Everything’s So Blurry…even this

Posted on August 13, 2019 by America's Keswick in Freedom Fighters

“The LORD is your keeper; The LORD is your shade on your right side. The sun will not smite you by the day, Nor the moon at night. The LORD will protect you from all evil; He will keep your soul” Psalm 121:5-7 (NASB)

I don’t have to make anyone any more aware that we ain’t living in a very safe place during a very safe time, do I? I mean, you don’t even need cable news to tell you how ‘not safe’ things have gotten. Folks can’t go shopping or enjoy an evening out without something evil rearing its ugliness upon the situation. If that’s not bad enough, we have all these resident know-it-all’s of Secularland, pointing fingers during interviews, casting down blame and not offering reasonable solutions.

Even the everyday Christian chimes in with a little something or other about the lack of God in things, and that would be right to say, if only it were to be left just like that, but even the everyday Christian can get it wrong. And that’s something we need to understand…that we Christians do gets things wrong, even in our walk with God.

Psalm 121 is one of those Psalms where, in a gentle, kind way we are being told that our gazes aren’t really on the right thing. “I will lift up my eyes to the mountains; From whence shall my help come?” (Psalm 121:1). Mountain ranges can be great places to look up to but when this Psalm was written, the mountains were places full of paganistic worship. There was all kinds of nonsense going on in them there hills. I kinda remember a story about Elijah telling the prophets of Baal to, “Call a little louder! He’s a god after all, maybe he’s overslept and needs to be woken up?” (1 Kings 18:27). Even the prophet Jeremiah writes, “Surely, the hills are a deception, A tumult on the mountains” (Jer 3:23a).

In his book, “A Long Obedience in the Same Direction”, Eugene Peterson says that the great dangers of Christian discipleship is that we have two religions. One that is a Biblical Sunday gospel meant to deal with the big cries of existence and a Readers Digest condensed gospel that has “huckstered wisdom of a talk show celebrity.” So, with that being said, when we see the kinda evil that has reigned down recently we look at the majesty of creation and go to its Creator shouting “LORD save us all” instead of gazing inwardly and humbling ask, “Please Lord help me?”

If those Christians, who are out there now screaming how much the world needs God put back into things, would instead share how God has done an amazing work in their own hearts maybe the Great Commission would be allowed to do its work. Now that’s just my opinion, not a theological statement to debate, but feel free to disagree with me. I look forward to hearing from you. Anyway…

A lot of us are aware of something we read in 1 John 2:15-17 and it starts of with, “Do not love the world nor the things of in the world.” But what exactly is the “world” that the Christian disciple is not to love? If “God so loved the world” (John 3:16) are His children to do less? Here’s where the line gets blurry, today’s Christian has adopted the good things culture and society offer, just look at their photo’s on social media, but rarely will they get involved to create a positive change. They’ll have an opinion to share about secular or political affairs but that’s where it ends for them. Apparently, it is easier to rest on “For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever, Amen.” (Romans 1:25) and not do our part to expose the lie.

In closing today, let me say that the Christian life has a fine line between its quiet, uninterrupted prayerful stroll in the garden with the Lord and being stuck on “The Happiest Cruise That Ever Sailed” while “It’s a Small World After All” repeats itself over and over again until it’s so stuck in your head that you’re literally praying, “make it stop, make it stop.” It’s right down that line where the words of Psalm 121 can guard us against the evil of the world and yet allow us enough room to walk into a world that desperately needs to hear how the love of Jesus Christ is what it is going to take to combat the evil that surrounds us in these very uncertain days. We can be “in it but not of it” all we want but if you ain’t impacting it, the world will never know why, Jesus Saves!!” Amen?

Written by Chris Hughes: Chris, a graduate of The Colony of Mercy (11-2003) has been married for 25+ years (Kathy), has a married son (Kevin) and a daughter in college (Karen). He has been a Freedom Fighter contributor since 2008.

Think About This: “It will always be true that the wisest course for the disciple is always to abide solely by the Word of God in all simplicity.” — Dietrich Bonhoeffer

The Daily Bible Reading: Psalms 87-88, 1 Peter 3| You can download our 2018 Daily Bible Reading Plan by clicking here

This Week’s Verse to Memorize: Who is wise? Let him understand these things. Who is prudent? Let him know them. For the ways of the Lord are right; the righteous walk in them, but transgressors stumble in them. – Hosea 14:9

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the doctrinal and theological views held by America’s Keswick.