April 18, 2012
Defending
When someone goes on
the attack after our child, our parent or our spouse the gloves come off and we
rush to the rescue. We won’t let anyone say something bad about our loved ones
without responding. And yet, how often do we hear people in all walks of life
go after our Heavenly Father without coming to His defense. Certainly we know
that God can take care of Himself, but defending Him is part of our family relationship.
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Gail;
-----I like to think that I would step in front of anything attacking my loved ones. I generally don’t like the thought of physically fighting off an aggressor, especially since I know next to nothing about how to fight. And I doubt if I would do much better if the attack was verbal. I think I would do even less well stepping between an attacker and the Lord. For not only am I lousy at fighting, I have absolutely no platform from which to defend Him. On top of that, Jesus Christ said that we should love everyone, even our enemy, who would be the one attacking. And now does not the task become giant and confusing?
-----I remember one time I found myself in exactly that dreaded spot. A rowdy patron was being thrown out of a restaurant by its owner and a couple other folks. The patron pasted the owner in the mouth, knocking him down, then backed off several feet. I was horrified! And my compassion for the owner was inflamed. I had become passionate beyond words. So when rowdy began a second approach, I had nothing to offer but a resolute glare above a sneer, a fist, a prepared stance, and a finger pointing to where he should leave. I was really surprised when rowdy took the suggestion of my point and left; in those days my stature was even more mousy than it is now. I think his flight had less to do with me and more to do with the picture of solidarity my actions drew. The sight of four before him must have finally soaked through his emotional rage and met up with his better senses.
-----By myself I had no platform from which to defend the restaurant owner, let alone any substance to fill up the formidable expression I tried to make. But together, the four of us were both the platform and the defense. And it was not flying teeth and squirting blood that sent rowdy packing, but simply the obvious sense in what he saw. By ourselves we have no platform to defend the Lord. And what fist could we throw against the evils which mock and deride Him in these times? But what we have are the hands of those around us to hold and their hearts to love. We have stature made by pouring ourselves out, the shock of the same paradox by which He defended us. Together, through the love He poured into us we become the platform for His defense as He Himself stated, “...that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places.” (Eph 3:10)
-----It isn’t that they are the ones attacking God and need to see. It is that in now knowing His wisdom, they join also in the platform for His defense. God, His people in the church, and all other creatures of His heaven together point with one unified finger towards the fiery lake of Hell.
-----It isn’t like I actually want anyone to experience that place for more than a moment (maybe like a baptizing dip.) Possibly God’s angels also cringe at the idea of their once beloved Lucifer and one third of their sweetheart friends surfing those fiery waves. But after the carnage God’s mockers have raised to now has joined the horrors the Beast will bring during the tribulation, one more instance of his insanity raised following a thousand years of blissful, peaceful, and righteous life on Earth will be enough to bring every one of God’s creatures to a stance pointing at that lake of fire making one giant prayerful statement for God's will to throw them in. For sure we live in His defense by loving what is right and speaking what is true and being bold for what must be done.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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