Through a Glass Darkly

Today, a guest post from the blog Flagrant Regard. A longer version appears at the link in the title below.

‘Through A Glass Darkly’ – A Lesson On Spiritual Renewal

“We are all messed up like a person compromised with impurity; even all our right efforts are like soiled rags. We’re drying up like a leaf in autumn …”
Book of the prophet Isaiah, Chapter 64, verse 6

THE JOURNEY GETS MESSY

At the point of our conversion (or in my case, my reconversion), we’re given a new perspective by God which allows us to see more clearly the world around us and how broken it is. At the same time (and maybe more importantly) we are given much needed insight with respect to our own soul and moral character and how poorly developed they truly are. We become aware of God’s unmerited love for us but receive along with that a glimpse of how distant our goodness is from the goodness and purity of God. And because of our new, clearer perspective, we find ourselves humbly asking God for strength and the ability to live our salvaged-by-Grace lives for Him with a sincere determination.

But at some point, after this ‘great awakening’, we lapse back into familiar ways – well I believe most of us do – and find that the things of the Spirit become less important or engrossing compared to the urgent issues and distractions that make up our day-to-day existence. Still having the Spirit of God within us, we may become aware of this lapse, but often feel helpless to deal with it. And then guilt sets in – the biggest nail in the coffin for a once spiritually inspired, enthusiastic mindset. So we pray, “God get me out of this funk.” Or, “Make me better than I am.” Or, “Fix me (or things) again so I can feel connected to You!” But these repeated requests or prayers often come across as a seemingly useless endeavour. It’s like trying to repair or clean things up with broken and dirty implements.

And that’s exactly what we’re doing.

As our spiritual energy and connection to God seems to diminish, we feel caught in a loop and a dryness of the soul begins to overwhelm us. This is a dangerous ‘tipping point’ for some believers. If they don’t feel or see enough of God’s power in their lives, they walk away from the faith and give up ‘trying’.

HOW YOU BRING AN END TO A SPIRITUAL RUT

Here’s the thing: you can’t. As your spiritual life continues, you will lose connection with God frequently and all your efforts to rekindle the excitement or ‘vision’ you had the day you knew God had entered your life will, in your mind, amount to a hill of beans. You’ll feel adrift in stagnant water and those living waters Jesus promised his followers are somewhere on the other side of dark mountains that have seemingly hemmed you in. Welcome to the valley of the shadow of death. You have now joined the ranks of every single believer who’s ever asked God to change them! This might come as a shocker, but you were meant to arrive here.

“Why?”, you ask.

Because it is at this time, God is about to reveal to you that everything you think you have done or have attempted to do to put things right between you and Him is not unlike your trying to clean a pair of glasses with dirty rags. And as long as you continue to assume you’re the one who has to clean up your spiritual lenses to restore clarity, perspective and objectivity to your own soul-view you will fail miserably because God has set it up that way.

Again, you ask, “Why? Why would God allow me fall so hard if I am doing my best to put things right?”

He does this so that He can reveal within us His power, His strength and what His vision for you truly is. It’s only when every light you’ve tried to keep going has gone out that it’s His time to shine! When your knees have hit the floor it’s then He eagerly shows you how strong His arms are by pulling you back up. He takes your worn-down perceptions – all the methods that you thought were going to keep you connected to Him or ‘spiritual’ – and tosses them into His washing machine. Then He hands you back those things that are really needed to really make a difference in your world, your outlook and life-experiences.

God likes to show off – the Scriptures evidence this repeatedly with respect to His character and/or his modus operandi. Deep in our personal valleys, if/when we continue to walk by faith (what little there may be of it at times) He will restore our spiritual sight by showing us who He really is by answering our prayers from an unexpected angle or entering our world in ways we never would have anticipated.

“Humility is the mother of giants. One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.”
~ G.K. Chesterton

This kind of thing – beautiful and powerful spiritual renewal – happens frequently over one’s lifetime in the hearts of those who humbly walk with God. Admittedly, it takes a lot of patience and waiting for it to happen. But God helps with that too … just hang … on … a little … longer!

Wash, rinse, repeat.

This is God’s style of restoration and it’s so welcomed, especially when we’re spent from our trying so hard. With respect to our dealing with ourselves and God, preacher and author, John Ortberg, instructs us to ‘try softer’.

“Often the people in the Gospels who got in the most trouble with Jesus were the ones who thought they were working hardest on their spiritual life. They were trying so hard to be good that they could not stop thinking about how hard they were trying. It got in the way of them loving people. … there is an alternative: Try softer. Try better. Try different. A river of living water is now available, but the river is the Spirit. It is not you. … Don’t push the river.”
~ John Ortberg, from the book, ‘The Me I Want To Be’

WHAT’S THE WORD ON ALL OF THIS?

I cannot emphasize this enough: the Bible and its guiding principles as presented to us through the many colourful characters who authored it is like having a legal representative with you when you are in your darkest trial and at your lowest ebb. It stands beside you to instruct you when direction is seeminly absent. It is there to remove (not add to) your guilt when you may be completely bereft of feelings, spiritual enthusiasm or at the tail end of your faith. There is NOTHING you are experiencing (including the dryness of soul and even the disdain for all things spiritual) that has not been experienced by those who went before us – from Adam to Amos, Joseph to Jesus, Paul to Peter.

Read the Word and wait. Don’t read it, and you’ll feel utterly alone. I don’t care if you’re a literalist or a liberal – the Power of God is in that set of 66 books. You will find God in those words (try to resource a good translation like the New International Version or The Voice) and they will comfort you and set you up for that glorious moment of restoration – the big wash – that is coming to restore you to a fresh awareness of God’s will for your life and a clarity of vision that only He can provide.

FINAL THOUGHTS

In the medical field, visual clarity isn’t something that occurs by one’s trying to see better or by applying a plethora of home-remedies. It occurs via the efforts of a skilled outside agent who is able to alter the eye’s lens in order to enhance or correct poor vision. Similarly, we must await God’s agent – the Spirit – to restore to us the perspective, outlook and vision we are deeply in need of to get through this thing called life. We cannot experience these necessary renewals through any amount of redo’s that we embark on, no matter how sincere our effort.

Wait for God to be the Saviour He truly is. You will not be disappointed.

“But those who trust in the Eternal One will regain their strength. They will soar on wings as eagles. They will run—never winded, never weary. They will walk—never tired, never faint.”
The book of the prophet Isaiah, chapter 40, verse 31 (The Voice Translation)

“The temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so that you can endure.”
Paul’s 1^st letter to the Corinthians, Chapter 10, verse 13 (New Living Translation)

“Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death.”
Paul’s second letter to the church in Corinth, chapter 7, verse 10 (NIV Translation)

“Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent.”
Book of Revelation chapter 3, verse 19 – Jesus speaking through John the disciple to the church in Laodicea (N.I.V. Translation)

“For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.”
Paul’s letter to the Phillippians, Chapter 2, verse 13

“To those who through the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ have received a faith as precious as ours: Grace and peace be yours in abundance through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.”
Second letter of Peter, chapter 1, verses 1 thru 4 (NIV Translation)

 

©Flagrant Regard; used by permission

Turning a Sinner — Who is Among You — From Error

^{NIV James 5:19} My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring that person back, ²⁰ remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

The last two verses in the book of James are not typical of the way an epistle usually ends. They have been the subject of much writing. After clicking through more than a dozen options which I rejected (too long, audio link to sermons, forcing the text to address another agenda, etc.) I settled on these.

To kick things off, two short answers from a Catholic forum (yes really!) starting with:

This verse is somewhat ambiguous in the way that it’s written; given the way it’s constructed, it’s a reasonable question to ask “whose soul is saved? whose sins are covered? The revert, or the person who brought him back?”

Clearly, sacramental absolution — that is, ‘confession’ — is a necessary part of every Catholic’s life, and the letter to James isn’t suggesting an alternate path to forgiveness. With that in mind, and given some of the textual clues in the letter, it seems reasonable to suggest that a person who brings back a person to the faith is part of the process by which that person’s soul is saved, and is part of the dynamic by which that fallen-away Christian’s sins may be wiped away — none of which would have happened if that person didn’t bring the fallen-away Christian back into the fold!

And:

Scholars are divided to the exact meaning. What seems clear is the importance placed on the corporeal work of mercy of regaining a lost brother. “will save his soul from death” more likely refers to the lost brother’s not the re-gainer since the confession and apostasy seem to be chief concerns. “A multitude of sins”: some scholars say of the lost, some the re-gainer, some say both. The language is similar to 1 Pt 4:8 and Prov 10:12. These verses seem disconnected from the preceding ones. A practical thought might be that if your brother remained heretical, he may persuade others in his way, whereas due to your intervention, your brother returned and no longer persuaded others (that’s just a thought). But there is no question that the writers thought communally of both sin and benefit of fervent prayer.

Sorry, nothing definitive. Hope it helps.

Still with us?  Here’s a point-form outline from a local Church of Christ assembly that was simply immune to all attempts to copy and paste.

Finally, from the website Pure Unadulterated Grace, one more response. This is lengthier than I’ve reproduced here, so you’re encouraged to read it in context.

The word “save” in James 5:15 means exactly what it meant in verse 20.  Our opponents like to read, “save a soul” as meaning “saved from eternal damnation” but the context clearly does not allow for that rendering, as the “save the sick” in verse 15 clearly was not “saved from damnation.”  One can see that the “save” of verse 15 continued with the same meaning into verse 20.  The word “save” was already defined by the context (vs. 15), so if “save” in verse 20 referred to another type of saving then James would have made it clear.  The word “soul” had to do with the physical life of a person that flows consistently with the previous verses of one that was sick, and this was the saving in the context.  To read “saved or healed the sick” in verse 15, but “saved from eternal damnation” in verse 20 is simply being entirely dishonest with the context.

Verse 19 makes it clear that James was addressing “Brethren” who very well might “err from the truth.”  It would be another “brethren” (not God) to convert him from the “errors of his way” as it was not a “brethren” lost again being saved from eternal damnation.  This again flows with the context of restoration and not a person spared eternal damnation by hearing the gospel afresh.

People see the word “convert” and immediately assume that it refers to being saved by grace that is not in the context here, but rather it refers to the errors one has turned after.  It certainly can refer to one that is in darkness coming to see the light, but the context always determines that and never leaves us guessing.  Convert simply means to “turn back, to return.”  The brethren was to turn back to the truth and no longer the error he fell into, as this was not a “return back to eternal life.”  Nothing even states the loss of salvation.

Verse 20:  Who here is hiding a multitude of sins?  God?  No, He is not in the context here.  God forgives sins and not hides them.  Some try to say “hide” means forgiveness, but God does not merely veil our sins today but rather He takes them away.  You will find one parallel passage to what you read here in James 5:20 in 1^st Peter 4:8:

⁸And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins.

…This paragraph is important: Was Peter saying that our love would cause God to forgive a multitude of sins of another believer?  No, so neither was James saying that our converting the “brethren” from error would cause God to forgive him of a multitude of sins, but that is what our opponents would like for us to think that James was saying.  This is not a brethren being forgiven again by God, but being restored by a fellow “brethren.”  This is not a believer being saved a second time from eternal damnation, but rather being restored by a fellow “brethren.”

…The person that erred was to be restored in love, and not with “turn or burn” type of nonsense.  This is a practice seldom seen in the church today, because the treatment a person receives for falling away can be quite abusive.  A person often is embarrassed to come back to the truth because of all the gossipers and the ill speech found in most religions today.  A person does not care to come back to the faith where they feel only judgment and glaring eyes await them.

I talk to people all the time that have been rejected by family and friends.  People do not want to stand before a large congregation and ask for forgiveness for whatever it was they did wrong, as religion abuses scripture and people.  These poor souls have no business confessing their sins before a large congregation, as they do not need reconciliation from Joe Smith that they do not know personally, and have not offended personally.  James 5:19-20 clearly was restoration and not preaching fear or guilt tactics.  The hiding a multitude of sins was the fellow brethren accepting the other brethren and their faults, and not God forgiving the person.

James 5:19-20 is not even remotely teaching eternal damnation, loss of salvation, the gospel, God forgiving the erring brethren, or saving him a second or third time from eternal damnation.  Once we stop adding words nowhere stated in the passage is when everything tends to clear up.  Our opponents focused on the words “saved from death…cover a multitude of sins” and have ran off with it ignoring the entire context.

It was the “brethren” that was doing the “converting,” it was the “brethren” that was doing the “saving,” and it was the “brethren” doing the hiding of a “multitude of sins” here.  Religion has allowed our eyes to see words and ideas nowhere presented in the context.  If this passage scared you before then read it again and notice that James preached no fear there at all, but loving restoration only.

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I think that various commentaries can give us hints as to the meaning, but probably the framework through which you’re reading this may lead you to a more individual response. Like so many other scripture passages, I think this one is meant to challenge us to think! If you have any thoughts on this passage, be sure to leave a comment.