I stood next to the hospital bed where my dad was dying (this
won’t be a funny blog – sorry!), and the prayer group from my mom’s church
stood around us. His lungs weren’t working at all anymore, and they were
praying for miraculous healing. In that moment, I have to admit, I wasn’t
praying at all. At noon I had been having a normal day, teaching and shouting
at kids in the hallway four states away. Then a phone call, a ride home, plane
tickets, connecting flights, and now an ICU bed with my family and the prayer
team; I wasn’t in a great place and so instead of praying, I was thinking of
the absurdity of their prayers. (Please know that in retrospect, I am so
thankful for the ministry of those anonymous people who had gathered to stand
in that gap.)
My dad had been in a coma for a week, as a result of
complications after what should have been a simple surgery. Doctors were
scrambling for explanations of why his lungs were failing, why so many body systems
were breaking down; all of my confidence was in the medicine. I felt like if
God couldn’t work through the medicine and the doctors, we were pretty much
done. In the moment, I found their prayers frustrating, and their presence
intrusive. They left, we cried, he died. No miracle.
There were lots of quiet hours that followed that day. We
didn’t have loud kids yet, and we moved to a new city soon after; I didn’t even
have a job or friends to get in the way of my thoughts.
I wasn’t angry with God about my dad’s death – I knew
that my dad loved Jesus and trusted Him for his salvation, and I have confident
hope that he is full of delight in His presence. But my cynical moments with
the prayer team revealed a deep issue in my heart that couldn’t be ignored. Did
I believe God could do anything? Did I trust Him?
I had to wrestle with the question: Who had I been trusting
to save my dad, medicine or God? And who do I trust to take care of me, myself
or God?
Sometimes big moments reveal the underlying truths that
define our daily lives. I began to see that I trusted myself, and my logic and
wisdom. I trusted education and money to make my world secure and safe, I
trusted my own plan for the future (built on toothpicks of Biblical wisdom, but
held together with the glue of human wisdom), to make me happy. I trusted God
to take me home at the end…but I trusted Him for very little else.
In my very passive pursuit of God (showing up on Sundays,
trying to be good, and occasionally remembering that I claimed to have quiet
time and I should dig out my Bible and look at the words inside for a few
minutes), I had reduced Him, and then added beliefs in culture’s definitions
and methods of happiness and fullness – at least, the ones that were acceptable
for a Christian. I knew so little of God (because I had not spent time seeking
to know Him!), and so much of culture (because it was so available and easy and
unchallenging), God had become small in my life.
This Sunday, Pastor Dirk shared from Jesus’ letter to the
church at Pergamum in Revelation 2:12-17. Jesus was calling them out for this
same issue – for believing in God, but then adding on other beliefs that
rivaled God until their faith was unrecognizable and unremarkable. They
believed in Jesus and participated in a faith community; but their inclusion of
other beliefs and worship to fulfill their desires revealed their distrust in
God. He might not be enough, so they supplemented Him with cultures’ wisdom and
practices. They had adapted to the world around them, until they were in a
place where they needed a rebuke from Jesus! Their faith became unrecognizable
as they added choice after choice to their belief in Jesus Christ as their
Savior.
“Compromising with the world begins with a lack of trust
that God will see you through.”
That quote from Pastor Dirk reminds me of Eve, that
original lady and her struggle with trust – and fruit. She lived in full communion
with God, and enjoyed the fullness of His creation. She had everything she
needed for the most joy-filled, abundant life. No sin, no death, no brokenness,
no shattered dreams or broken hearts, no separation – just peace and
contentment and fellowship with her Maker. As she discussed the only thing God
had asked her not to do (eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil - fruit
she wasn’t supposed to want and definitely didn’t need) with Satan, her trust
in God faltered. She began to doubt that God was good, wondering if He was
holding back something desirable, depriving her of what she began to imagine
was better than everything she already had in Him. Her trust in God shrank, and
she compromised and tried the fruit. Her doubt led to sin. See James 1:13-18
for a New Testament description of this same thought process that we can get so
caught in!
In those dark months after my father died I wrestled for
trust in God; He whispered to my soul, inviting me to know Him in new ways I
never had, showing me His faithful love. We are on a journey, and He reveals
more and more places where I have compromised, where I have tried to merge
faith with worldly wisdom, where I have tried to bend His plan to my own. I’m nowhere
near the end of the path, but I trust Him so much more deeply now than I would
have if He had not shaken my sleepy, small faith awake!
In the letter to Pergamum, Jesus has some encouragement
to those who “overcome.” Way back in Genesis, Jacob (the grandson of Abraham,
father of the twelve tribes of Israel) wrestles with God – literally (Genesis
32). Jacob hangs on, wrestling all night until the light begins to dawn. He
never pins God, or gets Him to tap out; yet God rewards him with a new name for
“overcoming.” It’s striking that God declared Jacob an overcomer simply for
remaining in the struggle, and holding on to Him. Jacob wasn’t perfect, he didn’t
have exceptional character or morals, he just wouldn’t give up or disengage
from God. Might we also stay in the fight, clinging to God, letting Him prove
faithful even in our doubts, that we might be called overcomers!
Stay in the fight. Ask God to open your eyes to the places where lack of
trust creates compromise with the world in your life.
[Robin Bupp is married to Caleb, and they are from many places east of the Mississippi (but are calling Michigan home for the foreseeable future). A former high school science teacher, Robin is slowly turning the two Bupp kiddos into tiny nerds while they teach her lots of things, especially humility and patience.]
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