• Just a reminder that there is no Selah (music and prayer) tonight. If you would, please pray for the elders as we deliberate singing in worship in response to the governor’s recent directive. Also, I invite you to join us for worship Sunday evening. I’ll be offering thoughts on how to understand the biblical roles of men and women in home and the Church, in contrast to the cultural solutions being offered.
• I was reminded several times this week that one of the most destructive questions to ask in this brief sojourn on earth is “How am I being treated?” Nothing will destroy your marriage, your character as a parent, your church, or your personal service to Jesus Christ so quickly as that one question. Once considered petty and small-minded, then tolerated, it is now an assumed ethic: a question we are supposed to ask. When I was a child, President Kennedy famously said, “ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country,” a statement that was widely acknowledged as noble and a necessary corrective to human self-absorption. But a few weeks ago, when I tuned-in to watch a political debate, both candidates opened with appeals to self-interest, as though great matters of political discourse could be reduced to self. Presumably they felt they were playing their strongest card. What a misery.
• You can ask “how am I being treated?” all you want, but it will cost you the opportunity to follow Christ who “in humility counted others more significant” than himself (Php 2:3), who came “not to be served but to serve” (Mk 10:45); and who was “oppressed and afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth” (Isa 53:7) in order that others might live through his death. Let me be more plain: “how am I being treated?” is a blasphemy. In the Kingdom of God, it is treason. It is an affront to any biblical understanding of Jesus Christ whose entire mission as Messiah depended on never entertaining a thought that approached such a question. For your own sake, for the sake of your Savior, and for the sake of all those around you, be done with it. Pronounce a curse upon it. Pray each day that the question will stop entering your mind.
• We are safe and cared for not because we attend to such things, but because our Lord attends to them. Consider John 10, “…he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out” and “if anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture… that they may have life and have it abundantly.” As Jesus said, “are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows” (Luke 12:6,7). Maybe most to the point, “he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” So we can confidently say, “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?” (Heb. 13:5).
• There it is: what can man do to you? Apparently, not much that matters. Part of Paul’s ordinary service to Christ was “through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise” (2 Cor 6:8). Does that mean we should put up with being slandered and dishonored? Yes, that’s what that means. It also means it doesn’t matter. What matters is that “no fault may be found with our ministry” and that “as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way” (2 Cor 6:3). That’s what matters. Let’s get serious about what matters.
• Lisa reminded me of the important caveat for people in abusive relationships. If you are in a relationship that is genuinely abusive (not just difficult or demanding, which all relationships are at some point), then the question of how you are being treated becomes important. Physical abuse is punishable by law and should be; verbal abuse is subject to the discipline of the Church and should be. If you believe you are in such a relationship, I encourage you to call the elder or pastor you are most comfortable speaking with, or call a trusted friend. If you are in a physically abusive relationship, I urge you to call one of the pastors and the police.