Jason E. Royle's Blog, page 4
July 9, 2020
EnD Times in the Bible
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. (1 Peter 1:3-5).
The salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time?
In this text Peter mentions two concepts, two ideas that existed in the environmental fabric of New Testament thinking. The New Testament frequently speaks of the last days, or the last time. The background of this thinking comes primarily from the Jewish idea of time. According to the biblical scholar F. F. Bruce, the Jewish mindset divided all time into two ages. There was this present age, which is altogether bad and altogether under the dominion of evil; and there was the age to come, which will be the golden age of God. In between there was the day of the Lord during which the world would be destroyed and remade, and when judgment would come.
It is this "in-between-time" which is the last days, or the last time. When the New Testament speaks of the last days and the last time, it is speaking of that time when time and the world as we know them will come to an end. Simply put: Christ will return, time will end, the judgment has come (John 5:28-29). We must always remember that no one, no matter how religious or intelligent they seem, knows when that time will be, nor what will actually happen. But we can gather together what the New Testament does say about the last times.
The early Christians believed that they were already living in the last days. "It is the last time," said John to his people (I John 2:18). The writer of Hebrews speaks of the fullness of the revelation which has come, in the last days, through his Son (Hebrews 1:2). As the first Christians saw it, God had already invaded time, and the end was quickening. The last times were to be times of the pouring out of God's Spirit upon men (Acts 2:17). Yet another prophecy the early Christians found true on the day of Pentecost.
We have been living, you see, in the last days for over two thousand years now; faithfully waiting for the return of the Lord that "will come like a thief in the night" (1 Thessalonians 5:2). And it is that, and nothing less than that, to which Christians should focus attention when discussing and considering the end times. Salvation (in Christ) has been revealed to the world and has given us, in this last time, a living hope—an inheritance kept in heaven for you (and me). Amen!
The salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time?
In this text Peter mentions two concepts, two ideas that existed in the environmental fabric of New Testament thinking. The New Testament frequently speaks of the last days, or the last time. The background of this thinking comes primarily from the Jewish idea of time. According to the biblical scholar F. F. Bruce, the Jewish mindset divided all time into two ages. There was this present age, which is altogether bad and altogether under the dominion of evil; and there was the age to come, which will be the golden age of God. In between there was the day of the Lord during which the world would be destroyed and remade, and when judgment would come.
It is this "in-between-time" which is the last days, or the last time. When the New Testament speaks of the last days and the last time, it is speaking of that time when time and the world as we know them will come to an end. Simply put: Christ will return, time will end, the judgment has come (John 5:28-29). We must always remember that no one, no matter how religious or intelligent they seem, knows when that time will be, nor what will actually happen. But we can gather together what the New Testament does say about the last times.
The early Christians believed that they were already living in the last days. "It is the last time," said John to his people (I John 2:18). The writer of Hebrews speaks of the fullness of the revelation which has come, in the last days, through his Son (Hebrews 1:2). As the first Christians saw it, God had already invaded time, and the end was quickening. The last times were to be times of the pouring out of God's Spirit upon men (Acts 2:17). Yet another prophecy the early Christians found true on the day of Pentecost.
We have been living, you see, in the last days for over two thousand years now; faithfully waiting for the return of the Lord that "will come like a thief in the night" (1 Thessalonians 5:2). And it is that, and nothing less than that, to which Christians should focus attention when discussing and considering the end times. Salvation (in Christ) has been revealed to the world and has given us, in this last time, a living hope—an inheritance kept in heaven for you (and me). Amen!
June 7, 2020
Finding Happiness
Quite often we hear people say, "I'm unhappy," as though happiness were the object, or purpose, of life. It isn't, nor can it be. Happiness is an effect, a by-product of something else.
Happiness generally comes most often to productive and creative people when they have found and are engaged in work in which they can lose themselves. We are usually happiest when we are unaware of our happiness. We'll be busily engaged in something that demands our full attention and best talents and suddenly discover, during a pause in the work, that several hours have passed in which we've been completely unaware of the passage of time and our surroundings. And, if we think about it, we'll realize that we were living close to the peak during that time and that we were in a very high array of happiness.
Happiness comes when we are doing something for others, too. On Christmas morning, our joy or our happiness can be at a very high level, not because of our anticipation of what we might receive but, rather, in anticipation of watching our loved ones open our gifts to them.
So if we can remember that we are happiest when we are doing things for others, when we are busiest, and after we have accomplished something worthwhile, we need never be unhappy again, at least not for long. We need only find a project on which to work, or put in a good hard day doing those things that need to be done, or find a way to do something for others. Then happiness, like a butterfly, will come and land on our sleeve.
Happiness is not the purpose of life. It is a by-product of losing ourselves in our work and of doing things for others. Knowing that, we need never be unhappy again.
~ Earl Nightingale
Happiness generally comes most often to productive and creative people when they have found and are engaged in work in which they can lose themselves. We are usually happiest when we are unaware of our happiness. We'll be busily engaged in something that demands our full attention and best talents and suddenly discover, during a pause in the work, that several hours have passed in which we've been completely unaware of the passage of time and our surroundings. And, if we think about it, we'll realize that we were living close to the peak during that time and that we were in a very high array of happiness.
Happiness comes when we are doing something for others, too. On Christmas morning, our joy or our happiness can be at a very high level, not because of our anticipation of what we might receive but, rather, in anticipation of watching our loved ones open our gifts to them.
So if we can remember that we are happiest when we are doing things for others, when we are busiest, and after we have accomplished something worthwhile, we need never be unhappy again, at least not for long. We need only find a project on which to work, or put in a good hard day doing those things that need to be done, or find a way to do something for others. Then happiness, like a butterfly, will come and land on our sleeve.
Happiness is not the purpose of life. It is a by-product of losing ourselves in our work and of doing things for others. Knowing that, we need never be unhappy again.
~ Earl Nightingale
June 6, 2020
Bible Verses on Sharing
Therefore I command you, ‘You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor, in your land.’ (Deut. 15:11)
Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God. (Hebrews 13:16)
My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. (John 15:12)
Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. (Phil. 2:4)
When you give to the poor, it is like lending to the Lord, and the Lord will pay you back. (Proverbs 19:17)
Be generous and share your food with the poor. You will be blessed for it. (Proverbs 22:9)
Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality. (Romans 12:13)
We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves. (Romans 15:1)
If we say we love God, but hate others, we are liars. (1 John 4:20)
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Luke 12:34)
‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’ (Matthew 25:45)
Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same. (Luke 3:11)
If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? (James 2:16)
Parable of the Good Samaritan... and Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise." (Luke 10:25-37)
Do good. Seek justice. Help the oppressed. Defend orphans and widows. (Isaiah 1:17)
If anyone is poor among you...do not be hardhearted or tightfisted toward them. (Deut. 15:7)
Show mercy and compassion to one another... Do not oppress the foreigner or the poor. (Zech. 7:9-10)
The Lord upholds the cause of the needy. (Psalm 140:12)
Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God. (Hebrews 13:16)
My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. (John 15:12)
Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. (Phil. 2:4)
When you give to the poor, it is like lending to the Lord, and the Lord will pay you back. (Proverbs 19:17)
Be generous and share your food with the poor. You will be blessed for it. (Proverbs 22:9)
Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality. (Romans 12:13)
We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves. (Romans 15:1)
If we say we love God, but hate others, we are liars. (1 John 4:20)
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Luke 12:34)
‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’ (Matthew 25:45)
Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same. (Luke 3:11)
If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? (James 2:16)
Parable of the Good Samaritan... and Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise." (Luke 10:25-37)
Do good. Seek justice. Help the oppressed. Defend orphans and widows. (Isaiah 1:17)
If anyone is poor among you...do not be hardhearted or tightfisted toward them. (Deut. 15:7)
Show mercy and compassion to one another... Do not oppress the foreigner or the poor. (Zech. 7:9-10)
The Lord upholds the cause of the needy. (Psalm 140:12)
May 18, 2020
Gettysburg Address
Abraham Lincoln’s Address at Gettysburg: Lincoln was president of the United States of America during the Civil War. As a Christian statesman he hated war but believed it necessary to defeat the Southern States which had left the Union. He made this speech at the dedication of a cemetery where those killed in the battle of Gettysburg were buried.
Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place of those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far and above our power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work they have thus far so nobly advanced.
It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that the dead shall not have died in vain, that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom, and that the government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
~ Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865), Dedicatory Address at Gettysburg Cemetery, 19 November 1863.
Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place of those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far and above our power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work they have thus far so nobly advanced.
It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that the dead shall not have died in vain, that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom, and that the government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
~ Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865), Dedicatory Address at Gettysburg Cemetery, 19 November 1863.
May 16, 2020
Purpose of Trials
No one, when tempted, should say, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself tempts no one. But one is tempted by one’s own desire, being lured and enticed by it; then, when that desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and that sin, when it is fully grown, gives birth to death. (James 1:13-15)
I would not be surprised if you've never thought of it like this before, but from the beginning of time it has been man's first instinct to blame others for his own wrong doing. The story of the first sin in the Garden of Eden was, from a certain perspective, a first class dive into the psychology of the human heart.
When God challenged Adam with his sin, Adam's reply was, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.” Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate" (Genesis 3:12-13). In other words, Adam was saying, "Don't blame me; blame Eve." And Eve was saying, "Don't blame me; blame the serpent." Since the beginning, we have been experts in evasion of responsibility.
Every trial, every external difficulty, carries with it a temptation, an inner enticement to sin. God may bring, or allow, trials; but he is not, James insists, the author of temptation. Enticement to sin comes from our own sinful natures, not from God. 'Sin,' declared G. K. Chesterton, 'is the most demonstrable of all Christian doctrines.' What he meant by that was, we do not need to prove the doctrine of original sin—the evidence is all around us!
James' concern here is to help the followers of Christ resist the temptation that comes along with the trial. For every trial brings temptation. Financial difficulty can tempt us to question God's providence in our lives. The death of a loved one can tempt us to question God's love for us. The suffering of the righteous poor and the lavish lifestyles of the wicked rich can tempt us to question God's justice, or even his existence.
It was not God who wished to do evil to Job, but the devil. “All right,” the Lord said to Satan, “everything he has is in your power, but you must not hurt Job himself” (Job 1:12). Therefore rather than blame God (who gives only good gifts, James 1:17), Christians should look within at their own desires, which make them vulnerable to testing and temptation. God never orchestrates the events of our lives with an intent to lure us away from Himself. He always roots for us to move closer. That's who God is. The purpose of trials is not to drive us away from God, but to draw us closer to Him. In Jesus' name. Amen.
I would not be surprised if you've never thought of it like this before, but from the beginning of time it has been man's first instinct to blame others for his own wrong doing. The story of the first sin in the Garden of Eden was, from a certain perspective, a first class dive into the psychology of the human heart.
When God challenged Adam with his sin, Adam's reply was, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.” Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate" (Genesis 3:12-13). In other words, Adam was saying, "Don't blame me; blame Eve." And Eve was saying, "Don't blame me; blame the serpent." Since the beginning, we have been experts in evasion of responsibility.
Every trial, every external difficulty, carries with it a temptation, an inner enticement to sin. God may bring, or allow, trials; but he is not, James insists, the author of temptation. Enticement to sin comes from our own sinful natures, not from God. 'Sin,' declared G. K. Chesterton, 'is the most demonstrable of all Christian doctrines.' What he meant by that was, we do not need to prove the doctrine of original sin—the evidence is all around us!
James' concern here is to help the followers of Christ resist the temptation that comes along with the trial. For every trial brings temptation. Financial difficulty can tempt us to question God's providence in our lives. The death of a loved one can tempt us to question God's love for us. The suffering of the righteous poor and the lavish lifestyles of the wicked rich can tempt us to question God's justice, or even his existence.
It was not God who wished to do evil to Job, but the devil. “All right,” the Lord said to Satan, “everything he has is in your power, but you must not hurt Job himself” (Job 1:12). Therefore rather than blame God (who gives only good gifts, James 1:17), Christians should look within at their own desires, which make them vulnerable to testing and temptation. God never orchestrates the events of our lives with an intent to lure us away from Himself. He always roots for us to move closer. That's who God is. The purpose of trials is not to drive us away from God, but to draw us closer to Him. In Jesus' name. Amen.
April 27, 2020
Extending Kindness
Kindness should not stop with us—we can extend it outward from ourselves, like the ripples on a pond, toward our family, friends, and loved ones. This is relatively natural and effortless. But for loving kindness to be genuine, it cannot just end with the people we know and like; it has to go further, toward those we do not know and even do not like. This includes people we may be having a hard time with, someone with whom communication is difficult, where negative issues have arisen that are pulling the relationship apart, where there is anger, resentment, or dislike.
When we are affected by someone being dismissive, critical, or hurtful, then it is often because there is a hook in us for that tension to grab hold of, a place where it can land that triggers all our hidden feelings of unworthiness, insecurity, doubt, even self-hate. However, when we extend kindness toward others outside our usual circle, an extraordinary thing happens: the landing place, or the hook within, begins to dissolve.
As a Burmese teacher once told author Andrew Harvey, "Out of compassion for myself, let me let go of all these feelings of anger and resentment toward others."
Prejudice can go very deep. It is only healed when we end the war within and accept those parts of ourselves we find so unacceptable. Then we will have the courage to accept those who are different from us, who have different beliefs, who are a different color, or who live differently. When we can tolerate ourselves, then we can be tolerable toward others and extend kindness to all... equally.
As Gandhi said, "We must widen the circle of our love until it embraces the whole village...until the scope of our love encompasses the whole world."
~ Ed and Deb Shapiro
When we are affected by someone being dismissive, critical, or hurtful, then it is often because there is a hook in us for that tension to grab hold of, a place where it can land that triggers all our hidden feelings of unworthiness, insecurity, doubt, even self-hate. However, when we extend kindness toward others outside our usual circle, an extraordinary thing happens: the landing place, or the hook within, begins to dissolve.
As a Burmese teacher once told author Andrew Harvey, "Out of compassion for myself, let me let go of all these feelings of anger and resentment toward others."
Prejudice can go very deep. It is only healed when we end the war within and accept those parts of ourselves we find so unacceptable. Then we will have the courage to accept those who are different from us, who have different beliefs, who are a different color, or who live differently. When we can tolerate ourselves, then we can be tolerable toward others and extend kindness to all... equally.
As Gandhi said, "We must widen the circle of our love until it embraces the whole village...until the scope of our love encompasses the whole world."
~ Ed and Deb Shapiro
April 21, 2020
Do You Want to Be Right?
One of the most important questions you can ever ask yourself is, "Do I want to be "right"—or do I want to be happy?" Many times, the two are mutually exclusive.
Being right, defending our positions, takes an enormous amount of mental energy and often alienates us from the people in our lives. Needing to be right—or needing someone else to be wrong--encourages others to become defensive, and puts pressure on us to keep defending. Yet, many of us (me, too, at times) spend a great deal of time and energy attempting to prove (or point out) that we are right—and/or others are wrong. Many people, consciously or unconsciously, believe that it's somehow their job to show others how their positions, statements, and points of view are incorrect, and that in doing so, the person they are correcting is going to somehow appreciate it, or at least learn something. Wrong!
The truth is, all of us hate to be corrected. We all want our positions to be respected and understood by others. Being listened to and heard is one of the greatest desires of the human heart. And those who learn to listen are the most loved and respected. Those who are in the habit of correcting others are often resented and avoided.
It's not that it's never appropriate to be right—sometimes you genuinely need to be or want to be. Perhaps there are certain philosophical positions that you don't want to budge on such as when you hear a racist comment. Here, it's important to speak your mind. Usually, however, it's just your ego creeping in and ruining an otherwise peaceful encounter—a habit of wanting or needing to be right.
A wonderful, heartfelt strategy for becoming more peaceful and loving is to practice allowing others the joy of being right—give them the glory. Stop correcting. As hard as it may be to change this habit, it's worth any effort and practice it takes.
When someone says, "I really feel it's important to. . . " rather than jumping in and saying, "No, it's more important to. . . " or any of the hundreds of other forms of conversational editing, simply let it go and allow their statement to stand. You'll discover the joy of participating in and witnessing other people's happiness, which is far more rewarding than a battle of egos.
~ Richard Carlson
Being right, defending our positions, takes an enormous amount of mental energy and often alienates us from the people in our lives. Needing to be right—or needing someone else to be wrong--encourages others to become defensive, and puts pressure on us to keep defending. Yet, many of us (me, too, at times) spend a great deal of time and energy attempting to prove (or point out) that we are right—and/or others are wrong. Many people, consciously or unconsciously, believe that it's somehow their job to show others how their positions, statements, and points of view are incorrect, and that in doing so, the person they are correcting is going to somehow appreciate it, or at least learn something. Wrong!
The truth is, all of us hate to be corrected. We all want our positions to be respected and understood by others. Being listened to and heard is one of the greatest desires of the human heart. And those who learn to listen are the most loved and respected. Those who are in the habit of correcting others are often resented and avoided.
It's not that it's never appropriate to be right—sometimes you genuinely need to be or want to be. Perhaps there are certain philosophical positions that you don't want to budge on such as when you hear a racist comment. Here, it's important to speak your mind. Usually, however, it's just your ego creeping in and ruining an otherwise peaceful encounter—a habit of wanting or needing to be right.
A wonderful, heartfelt strategy for becoming more peaceful and loving is to practice allowing others the joy of being right—give them the glory. Stop correcting. As hard as it may be to change this habit, it's worth any effort and practice it takes.
When someone says, "I really feel it's important to. . . " rather than jumping in and saying, "No, it's more important to. . . " or any of the hundreds of other forms of conversational editing, simply let it go and allow their statement to stand. You'll discover the joy of participating in and witnessing other people's happiness, which is far more rewarding than a battle of egos.
~ Richard Carlson
April 20, 2020
Listening - Poem
'T is you that are the music, not your song.
The song is but a door which, opening wide,
Lets forth the pent-up melody inside,
Your spirit's harmony, which clear and strong
Sings but of you. Throughout your whole life long
Your songs, your thoughts, your doings, each divide
This perfect beauty; waves within a tide,
Or single notes amid a glorious throng.
The song of earth has many different chords;
Ocean has many moods and many tones
Yet always ocean. In the damp Spring woods
The painted trillium smiles, while crisp pine cones
Autumn alone can ripen. So is this
One music with a thousand cadences.
By Amy Lowell
The song is but a door which, opening wide,
Lets forth the pent-up melody inside,
Your spirit's harmony, which clear and strong
Sings but of you. Throughout your whole life long
Your songs, your thoughts, your doings, each divide
This perfect beauty; waves within a tide,
Or single notes amid a glorious throng.
The song of earth has many different chords;
Ocean has many moods and many tones
Yet always ocean. In the damp Spring woods
The painted trillium smiles, while crisp pine cones
Autumn alone can ripen. So is this
One music with a thousand cadences.
By Amy Lowell
April 19, 2020
Trials of Many Kinds
My brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, consider it nothing but joy, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance; and let perseverance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking in nothing. (James 1:2-4)
What were the "trials" that James's readers were enduring? Poverty must certainly have been among them. James's letter is filled with references to poverty and wealth, and he makes clear that at least the majority of his readers are poor. James 2:6-7 makes pretty clear that unfair persecution was one of the causes of the poverty that the early Christians were experiencing. Rich people, who were "slandering" the name of Christ, were "exploiting" the Christians and "dragging them into court." See also 5:1-6, where James accuses rich people of "hoarding wealth in the last days" and "killing" the "innocent" by withholding wages from them.
By stressing that the trials were of "many kinds," James deliberately casts his net widely, including the many kinds of suffering that Christians undergo in this fallen world: sickness, loneliness, disappointment, mourning, uncertainty. Why can believers react to trials with so strange and unexpected a response as joy? Because we know that trials perfect our faith and make us stronger.
I like what Luke Timothy Johnson, a New Testament scholar and historian of early Christianity, points out about the trials we face: "The difficulties of life are intended by God to refine our faith—heating it in the crucible of suffering so that impurities might be refined away and so that it might become pure and valuable before the Lord." The "testing of faith" here, then, is not intended to determine whether a person has faith or not—it is intended to purify faith that already exists.
Testing produces, first of all, perseverance (also interpreted "patient endurance"). The picture of the Greek word here is of a person successfully carrying a heavy load for a long time; eventually steering
them in the right direction. Like a muscle that becomes strong when it faces resistance, so Christians learn to remain faithful to God over the long haul when they face trials of many kinds.
James believes we should rejoice because trials give us an opportunity to develop the virtue of "patient endurance," which will in turn lead to a mature and complete Christian character. This is how Christians are to live. This is not to say that we cannot call pain, pain; difficulty, difficulty. Paul makes it very clear that he could recognize pain, call it what it is, and experience it with the full depth of human anguish (1 Cor. 4:9-13). He also left us the example of fleeing from persecution when it was appropriate (Acts 17:10-14). Yet even in such situations he, with James, could look beyond them to "an eternal glory that far outweighs them all—reminding us to fix our eyes not on what is seen but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal" (2 Cor. 4:17-18).
What were the "trials" that James's readers were enduring? Poverty must certainly have been among them. James's letter is filled with references to poverty and wealth, and he makes clear that at least the majority of his readers are poor. James 2:6-7 makes pretty clear that unfair persecution was one of the causes of the poverty that the early Christians were experiencing. Rich people, who were "slandering" the name of Christ, were "exploiting" the Christians and "dragging them into court." See also 5:1-6, where James accuses rich people of "hoarding wealth in the last days" and "killing" the "innocent" by withholding wages from them.
By stressing that the trials were of "many kinds," James deliberately casts his net widely, including the many kinds of suffering that Christians undergo in this fallen world: sickness, loneliness, disappointment, mourning, uncertainty. Why can believers react to trials with so strange and unexpected a response as joy? Because we know that trials perfect our faith and make us stronger.
I like what Luke Timothy Johnson, a New Testament scholar and historian of early Christianity, points out about the trials we face: "The difficulties of life are intended by God to refine our faith—heating it in the crucible of suffering so that impurities might be refined away and so that it might become pure and valuable before the Lord." The "testing of faith" here, then, is not intended to determine whether a person has faith or not—it is intended to purify faith that already exists.
Testing produces, first of all, perseverance (also interpreted "patient endurance"). The picture of the Greek word here is of a person successfully carrying a heavy load for a long time; eventually steering
them in the right direction. Like a muscle that becomes strong when it faces resistance, so Christians learn to remain faithful to God over the long haul when they face trials of many kinds.
James believes we should rejoice because trials give us an opportunity to develop the virtue of "patient endurance," which will in turn lead to a mature and complete Christian character. This is how Christians are to live. This is not to say that we cannot call pain, pain; difficulty, difficulty. Paul makes it very clear that he could recognize pain, call it what it is, and experience it with the full depth of human anguish (1 Cor. 4:9-13). He also left us the example of fleeing from persecution when it was appropriate (Acts 17:10-14). Yet even in such situations he, with James, could look beyond them to "an eternal glory that far outweighs them all—reminding us to fix our eyes not on what is seen but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal" (2 Cor. 4:17-18).
April 17, 2020
Coronavirus Prayers
Coronavirus: Responding in Prayer:
Merciful God:
Heal those who are sick with the virus. May they regain their strength and health through quality medical care.
Heal us from our fear, which prevents nations from working together and neighbors from helping one another.
Heal us from our opinions, which can make us claim invulnerability to a disease that knows no borders.
Be with the doctors, nurses, researchers and all medical professionals who seek to heal and help those affected and who put themselves at risk in the process. May they know your protection and peace.
Jesus Christ, healer of all, firmly hold our hand in this time of uncertainty and sorrow.
Be with those who have died from the virus. May they be at rest with you in your eternal peace. Be with the families of those who are sick or have died. As they worry and grieve, defend them from illness and despair. May they know your comfort.
Whether we are home or abroad, surrounded by many people suffering from this illness or only a few, Christ Jesus our Lord, stay with us as we endure and mourn, persist and prepare. In place of our anxiety, give us your calming peace. In Jesus' name. Amen.
Merciful God:
Heal those who are sick with the virus. May they regain their strength and health through quality medical care.
Heal us from our fear, which prevents nations from working together and neighbors from helping one another.
Heal us from our opinions, which can make us claim invulnerability to a disease that knows no borders.
Be with the doctors, nurses, researchers and all medical professionals who seek to heal and help those affected and who put themselves at risk in the process. May they know your protection and peace.
Jesus Christ, healer of all, firmly hold our hand in this time of uncertainty and sorrow.
Be with those who have died from the virus. May they be at rest with you in your eternal peace. Be with the families of those who are sick or have died. As they worry and grieve, defend them from illness and despair. May they know your comfort.
Whether we are home or abroad, surrounded by many people suffering from this illness or only a few, Christ Jesus our Lord, stay with us as we endure and mourn, persist and prepare. In place of our anxiety, give us your calming peace. In Jesus' name. Amen.
