“passing of the hero”
April 20th, 2007
Oswald Chambers wrote:
Our soul’s history with God is frequently the history of the “passing of the hero.” Over and over again, God has to remove our friends in order to bring Himself in their place, and that is where we faint and fail and get discouraged. Take it personally: In the year that the one who stood to me for all that God was, died — I gave up everything? I became ill? I got disheartened? Or — I saw the Lord?
It must be God first, God second, and God third, until the life is faced steadily with God and no one else is of any account whatever. “In all the world, there is none but thee, my God, there is none but thee.”
Keep paying the price. Let God see that you are willing to live up to the vision.
In the time since losing my father, one of my “hero” figures that Chambers speaks of, I’ve had to learn this lessen again and again. Perhaps now, this latest bout with the loss of a friend will be my last; perhaps I have finally learned what it is God has been trying to teach me for years. Or perhaps, as is more likely the case, I shall always experience this, at various points in my life, in order to continually remind me that God is my all.
Dad was my hero, my friend, my mentor, my teacher, my father — he was my first glimpse of who God is because he demonstrated what it meant to be a loving father and a bridegroom. I was blessed to have had 19 years with him. Nineteen rich, full years. And when I lost him, I lost my world. I lost my sense of justice. I lost my security.
It was then that God was calling my name, ever so softly, asking me to turn to Him and learn that He is my all.
I took a baby step that year.
And I’ve taken more steps as the years go by.
As people and circumstances and church families and social groups have come and gone in and out of my life, I have learned, step by step, to rely upon the Lord. The past couple of months have been the most incredible, for I feel that I have finally learned to put into practice what I have been learning in theory through the many times God has allowed the rug to be pulled from underneath me.
I am learning what it means to have the Lord be my all. What it means to have friendships and relationships with people and to cherish them but to be ready to lose them at a minute’s notice, and when I do, or when they change drastically, to be at peace with my circumstances, knowing the Lord is in sovereign control and knows the plans He has for me - plans for good and for a future and a hope (Jeremiah 29:11).
I have learned what it means to hold everything I have with an open hand — family, security, jobs, school, material things and comforts — ready and willing for the Lord to take them away as suddenly as He gifted me with them.
I have learned to thank Him in the midst of confusion and pain.
And I have learned that being in love with the Lord, walking with Him daily, making Him my all — my everything — the first person I turn to when I am afraid or stressed or angry or hurt — is one of the most satisfying and incredible feelings and experiences a human being could ever know.
I have found true joy and peace in a way I have never experienced before.
So when I came upon Chamber’s quote the other day, it struck home. No one else but Jesus is of any account in my life; I am learning what that means practically through living out my life, and it’s such an exciting adventure.
Of course, having realized this spiritual truth, I am on guard because I know I will be tested. It seems to be the case without fail that as soon as the Holy Spirit reveals insight and wisdom into the spiritual realm, and I achieve victory in some areas through His power and/or give counsel to another brother or sister about a specific issue, I am tested in that very area. Which is to be expected, for of course Satan doesn’t want us to grow spiritually; of course he is on the prowl and wants to strip us of the freedom we have in Christ; he shudders at any strides we make through the Holy Spirit’s help because it means we are that much closer to reflecting Jesus Christ’s character and person to the world around us. And it is Christ whom we are to model; to be like Christ is God’s will for us.
“Our model is the Jesus, not only of Calvary, but of the workshop, the roads, the crowds, the clamorous demands and surly oppositions, the lack of all peace and privacy, the interruptions.” -C.S. Lewis, “The Four Loves.”
So while I am rejoicing in knowing this truth — of experiencing the peace that comes through making Jesus number one, number two, number three, and number four in my life — I am also prayerful that I would not forget this lesson, that I would not forget my first love, that I would continually seek the Lord daily and make Him my everything.
It’s a daily commitment. A daily desire. A desire that I hope never to let become stagnate nor forgotten.
-Christen Patterson [Originally written June 2005; revised April 2007]
one pharisee, coming right up: reflections on war-torn sudan
April 11th, 2007
“No,” I assured her. “No, it’s not the first time.”
I didn’t explain that I had been reading news magazines and online accounts of the situation in the Sudan for years; it didn’t matter because I didn’t intend to explain away my tears. Sometimes weeping is the only response.
–
It was a Thursday evening, and we had just finished watching “The Invisible Children,” a powerful documentary detailing the hell the Sudanese people are facing at the hands of rebel forces in a war-torn country. The documentary particularly focuses on the thousands of Sudanese children forced to flee their homes every night to seek refuge and shelter in the cities out of fear of being captured and enslaved by rebel forces — enslaved into a life of calculated killing and terror, brainwashed soldiers-in-training.
As the images flashed upon the screen and the stories were told, my response was an emotional, broken response. As I sat there, with tears streaming down my face, I thought to myself, “Christen, pull yourself together.” Thirty college students surrounded me, thirty students who will be, in part, my students next year when I come on full-time staff with Intervarsity, and here I was, sobbing. It was an uncomfortable few minutes as I wrestled with what my response should be; students looked at me out of the corners of their eyes, unsure of what to do. I am one of the ones who is supposed to be strong, and yet I found myself with tears streaming down my face. My heart, broken. Answers, I had none. Except the plea, “Come quickly, Lord Jesus” and the prayer, “Have mercy, Lord.”
And I couldn’t help but question how many times are we faced with the uncomfortable fact that we have been born into privilege; how many times have I genuinely faced the hard, cold fact that for the first twenty-three years of my life, I lived in the third richest county of the United States? I am one of the “rich” Jesus talks about who will have more trouble entering into heaven than a camel will have entering in through the eye of a needle (Matthew 19:24). Yikes. I wish Jesus had never said that. It’s not something I want to deal with. I remember a conversation with my father during a car ride years ago; he pointed out that we were the “rich” ones Jesus was speaking about in that passage. I remember thinking to myself, “What in the world are you talking about, Dad? We’re not rich; our couches have stuffing coming out of them, we have duct tape on our stairs, we drive old cars…” but the older I become, the more I realize my father in his wisdom knew something I didn’t.
Compared to the rest of the world, I am faced with extreme richness and opportunity, and here I am, talking about trying to “make ends meet” in the struggling Michigan economy while the children of the Sudan are living a literal hell. And what provokes me is that despite their circumstances, they are still both praising Jesus and displaying great joy and hope. I should be ashamed of myself for ever complaining about anything or being tempted to complain. Period. I confess that I have been jealous of those around me who aren’t struggling financially; who by their financial status make me feel poor and who give me the “excuse” to feel self-righteous because of the way I choose to spend my finances. I think “Well, God, you’re pretty lucky to have me because I’m frugal and I manage your money well.” What a dreadful disease pride is, allowing us to rank ourselves, consciously or unconsciously, against those around us. And then I am confronted with the documentary “The Invisible Children” and I am immediately brought to my knees in repentance for being a Pharisee and priding myself on how I am not materialistic.
And I sit there, sobbing, because the reality is that the tears streaming down my face expose the realization that I could be doing so much more. As I watched those beautiful children, scarred — emotionally and physically — praising our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, with joy, hope, and resilience etched upon their faces, I was forced to examine my own heart; if I faced the same circumstances, would I have the same response, and furthermore, with the privilege and power that I do have, what is my response to their plight and the plight of so many others around the world?
It’s one thing to have empathy for another, and empathy is certainly one of the first steps, but the true question we should be asking ourselves is, what do you do with that empathy?
So I ask you: in light of this broken, messed-up world, with nations being torn apart by war, with men and women committing atrocities, with children growing up with delinquent or absent parents, with disease ravishing bodies, with the poors’ needs not being taken care of, what are you doing? What is your emotional response? What is your physical response? Or would you rather not think about it today and deal with it tomorrow?
Some of these children will not have a tomorrow.
- Christen Patterson
April 2007