with restrictions and rules that keep us far more than arms length from one another, that close the mouths of little ones from singing, and make us a people marked by fear and not love?

It's interesting to note that it was as Deitrich Bonehoffer pondered the clashes that Jesus had with the teachers of law on the Sabbath that he found the ethical framework required to allow him to actively resist the Nazis and later to engage in the work to eliminate Hitler.

There are times when the church finds itself drawn by God into a wilderness so it can be tested, purified and allured into a deeper experience of union.

Genuine worship. Genuine Confession and Absolution. Genuine Proclamation of the magnificence of God's reconciling work in Christ. Genuine Participation by feeding on Christ's flesh and blood in the Supper. These are what should define us, always, as God's purchased and cherished people. Nothing more, nothing less.

Strange Flesh

 "Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked".    Genesis 3:7.

There's nothing like it... 

Declaration of something that is really worth knowing.

So, following that train of thought....

A few days ago, I was having one of those conversations I really enjoy - exchanging recollections with a work colleague about the movies we really like, when I mentioned a favourite film that the other person hadn't seen. That took the conversation into a higher gear, because there's nothing like telling someone just enough of a good story to get them wanting to know more - that point where they just have to see it, hear it or read it for themselves... all because of your enthusiasm for the material.

Truly knowing something is not only good, it's essential, on the road to recovery or refreshment. The problem becomes when we'd rather fabricate a lie to bury the truth.

Adam and Eve buried the disclosure that came to them. Their estate became shameful, as Whitfield most certainly correctly noted, not because they were externally unclothed (they had already known that), but 'because they had become naked of soul' - what was within them had become as sour as rotting flesh, and they witnessed this in the suddenly painful disconnect of the radiance of paradise.

 They had to get away.

The answer wasn't in fig leaves, or even in the temporary garb God would give them to exit the garden. The answer came in a story - that from amidst the very mire and shame they now inhabited, a vanquisher would arise who would liberate their children from their misery.

Mankind, of course, soon denied it. They sought to allow a far grubbier, heinous rendition of the tale to magnify their slavery (Genesis 6), and when that was stemmed, they tried yet again by buying in to the notion that they could enslave heaven to their chaos (Genesis 11). That's what happens when lies seek to drown what's beyond ourselves, but the true story proved far greater, deeper, richer, than we could imagine, and slowly but surely, it began to play out its exquisite reality amongst us (Hebrews 11).

When you share something rare and enthralling with someone else - a stark truth or a deep revelation - it conveys something that can truly change what we are and the direction of our lives. The truth God shares in that moment of our deepest despair (Genesis 3:15) has set the course of existence for eternity. If we 'hear' that story - if we allow its circumference and panacea authority in shaping what we are by becoming our hope, then we enter into a tale in which dragons are truly slain, maidens are truly won, and kingdoms are forever forged.

There's nothing like it.

Obscurity?

 "With our mask-wearing proclivity ever-present, removing those masks seems counterintuitive to both common sense and religious sensibilities. We have a deep-seated aversion to naked honesty, inside and outside the walls of religious institutions. As author Rachel Held Evans observes, "We think church is for taking spiritual instagrams and putting on our best performances". Common sense tells us to fake strength lest others spy our weakness, to boast of our best, and not admit the worst. Religious sensibilities so easily echo this. Don't admit you doubt... Admit, in generic terms you are a sinner (that's permissible), but never get specific (that makes you weak). "The pious fellowship doesn't permit actual sins" Bonhoeffer wrote, "so we must conceal our sinful selves from that. We dare not be actual sinners. So we will remain alone in our sin and our hypocrisy".

Chad Bird - Night Driving- Notes from a Prodigal soul.

"So here we are... out on the raggedy edge".

Mal Reynolds - Serenity.

"IF we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness".  1 John 1:9.

I really enjoy the films of Denis Villeneuve. In Arrival, he sought to examine what happens when our frailty has to confront the entirely extraordinary - will we recoil back into our ruinous and selfish behaviours, or will we seek to be honest and expose ourselves to something that will truly transform us?

In Blade Runner 2049, he asks us to explore what makes humanity worth something, showing, again, that it's not the external definitions or actions which really matter there, but what defines us at our core, in spite of our various failings, which counts.

Villeneuve uses the cinematic screen as Michelangelo used a certain chapel's ceiling - as a canvas to tell a rich and elaborate tale about what we are and the truth that we know we could be something more.

2021, however, presents him with a very serious problem.  After spending several years seeking to create a new big screen rendition of the first part of Frank Herbert's epic Science Fiction novel, Dune, he finds himself, like all of the world's movie industry, facing a wall that may well prove insurmountable for quite some time. With the global closure of the cinema industry last year, the studios are rushing to make deals with social media platforms to allow their latest productions a means of distribution to the public, and, just as important, provide a source of income to keep them in business, at least for the present, but this is far from an ideal solution. For one thing, if contracts are signed between studios and net suppliers, it will mean that Cinemas simply will not re-open, and that leads to another even more telling and far more damaging consequence.

Years ago, I recall seeing the brilliant Shakespeare in Love, which, among other notable qualities, captured some of the sense of energy and delight there must have been in the 16th century in seeing some of those astonishing plays for the very first time in a Medieval theatre. Having been to the theatre and seen Shakespeare performed, the sense of connection to something that overwhelming (the movie constructs this around the writing of Romeo and Juliet) is palpable, but ask yourself what it would be like to live in a world where plays were not performed, only known about from what was written in transcripts and perhaps on line studies of their contents... what would that be like?

Christianity isn't a disconnected, dis-embodied, "manner" of thinking or speaking or behaving. Like a creative work of art, it's aim is to always join us, heart and soul, to life deeper and higher than our own by requiring us to be genuine in relation to such, so how can we fulfil such a calling if the very means provided to us to bring about such connection are muted, dis-jointed or entirely absent?

In the days of the Reformation, this problem quickly became pretty clear.

"The church had exchanged God-given grace for a human religiosity, a jury-rigged, lashed-up system to seek to appease the divine. This exchange of truth for a lie - the oh so tempting idea that sin is 'contained' and thereby controlled, something we can manage through our own rendition of ritualised practices, a fire we can contain, is a perennial problem.

Grace contradicts every system... especially 'rational' religion which seeks to maintain that 'god helps those who help (organise) themselves'. Luther states in his Heidelberg disputation that the person who believes in this manner of 'doing' only 'adds sin to sin'. Grace is only received when we despair of our natural facilities". (Biblical Authority after Babel - Kevin Vanhoozer).

The scope of cinema creates something that simply cannot be translated into a tablet or even a widescreen TV. In like manner, the way we so often chose to operate as church can dissolve or minimise the very key aspects that our faith and our fellowship need to convey, unpack and resolve - otherwise, we are simply going through the motions, performing a validation of what's 'natural' - contrivance.

Beyond the 'controlled' image we so easily project is the real side of life... of us.

Jesus meets us right there, as I was so brilliantly reminded this week in this superb posting.

Church really cannot be church without such realisations front and centre.

Ashes, Dust and Aid...

On the day of Martin Luther's Death.

Psalm 12.

Save, O Lord, for the godly are gone;

for the faithful have vanished from among the children of men.

Everyone utters lies to their neighbours, with flattering lips and a double heart they speak.

May the Lord silence them, those who say 'that with such tongues, we will prevail'.

Because the poor are plundered, and the needy groan.

“I will now arise”, says the Lord.

“I will place my own in safety for which they long”.

The words of the Lord are true and pure.

Like silver refined in fire.

You, O Lord, will keep us.

You will guard us from this generation forever.

On every side the wicked prowl as wickedness, vileness is exalted among the children of men.

These are the days amidst the caves Adullam, when God's company are pursued by the Lord's anointed. This is the moment to pray for the ones who are in compromise in respect to their service to God, that they and we may truly repent and lament for the ones around us (1 Samuel 22).

“We are all beggars” - Luther's final words.

Flayed

"That night the Lord said to him, “Take your father's bull, and the second bull seven years old, and pull down the altar of Baal that your father has, and cut down the Asherah that is beside it and build an altar to the Lord your God on the top of the stronghold here, with stones laid in due order. Then take the second bull and offer it as a burnt offering with the wood of the Asherah that you shall cut down.” So Gideon took ten men of his servants and did as the Lord had told him. But because he was too afraid of his family and the men of the town to do it by day, he did it by night".  Judges 6:25-27.

If I could transport a 4th century pagan Viking Warrior to a vantage point to view the vista of the modern day Copenhagen or Stockholm, in 2019, what do you think he'd make of it? Do you think the sheer sight of such a 'Christianised' world would be enough to make him set down his axe and, when he returned home, join himself to a church and raise a farm?

Alternatively, what if you were to come fresh from the Sinai peninsula at the time of the Exodus (after you'd witnessed Moses obtain a second set of stone tables) into a modern place of worship, and there, sitting at the centre of the region in where the congregation gathered, you found yourself staring at a larger than life golden image. Upon enquiring as to the reason for this, you're informed by someone in charge that 'it's what the current situation requires... we therefore decided to throw something together in this crisis, and, well, this is it'.

Ah...  Reform, of a sort - change because of what is required or demanded by the perceived needs of certain facts or circumstances.

Reform isn't like revival, which, at least in modern times, equates to bringing people into a place of refreshment or unexpected blessing. Reform presses us to the wheel and, once there, for good or for ill, moves us inexorably to a new condition in respect to life in general and faith in particular.

Josiah knew the crushing weight of such when the book of the law was unearthed amidst the ruins of a neglected house of God. His flesh shook and his clothes were wrenched and torn as he allowed the weight of those words to fall upon him and the people (2 Chronicles 34:19).

Reform means there is no going back - the direction of travel is set, the way forward is pegged-out, and all those involved are expected to apply themselves to what's required.

So the question to ask ourselves, almost a year on from the 'great reform' of the UK to its new regime of control (why do I hear echos of the work of the Council of Trent in the 1500s in this regard), is where are we now? What have these amendments wrought among us?

In the prior days in England of John the son of Henry, as an attempt at reform commenced, certain key aspects of what defined the fibre of the country were included in respects to ensuring their continuation. One such statement was this: "That the Church of England shall be free, and shall have all her whole Rights and Liberties inviolable". (Magna Carta - 1215). As one minister noted a few months ago, most of the other clauses were dissolved ages ago, but, this one - an essential part of canon law - survived... until 2020.

The freedom to worship in a manner born from this which continued here for centuries, through all manner of conflicts and troubles, has now gone.

Empty buildings, sterile and devoid of the unique gifts and callings that were evident just 12 months ago, are now filled with alternatives, and no matter how much energy and zest is wired into what happens in the small number still open, the truth remains that the faith found there has been hollowed and jarred away from its calling and obedience to its proper requirements.

Which brings us to the opening passage above. The solution to the issue at hand was another, very different kind of change, radical and uncompromising - one that would lead back, as the Lord would put it, to the "Old paths, wherein lies the good way, where you will find rest for your souls" (Jeremiah 6:16).

We may very well find ourselves torn like Gideon right now. 

We want to see another kind fo reform, replacing what has been set up in the centre of things, subtlety replacing the vitality of our life, but the innumerable voices and pressures on all sides often thwart courage... until its 'dark' (safe) enough to say or do something, but there's much encouragement in that story. He was timid, but he did act - the window of opportunity came - and because of that action and the wisdom of a family member in supporting him, the Reform came, so perhaps we can follow suit.

Let's be clear. The need right now isn't revival - such blessings come and go like fragrances on the wind. Reform builds the markers and then takes the route required making us earnest and hopefully faithful enough to see the work through.

A smoking flax...

Let's earnestly pray and steadfastly seek that we see genuine, viable, enduring reformation amongst us in this dreadful day, that the 'candle' lit by Latimer, Ridley and Bilney may brighten once again.

Thirty Three (and a third).

The ironsmith takes a cutting tool and works it over the coals. He fashions it with hammers and works it with his strong arm. He becomes hungry, and his strength fails; he drinks no water and is faint. The carpenter stretches a line; he marks it out with a pencil. He shapes it with planes and marks it with a compass. He shapes it into the figure of a man, with the beauty of a man, to dwell in a house.He cuts down cedars, or he chooses a cypress tree or an oak and lets it grow strong among the trees of the forest. He plants a cedar and the rain nourishes it.Then it becomes fuel for a man. He takes a part of it and warms himself; he kindles a fire and bakes bread. Also he makes a god and worships it; he makes it an idol and falls down before it. Half of it he burns in the fire. Over the half he eats meat; he roasts it and is satisfied. Also he warms himself and says, “Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire!" And the rest of it he makes into a god, his idol, and falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, “Deliver me, for you are my god!”. Isaiah 44:12-17.

Life, when examined, in thirds...

ITEM (stage) 1 - Work is fine, but how long can you really continue to have strength in what you're doing unless you properly sustain yourself by refreshment and nutrition that comes from outside yourself that renews your capacity for doing well?

ITEM (stage) 2 - Work isn't the only reason we're here. As the body is nourished by food and drink, so should deeper needs be addressed with means that will 'speak' within our homes (our lives) about something more. There is a need within for more than immediate satisfaction, and for merely spending our days in labour. Beauty calls to us in our longing for significance... but we need to be careful where such inclinations can carry us.

ITEM (stage) 3 - There's nothing so foolish in this life as the miss-direction of our religious inclinations. We don't usually make material statues any longer that we deem to be representations of some 'god' we like, but we continually make beliefs, goals and surroundings for ourselves that accommodate and allow for gods of our devising to rule and direct us in countless ways (just watch this intriguing debate between Jordan Peterson and Susan Blackmore to see just how 'religious' atheism can be).

The third example, of course, conveys just how ridiculous such use of our misguided religious propensities can be, but notice something in this entire passage - immediate requirements (work, replenishment) take us all in the same direction - towards needing to satisfy even deeper needs, and the point the Prophet is making is how stupid it is for us to try and furnish and satisfy that vast appetite with something that is clearly not going to cut it, because there is so much more that needs to be answered and obtained for us to be what we were made to be.

This past year has left us all seeking to fulfil the basic demands of item 1, whilst constantly seeking to break out again, when and where possible, to stage 2 (having some engagement that has been just more than surviving), but where are we now with stage 3? Has the crisis taught us anything about how mute and foolish our regular 'gods' have been? Have we learned that any genuine spirituality has to draw from very deep roots to be able to sustain us through trials like this.

John tells us in His Gospel that on the last day of the feast in Jerusalem, Jesus raised His voice in the temple and cried "Listen, anyone who thirsts - anyone who believes on me, out of his innermost being will flow rivers of living water!" (John 7:38). 

One of the greatest joys of life is when we reach a point where we cease to be someone who is merely taking from everyone else, but actually begins to give to them in a rich and meaningful way - to enrich all by the gifts and treasures we have to share. That is the result of truth at work - we love, because we are truly loved, and that beauty allows us to truly become ourselves. It's essential that our relationship to what is above us and around us becomes whole.

Escaping the pain and the misery of the present can truly begin when we have our gaze, our insights, fixed beyond ourselves and our petty ambitions to truly see the face of God, revealed in His beloved Son.

Anosognosia

"My people are destroyed through a lack of knowledge". Hosea 4:6.

"Where there is no true vision, the people will cast aside what matters". Proverbs 29:18.  

Albert Einstein was one smart cookie. Ask any physics student, and they'll no doubt trot out his famous theory of relativity, or discuss how he revolutionised our understanding of the known universe. What's less well known about him is that in the last years of his life, he was a deeply troubled man - not about what he knew, but about what he didn't.

A whole new field of physics was opening up through the work of people like Neilz Bohr and Werner Heisenberg which was showing that the Quantum realms were far more exotic and strange than Einstein had ever imagined, and this was a problem. He spent his last days, frantically working to put this particular genie back inside the bottle, seeking to refute what these men were doing, but he failed, because he couldn't see the bigger picture of what was actually occurring in the world around us.

Blind spots are sadly also reflected in the realm of bodily affliction. Patients who have had strokes, for example, which have caused them to loose motion in a realm of their body still often think they are 'signalling' the limb or digit in such a way that they are actually causing it to move, even when they are in fact entirely failing to do so. It's interesting that the term agnostic derives from this troubling ailment.

Not grasping what is truly necessary can cause us to quickly find ourselves in a very disconcerting spot.

What happens, then, when we think about this manner of ailment in respect to faith and truth?

However 'switched on' we may think ourselves or our church leaders, the truth is that it's easy for this malady to be occurring.

The underlying problem here is that the less we really know about something, the less we usually recognise our own ignorance.

The scriptures, starting from our first parents, are littered with examples of when people step out in such ignorance, thinking they've grasped the key points, when they have actually missed it completely. What follows is a car wreck.

Intelligence has nothing to do with this flaw - remember Einstein - it's simply because we so often forget, to quote another great mind, Issac Newton, that the best we're going to do in this life is examine a few pebbles on the beach when the great expanse of the ocean still lies before us (actually, to be fair, Einstein did say something similar using the example of an eternal library, and us currently reading from just page one of the first volume... 'such is the mind of God').

Presumption of this kind - about what we think is comprehended - can quickly lead us to believe we are ('you shall be as gods') what we're not.

It's when we begin to apply this to our own particular circumstances that the cuckoos can really come home to roost.

If we are, in effect, essentially ignorant of how an issue or a teaching is actually impacting upon our witness, our fellowship, our ministry - if we have miss-read something crucial to the present moment - then the effectiveness of what we're about will have been compromised even though we believe we are still free from such a limitation.

It takes a great deal to pause and examine ourselves by the exhortation of Hosea or the Wisdom of Solomon - to face up to where our realms of examination may be lacking or where we may have missed aspects of the big picture, but allowing that manner of enquiry may well open a door into a far richer engagement with life and truth.

Jesus warned His disciples to avoid a particular religious 'leaven' (theology) that would impede them and stifle the growth of the Kingdom (Matthew 16:6). How prophetic this admonition proved when we consider what happened to some of the churches and leaders of the churches in Asia Minor, requiring Paul to step in, even when it ostracised him from the rest, to rectify the error for the sake of the Gospel (see the book of Galatians, chapter 2).

What so often counts in the church is when someone follows Paul's example - identifying what's being overlooked and strenuously engaging with this until it received the hearing it truly needs.

If we want to see health in the church and not some manner of fakery mistakenly taking hold, then we need to be equally as careful to follow in the light of that manner of discernment.

 

Uncovered.

 "When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when He divided mankind, He fixed the borders of the people's according to the number of the Sons of God, but the Lord's portion is His people, Jacob His allotted heritage".

Deuteronomy 32:8-9.

In his daily word studies, Pastor Chad Bird made a fascinating insight into the issue of plagues this week. To quote from the study: "Plagues are God warring with and defeating demons. The gods of the nations are the masks of demonic forces, who hide behind religion to deceive the world. So it was in Egypt, when, right before the 10th plague, the Lord said, “On all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments” (Exod. 12:12).

In the past ten months or so months, we have been surrounded by a barrage of media which has sought to 'inform' us to the reasons - the who, what, when and why - as to the rise and spread of a virus across the globe, but none, at least outside of the occasional reference by a Christian, have sought to examine or take seriously the manner of definition we find here.

When we soberly consider the key unpacking of the reality we face now given by the Lord in the latter half of Genesis chapter 3, one vital truth is clear - we are living in the midst of a war (Genesis 3:15).The invasion of sin into our lives is the instrument which allows that war to be evident and common to us in our time here. Numerous times in scripture, then, we see that the events played out in the material (i.e. the plagues of Egypt) are expressions of the larger war between the Lord and the 'gods' that men now serve as rebels against the Most High. The verse quoted above in Deuteronomy shows us the essential consequence upon the everyday of such contention (see also Ephesians 6:12). Moses is concluding his time as leader of the people, who are now finally close to entry into Canaan, but before he passes his final words, he conveys to them a recounting of God's works for their fathers through the means of a song.

The story if familiar - God seeks to be tender and caring, but the people spurn such love and scoff at such goodness, following 'gods' that allow them to become careless and ignorant of their poverty with their true redeemer. The consequence is that God allows both the poison and the poverty of such 'devotion' to become evident, so that all flesh and all powers might realise their folly - to bring a reckoning that allows for genuine change.

The record Moses refers to here can be traced all the way back to the very time of creation - the 'days of old', the 'years of many generations' which the fathers and respected elders of the people recalled so well.

We like to think of ourselves as so sophisticated, so beyond the past, but in reality, nothing, in respect to our wayward tendencies and the 'gods' we chose to venerate has changed.

The gods of our religious values today are equally as bent to the satisfying of our whims and appetites. Never has the world seen a moment when so many believe that what makes them well is merely 'having enough' of what they deem satisfying nothing beyond their immediate wants. We quickly become capricious, even violent, when others seek to take away our delusions of equity, but what are we to do when the entire world becomes a zone of quarantine and death? Where is the benevolence, the comfort, of our gods then?

The hurried response we make is to 'put our trust in chariots', as Egypt did to stem Jacobs children's departure, but the method of their severance from slavery also became the means for God's judgement upon such folly (Exodus 15:21). We therefore need to see the battle for what it is - God's call to our time to turn from the temporal to the eternal, and His affirmation over all other 'gods' - and seek to make sure that we are placing that kingdom, which cannot be shaken, above all such folly.

The 'truth' being shaken in our times is subjective secularism. This has made us self-referential and is now proving itself a religion far more mercenary and adulterous than Marxism was in the last century. In that respect, it may be the Devil's final throw as it is seeking to fully resurrect the lie of the fall - to make us creatures entirely turned in upon ourselves, hence, a plague that amplifies that trait in the form of severance and isolation, cutting us off from genuine care and love for God and each other, which makes us see our fathomless poverty.

So what is the answer? Where is the hospice which brings us mercy in the very midst of such terminal trouble?

There is only one point in time and space, beyond the moment of our final judgement, where this cycle of our folly is invaded and broken. It began with the birth of the promised 'seed' (see Genesis 3:15) that would crush the foul seraph that enchained us - the one who, by becoming sin for us, takes our death into Himself and bears it in the vile cruelty of crucifixion, to grasp the true moment when all sin, all death, all judgement, all cruel gods, are broken by His ascension as King in the very point that should have surely concluded in defeat. There, as one of His Apostles tells us, He stripped all such power and authority and made peace for us that we might know something more than the destitution of a world plagued by the misery of severance from its true maker and Father.

So the world is laid bare before us. 

Either this truth grants us confidence amidst these present trials, or we are deemed to live in a realm of chaos, where our every breath is no more than an accident, and we have no more value than a virus or a random particle of dust.

The present troubles, as Chad's posting reminds us, is to show we are not alone, and that it is not yet over - the Lord is seeking to rouse our dying world!