Sunday, July 31, 2011

Luke 22:47-53

The Coyotes are out by the barn again this morning.  I can hear them singing.  We are down to one adult barn cat out of 12.   The one black and white cat that is left hisses at me when I feed her.  She should be a little more thankful.   The coyotes have been most efficient at hunting cats.  So far no attempts at killing goats but I am sure that will come soon when other game gets scarce.   I am about out of cats!  I have noticed that the coyotes would rather hunt at night than the daytime.   I guess because it is easier to be sneaky.  If you want to kill something to eat you don’t want it to see you coming before you pounce.  I guess that in this respect coyotes are a lot like people… they like the dark to hide activities that they don’t want noticed.  Jesus was betrayed by Judas and taken into custody at night.  It was dark because the sun was down and dark because evil had an appetite for blood.   As Jesus is being arrested He comments on those who have come to take him into custody.


But this is your moment, the time when the power of darkness reigns.” Living Bible

I think I recognize 12 or 13 different insights from my meditation on this story about Jesus’ arrest.   Here are a few of them:

  1. There are times when the power of darkness reigns.  (Some of the low points in life may be the result of evil spiritual forces.  It is not an abnormal spiritual walk to endure them.  They are a part of life like the weeds I wrote about last week.)
  2. Sometimes the reign of darkness is necessary to advance the reign of light. (For a Christian there would be no Easter resurrection if there had been no death by crucifixion a few days earlier.)
  3. Sometimes those in positions of power and leadership lead the way in doing wrong instead of protecting me from it.  (It was the leaders that led the crowd to arrest Jesus not a lynch mob coming to the leaders asking for his arrest.)
  4. Some of these moments are personal.  No one else can fight to protect me from them.  (Jesus told his disciples to put away their swords.)
  5. These moments are never fair; they are painted with irony, trickery and deceit. (Judas attempted to greet Jesus with a friendly greeting.) 
  6. These moments happen when you are the most vulnerable.  (They did not try to arrest him when he was in the public’s eye but at night when he was alone with the disciples.)
  7. Jesus was not powerless during this time. (He still healed the ear of the high priest’s servant.  I would probably tend to look at what was going wrong rather than what I still possessed.)
  8. Jesus recognized that those who were doing bad things thought they were right.  (They considered Jesus a criminal and that it was the right thing to arrest him.  Very seldom do others or I do things that we do not feel fully justified in doing – right or wrong.)

We all experience times when a predator “stalks us at night” so to speak.  If you believe in good and bad spiritual forces like Jesus did, then a normal life includes attacks, when we are vulnerable, by others who feel justified in what they are doing.  We should not loose sight of the strength that we still have or the hope of a good final outcome in spite of all our spiritual battles.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Luke 22:39-46


The southwest corner of our farm is part way up the side of a 2,480-foot tall mountain.   (OK maybe a big hill?)  The mountain is called Mount Olive.  There are no olive trees growing on the mountain and the mountain is covered with brush so thick you cannot walk or crawl through.  I met a local Native American elder one afternoon hiking around looking for a rock outcrop that was supposed to be important in a local Native American legend but he could not find it.  I asked him why the mountain was named Olive but he had no idea either. 

The Biblical Mount of Olives in the Middle East is 2,676 feet tall and rises East of Jerusalem.   About the same height as my Olive Mountain.   It was named for the groves of Olive trees that were there.   I saw a picture of the modern day Mount of Olives and there is not much green to see.  Lots of rock, dirt, a big hotel, cemetery, an ancient convent and a few olive trees and tourist attractions.  In the Bible it was mentioned as a favorite place for Jesus to visit.  Reminds me of how we often take something beautiful and cover it up with a “memorial”.   Where you once used to go seek a peaceful place to pray becomes a “tourist attraction” so we can visit the spot where that “peaceful place to pray’ used to be.  I can just hear some parent saying to their kid, “Look Son, that’s what a peaceful place to pray looks like!” 

After Jesus had supper with his disciples they left Jerusalem and went out to the Mount of Olives to a garden called “Olive Press”  (Gethsemane)  This was one of his favorite spots.  He went there to pray and prepare himself for the ordeal he was about to endure.  Someone must have heard him praying because they recorded his prayer request.  He asked God if what was about to occur could be avoided in any way.  In any case, he told God he was willing to accept it, nonetheless, if it that is what God wanted. 

I grew up in church hearing about the details of how Jesus died.  All the grueling details which included the preacher pounding on the pulpit to simulate the sound of the hammer driving the nails into his hands and feet.  You could almost hear the flesh tear and the bones crack.  Roman Crucifixion was a horrible way to die.  And Jesus was innocent of any crime deserving that kind of death sentence.  I was encouraged to repent of my sins because Jesus had gone through all this and died for me!  But as I was meditating on this passage I came to realize that this horrible death is not what Jesus was asking to be delivered from.  There were a lot of other people who were tortured to death by crucifixion besides Jesus.  His death was the same as theirs.  Nobody pounded the pulpit to simulate his or her horrible end.  They died in obscurity. Jesus was not asking God if he could avoid dying. 

Why don’t we talk about what cannot be fathomed about Jesus’ death?  Why don’t we speak about what that cup was that Jesus asked about avoiding?   In Isaiah 53:12 is a hint into what I think Jesus was concerned about.. “…for he bore the sin of many…”  I have tried to imagine what this might mean.  I cannot illustrate this sin bearing in any way that is significant compared to what it must have meant to Jesus, to God.  I do not get it.  I get what it means to me but not what it meant to them.  Maybe that is why we can’t get past the gruesome details of the crucifixion because we cannot illustrate the more gruesome details of becoming a sin bearer.  It is much easier to faint at the sight of blood than at the sight of sin.  It is easier to wretch at the smell of physical death than its spiritual counterpart. 

I am going to be reminded of this inability of mine to comprehend what really happened when Jesus died for me every time I work in the field and look South West to my own Olive Mountain.  It will be a “memorial” that I did not build anywhere except in my mind. 

  12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,
   and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death,
   and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
   and made intercession for the transgressors.
Isaiah 53:12

Saturday, July 9, 2011

Luke 22:35-38

I have such a bountiful crop of star thistle this year.  It seems to grow better than anything I plant on purpose.  If I were alive in California during the Gold Rush I would not yet see a single star thistle in anyone’s garden.   Someone brought star thistle seed to America about that time.   It is not a native plant.  I have read one estimate that there are now 15 million acres of this invasive species growing in the United States.     I think I have more than my fair share.  But before I complain too much I have to admit that weeding in the field I have learned something about my life.  It is a lot like battling weeds from season to season.

In verse 35 – 38 Jesus reminded the disciples of how in the past they did not have to worry about food, money, clothing, their personal safety.  No worries.  Now He said things were about to change.  They needed to have money, a packed suitcase, and be prepared to defend themselves.   What had changed?  Sometimes life goes along without too much turmoil sometimes it is incredibly difficult.   Jesus’ explanation for the change was that his life was following a path.  This change of circumstance was part of a cycle.  It was part of a design.   It was not a reaction to any thing that was happening at the moment. (I do not agree with those who want to see every disaster as God's attempt to punish us.)

I mention in my last post how faith seems to survive regardless of circumstance.  One of the ways I am learning to mentally survive turmoil is to recognize that sometimes hardship is as much a part of life as weeds are a part of farming.  Farmers were doing battle with weeds before I started farming and they will still be battling weeds when I am gone.  Some things about life are just like weeds.   Having weeds is not a sign of personal failure.  (Maybe letting them go to seed and having more of them next year is?)   I hope you get what I mean.  I think I should not take every bump in the road of my life so personally.  The next traveler will hit the same bump. The problem is with the road not the traveler.

I also think that the best way to survive weeding is to discover that everyone else has weeds too.   Does your life have a good healthy crop of thistle?  We should probably let each other know. 

Saturday, July 2, 2011

Luke 22: 31 - 33 (continued)


When I was about 8 years old our family took at trip to visit Grandma in Louisiana.  Dad had been raised on a farm near Winnfield Louisiana along with 8 other brothers and sisters.   There were fig trees on the farm when dad was young.  During a trip to the now abandoned farm, dad dug up some small suckers from the fig trees to bring to California.  I remember we hid them under the seat to make it past the agriculture inspection station coming back into California.  We planted them in the backyard where I grew up.  Every place that I have lived, I have planted a cutting from the trees dad planted at my childhood home.  If I lived in an apartment I had a tree in a planter.  When we moved to Kelseyville one of the first trees that I planted was my dad’s fig.  That tree has become a symbol of something that has lasted generations.  Not only has the tree endured but as I watch it grow I feel connected to something that lasts.  Something that will continue to endure long after I am gone.

Farming has been harder than I had ever imagined. At times it has tested my faith.  (I have to admit that at times I have blamed God for it being so hard.)   How does one’s faith stand up during a trial?  What does that type of faith look like?   Jesus told Peter that this “sifting” the disciples were about to endure was so severe that it was necessary for Jesus to pray for Peter’s faith to endure.  I have experienced events in my life that should have driven me away from my faith in God.  I have at times doubted the validity of my own walk with God.  I have questioned if I even had any faith at all.  And then like a trick birthday candle that relights after you blow it out, a spark from somewhere unknown snaps the flame, ever so small, back into existence.  I do not will it.  I do not seek it. It is as if it seeks me.  Yes I know that those who mock my faith, from a position of never having had any, would suggest that I am flawed in this respect.  Yet I am not interested in convincing them otherwise.  They may have their fantasy and I shall have mine… or perhaps more correct.  My so called fantasy shall have me.  

My observations about the disciples “sifting” experience and their faith:
  1.  Jesus’ prayers are always answered.  Jesus said, “When you have returned” not “If you return”.   God preserves faith without human help. 
  2. Wherever Peter was returning from, his faith had never left him on the journey.  Where was he and what was the journey like?  I think I can compare my own journey with Peter's.
  3. He was humiliated. He had boasted that he would die for Jesus.  In the past I have said a lot of things about my faith in God.  If they could see me now.
  4. He was grieving.  After he denied Jesus, Jesus looked him in the eye and Peter recognized what he had done.  He ran off and wept.  I have often felt sorrow about my own weak faith.
  5. He was afraid.  When he saw Jesus was going to be executed he was afraid he would end up the same way since he was his follower.   I have sometimes wondered if my weak faith would bring disastrous results in my life.
  6. He hid.  Peter lost his courage and ran away to protect himself.  I have run from God and other people to try a find a safe place to be.
  7. He was disillusioned.   He had lost his focus.  One of the gospel writers mentioned that Peter went back to fishing.  He went back to doing what he had done before he met Jesus in the first place.  Out of my struggle for spiritual clarity I have been looking for a safe haven in things that have brought me peace in the past.
  8.  He was wondering.  I am sure Peter wondered about his own faith in Jesus.  He had spent three years of his life a disciple and now that was over.  Enough said.
  9. Peter’s faith, that endured, had no outward evidence of its existence.  He ran away.  Jesus predicted he would deny him three times.   I should not be so quick to judge who I think, has, and who I think, lacks, real faith.  I should be kinder to myself and the other Peters I meet in my life.
  10.  Peter could not tell that his present faith condition would be gone in a matter of hours.  He said, “I am ready to die for you”.   I should be careful when I think my own faith feels invincible.
  11. "Faith without works" (as is often quoted from the book of James) may be dead but works do not in of themselves demonstrate the faith that overcomes some trials.  That type of faith must be a gift from God and that faith outlives works.  I am thankful that when my own experience with God seems to lack any real dynamic, there is something still alive in the relationship.  I have not been abandoned.
  12. If Jesus is praying for me I can be sure of the eventual outcome. My dad had a favorite hymn.  It is an old hymn written by David Whittle in 1883. The words of the chorus go like this, "I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day".