June 2021 – AD CAELOS

Everybody worships

When your day is long
And the night, the night is yours alone
When you’re sure you’ve had enough
Of this life, well hang on
Don’t let yourself go
‘Cause everybody cries
Everybody hurts sometimes
So hold on.
R.E.M.

Whether you’re having a bad day, going through a bit of a rough patch, or having a bad life, I highly recommend watching R.E.M.’s 2008 Hyde Park performance of “Everybody Hurts” on YouTube. It’s wonderfully delivered and a very moving reminder of our common humanity. It’ll give you some comfort.

Everybody hurts. It’s also true that everybody worships. It doesn’t matter if you’re Christian, Buddhist, a New Ager, Agnostic, or Atheist, something in between or none of the above, if you’re a human being, you will inevitably worship.

Don’t be put off by the word. In this context, worship simply means to have something — a person or idea or philosophy, whatever — in which you place your hope, your identity, your meaning. What we put there often has to do with how deeply we hurt, whether we find ourselves moving towards despair.

At the end of the day, we’ve got two choices in terms of what we worship: the Creator or the created. Put your hope in the latter and you’ll be disappointed every single time. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but eventually you will be let down.

God will never, ever, ever let you down. Build your house on rock, not sand.

A crushed spirit — and what to do about it.

As I’ve said before, I like Tim Keller. The guy just speaks to me.

In one of his sermons, Keller speaks of the wounded or crushed spirit — what causes it. His answer: “it’s complicated.” It can have one of four causes, or combinations of any the four.

The first cause is medical/physical. The “we’re just a body” crowd tends to focus on this one. The most obvious example of this is biochemical depression, but it could also be a bad thyroid, physical exhaustion, or whatever.

The second cause is emotional or relational. People into self esteem focus here. If you buy in to the lie that above all else you must “believe in yourself,” you’re in for some bitter disappointment: You will fail you.

The third cause is conscience/moral. Many Christians tend to focus here. God implants in every human being a moral code. Ignore that code, as we all do as broken beings, and you’ll be haunted by a guilty conscience.

The fourth is existential/philosophical. If you are honest with yourself and think — really think — you’ll come to realize (with Nietzsche and others) that there exists in this world a “ground note of sadness” that cannot be overcome. All joy ends in grief: It is a fact that if you think about the people whom you love the most, there will be one of you in that group who lives long enough to see every one else die.

So what’s one to do about all this? Well, if it’s medical, get help. If it’s emotional or relational, do not put any person in a place that only God should be. For issues of conscience, you’ll do well to understand that we’re all deeply broken, confess your trespasses to God, and ask for forgiveness and strength not to repeat what you’ve done. (Also, remember: “There, but by the grace of God, go I.”)

Regarding the fourth, the Bible speaks of the Tree of Life, which represents the fullness of life, absolute satiation. Problem is, post expulsion from Eden, we are barred from it by an angel with a flaming sword.

Now is an in-between time. The good news is that we are saved by Christ, none of our sins are held against us, the price of justice has been paid in full. Yet still we weep. We must be content for now in the knowledge that soon enough the world we be set to rights. And God will dry every tear.

Source: Tim Keller’s sermon at https://youtu.be/pkL3R27ZV1o

Doubt

I was reading chapter 17 of Exodus this morning. The people of Israel had already grumbled in the previous chapter about not having food — God gave them food; they grumbled in this chapter about being thirsty — God gave them water.

All fine and well.

But then I read the final verses of chapter 17 about the Amalekite people attacking the Israelites in the wilderness, and a doubt overcame me that this part was a true story. It seemed so, well, unbelievable — even bothersome — that God would magically use Moses’ staff to overcome the enemy on the battlefield. This account must have been a later insertion.

So I immediately prayed that God would forgive me. Before I could even fully form the thought, God told me not to worry — it’s ok, even natural, to doubt like that. I smiled to myself and then finished reading the story. It ended with this verse:

“The LORD will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.”

Curious, I googled Amalek. Who the heck is that? Well, it turns out that he was the grandson of our hairy friend Esau. His people, the Amalekites, lived in the area near Horeb where Moses struck the rock to water his people. But here’s a quote from the googled commentary that struck me:

“Amalek is the constant doubter, brazenly rushing to any sign of passion for holiness and cooling things down.”

That, sayeth the LORD, is the bad kind of doubt.

Source: chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/3942715/jewish/Who-Were-Amalek-and-the-Amalekites