DEFIANT DEFENSE David said: “The Lord is my chosen and assigned portion, my cup; You hold and maintain my lot. The “boundary” lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; yes, I have a good heritage,” (Psalm 16:5-6). The Lord controls my fate. I hold in my heart my divine cup of destiny, the cup containing the swirling stages of my life on earth, the hopes and dreams, the opportunities and disappointments all mingling into the fulfillment of His plan and purpose. Whatever storms wage around me, when much is unsure in my life, I stand secure in my allotted place in His heart. My world is a battleground. I fight against sinful temptations within me and against assaults of evil around me. I am a spiritual new creature walking an old, barren land of sin, seeking separation not integration, and with the weapons to secure this goal. I fight to retain my holiness and establish my battle lines within me, to increase my resistance against the sin that frequently seeks to entice me. I do not fight my battles on worldly “fleshly” principles. My weapons are not of this world (Ephesians 6:11-12). They are full of divine power, employed in the sight of God, ready to overthrow strongholds of wickedness, every high and mighty thing which sets itself up in opposition to the true knowledge of God. I take captive every thought, every human device to secure its submission to the Lord,” (2nd Corinthians 10:3-5). I tell myself, if I have the merest grasp of glory-filled heaven and my assured place within its gates, I can cope with any earth-rooted, hell- inspired adversity. I am always and only passing through this alien world of sin- infused systems. Yet even passing through is at times so hard. So life goes on and sometimes I grow weary. I acknowledge there are seasons when, day after day, month after month there is waged a grueling campaign of adversity that would seek to destroy my desire and my will to fulfill my calling, because the circumstances are overwhelming and perhaps will only get worse. This ongoing struggle often gives birth to a rebellious attitude which poisons my perceptions, thus transforming the calling of my commitment to love and to serve others into mere drudgery, burdens that have to be borne, and they are increasingly borne with an unwilling spirit and with resentment as my attitude falls captive to the devil’s deceptive trap that God has forgotten me, and it’s all over. But I do waken up. I stand defiant on the faithfulness of God, embraced in His all- encompassing love. His love encourages, protects, comforts, and, in the midst of tears, produces joy in ridiculous, abundant amounts. This is my time to stand defiantly, the time to refuse to give up, the time to pray for the strength of compassion, for the energy of the Holy Spirit, the submission of a servant to her Master. After all, why should life be easy? I cannot find an answer to that question in the Word. Life is not easy; heaven will be easy. It is on earth that I am prepared for perfection, for holiness, for selflessness, and that preparation will never be accomplished within a life style of earthly ease. A life of perceived hardships is transformed into a life of fulfillment when I acknowledge I have a calling on my life and God is faithful to my calling, and His purpose will be fulfilled (1st Thessalonians 5:24). I must retain the quality of “ease” within my spirit, the peace that passes understanding (Philippians 4:7), cancelling the stress as I feel His powerful, controlling hand over the totality of my life. God’s Word tells me that “having done everything to stand firm,” (Ephesians 6:13). When I have difficulty doing so, I may turn to the examples in the Word that will encourage me. I picture Rahab, the Canaanite harlot, full of faith, believing in this powerful Israelite God’s promise, communicated through His spies, to save her and her family when all others within her city of Jericho will perish (Joshua 2). As the walls tremble and the enemy with shouts of victory invade and slaughter her people, I see her clutching defiantly the scarlet cord hanging over the wall from her window, the blood-colored, redemptive promise which threads its way through time, entangling human history with the divine until the reality of the blood-stained cross of the Christ that forever stands defiant against sin and evil. Emboldened, now I stand, confident that His goodness and mercy are behind me (Psalm 23:6); I stand defiant praying for endurance even as the sun fades and the shadows of gloom lengthen. Then I picture the exiled Israelite lads, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego who were flung into the hottest furnace King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon could produce (Daniel 3), seven times hotter than the usual, all because they refused to bow down and worship the golden image of the King himself. In fact they were seen, unaffected by the heat, their bounds loosened, walking together with the Son of God in the midst of the fire. And He still walks with us in the midst of our fires which threaten to overcome us. I remember Joseph, the Israelite slave wrongly imprisoned in an Egyptian jail for attempted rape of an Egyptian officer’s wife (Genesis 39). Surely that was the end of Joseph, but Joseph was the son of Jacob the patriarch of the Covenant whose sons, including Joseph, would form the twelve tribes out of which the nation of Israel would be birthed. Joseph kept in his heart the boyhood memory of his God- given dreams when his brothers would bow down to him (Genesis 37), and he kept not just faith in God but his integrity even when accused unjustly, and he continued to honor his God. And God honored him for in the space of less than a day he emerged from the deep prison cells to the position of second in command of Egypt under the Pharaoh (Genesis 41). God delivered Joseph and He delivers us. Psalm 20:7-8 states: “We who trust and boast in the name of the Lord our God, we are risen and stand upright. They, the people of the world, are bowed down and fallen; we rally and gather strength.” In 1521 the great reformer Martin Luther stood before the Diet of Worms, the powerful legal assembly of Charles V and the Lords of the German states and the representative of the Pope. The previous year Pope Leo X had issued a papal bull of excommunication against Luther on the charge of heresy. Heresy was committed when a baptized member of the church was supporting and spreading a doctrine that went against the church’s core beliefs. Luther had gloriously discovered in the Word of God that salvation was by faith and not by works (Ephesians 2:8-9); there was absolutely nothing anyone could do to be saved. This directly contradicted the church’s belief that salvation was by works, the human-decreed works that contributed much revenue to the coffers of the church. The penalty for heresy was death. At trial Luther was confronted and condemned by the books he had written, the lectures he had taught. Luther denied the charge, and his final words in his defense were words of holy defiance and humility: “Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me. Amen.” This is not a declaration of defeat but of defiance anchored in a glorious declaration of weakness, “God help me,” and He did. Even as this man, in his imagination, felt the heat of the burning stake threatening to torture and devour his flesh, Luther’s spirit and soul stood in holy defiance, unwilling indeed unable to deny his revelation of salvation. Yet in his humility he stood asking for God’s help. He ended his prayer by saying “Amen” so be it, thus submitting himself to the will of His God. Luther had no crisis of conscience but stood firm like Paul who, faced with unjust criticisms of jealous men, proclaimed, “I am what I am,” (1st Corinthians 15:10). Paul gloried in his freedom from the tyranny of the Law because he could never fully keep it; and Luther shook off the shackles of man-composed rituals and laws, glorying in his freedom from the corrupted clutches of church doctrine. A unanimous vote was required for condemnation but the vote was split and so Luther lived on. Luther, Paul and you and I are freed into salvation through faith, freed to flourish in the fruit of the Spirit, accomplishing God-ordained works, in humility, in confidence, in holy boldness, and in so much gratitude for our Jesus. God is my Deliverer (2nd Samuel 22:2) and He continues to deliver me, first and foremost, from my selfish self. So I keep fighting, and when I have spent my strength I stand defiant. Therein I have excellent company. In my Lord’s service, Gillian |
| WELCOME TO GILLIAN'S LETTER !! |
EMAIL DUSTY A COMMENT dustyxxxx@yahoo.com FOR GILLIAN TO BE POSTED HERE!! RETURN TO SITEMAP RETURN TO FRONT PORCH GILLIANS ARCHIVES |
By way of introduction, Gillian is a lovely lady I met recently at the monthly Return Ministries meeting. For those of you who don't know, Return Ministries is the prison ministry I'm a member of. They're the ones who send me into the jails to do bible study with the inmates on Saturdays, and out to volunteer in the Chaplain's office during the week. Gillian attended her first meeting a few weeks ago & when I heard that she had her own website, well......the rest is history! LOL! Her site is NOT like the porch. Where I'm given to whimsy and graphics, Gillian's is primarily text-based...and her subject matter grasped me from the start!! Not only is this woman on a MISSION to know & grow closer to the Lord, she's finding the answers she seeks by diving into the depths of the Bible and discovering how it relates to her: her life, her journey and others around her!! Fascinating stuff!!!!! By the second entry? I was hooked! Originally from Scotland, (complete with the most charming accent you ever heard!!) Gillian came over yesterday and we spent a delightful afternoon drinking tea on my little porch (literally !) and she's agreed to let me post a regular letter she emails out to a select group of friends once a month! WHAT A GENEROUS SPIRIT! So join me, if you will, as we accompany Gillian on her journey to seek the knowlege, wisdom & enlightenment contained in Our Lord's Holy Bible........it's only 1 letter per month which is fine with me...cause it will take me at least that long to look up & read the Scriptures she lists, digest what she's found, discover what I find, and come up with my own observations!! You too? Enjoy!! .....and GIllian? Many thanks!! Love, Dusty |
