The Damascus road.
Just as there are good grounds for confidence in biblical prophecy, so too there are good grounds to rely on the truth of the miraculous events recorded in the Bible. In the New Testament, these are explicitly said to be based on eyewitness testimony. The apostle John, for example, talks about that “which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched” (1 John 1:1). Luke bases his gospel on an account “handed down to us by those who from the first were eye-witnesses” (Luke 1:2). The apostle Peter likewise says: “We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eye-witnesses of his majesty.” (2 Peter 1:16) and describes himself as “a witness of Christ’s sufferings” (1 Peter 5:1).
In his letter to the early church in Galatia, St Paul also speaks from first-hand experience. He tells of his life before and after he saw a blinding light on the road to Damascus and the risen Jesus spoke to him there: see Acts 9:1-30. He tells his readers: “I want you to know, brothers, that the gospel I preached is not something that man made up. I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ ... I assure you before God that what I am writing to you is no lie.” (Galatians 1:11-12 and 20).
We are able to test the reliability of what St Paul says because Christianity contains within itself a fail-safe check of a kind that is completely absent from other religions: he independently received a message which conformed completely with that which had already been given to the other apostles (see Galatians 2:1-2 and 6-10).
The road apart.
St Paul’s behaviour after his life-changing encounter with Jesus is likewise powerful circumstantial evidence of the truth of Christianity. Here was a man who writes of “how intensely I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it.” (Galatians 1:13). He tells of how “I was advancing in Judaism beyond many Jews of my own age and was extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers.” (Galatians 1:14). Yet this same man spent something like the next thirty years going from place to place to preach “Jesus Christ, and him crucified.” (1 Corinthians 2:2). He gave up home, family, country, security, wealth and honour to do so.
Nor did St Paul merely forego comforts. He endured trials that most can scarcely imagine: “I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again. Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea, I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from bandits, in danger from my own countrymen, in danger from Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea; and in danger from false brothers. I have laboured and toiled and have often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked.” (2 Corinthians 11:23-27).
Throughout the ages, many have believed preposterous and even evil things, giving up comfort and enduring hardship for them. It is rare, however, to find someone who persists so long in error in the face of such obstacles. Sober reflection suggests that the claims made by St Paul deserve the most serious examination.
The great apostle to the Gentiles was called from his “previous way of life in Judaism” (Galatians 1:13) by God for a work that had been prepared for him: “God, who set me apart from birth and called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son in me so that I might preach him among the Gentiles” (Galatians 1:15). In the same way, God calls and sets apart all those he will use. The calling may be dramatic, like St Paul’s and the sense of purpose strong, like Churchill’s, but they may not. They are no less real for being revealed in “a still small voice.” (I Kings 19:12).
The road to glory.
Under divine guidance, St Paul took an unexpected road following his conversion: “I did not consult any man, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to see those who were apostles before I was, but I went immediately into Arabia and later returned to Damascus. Then after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to get acquainted with Peter and stayed with him fifteen days. I saw none of the other apostles – only James, the Lord’s brother ... Later I went to Syria and Cilicia.” (Galatians 1:16-19 and 21).
The result was that “I was personally unknown to the churches of Judea that are in Christ. They only heard the report: ‘The man who formerly persecuted us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.’ And they praised God because of me.” (Galatians 1:22-24).
St Paul did not rely on human instruction, but instead was taught by God. He “received [the gospel] by revelation from Jesus Christ.” (Galatians 1:12). Jesus told Ananias: “This man is my chosen instrument to carry my name before the Gentiles and their kings and before the people of Israel. I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.” (Acts 9:15-16). God took a man whose talents had until then been wrongly used and caused them to flow in a different channel. The work that was to come needed a man who was “extremely zealous” (Galatians 1:14). It needed someone committed and single-minded, qualities that St Paul had shown in “how intensely I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it.” (Galatians 1:13). What God did was to turn this fire from “the traditions of my fathers” (Galatians 1:14) and towards the truth of the gospel.
In the same way God will take our qualities and use them, if we allow him to do so. The very things that we may consider useless, the very things that may be the cause of shame or embarrassment, the very trials and sufferings that have brought us low can be things that the Lord employs most mightily. Churchill considered that: “all my past life had been but a preparation for this hour and this trial ...” It can be the same for us. There can come a day when we will be able to say of others that “they praised God because of me.” (Galatians 1:24).
This does not mean that we will instantly be turned into paragons of Christian virtue. We will retain human frailties and weaknesses, although over time we will increasingly “be conformed to the likeness of [Christ]” (Romans 8:29). Though he was called to so momentous a task, human foibles were certainly a large part of Churchill’s makeup. Throughout his life he was a prey to depression, which he called his “black dog.” He frequently did not get up until midday and then worked all through the night, fuelled by an alarming consumption of alcohol. So exasperating was the Prime Minister and so given to calamitous meddling in military affairs that Lord Alanbrooke commented: “We cannot win with him and we cannot win without him.”
Conclusion.
Churchill’s powerful sense of calling gave him confidence in victory even when all seemed lost. At a cabinet meeting shortly after the Dunkirk evacuation and the capitulation of France, when several ministers argued (not without reason) that negotiation with Hitler was the only sensible course, the Prime Minister said: “If this island story of ours is to end, let it only do so when each one of us is lying here choking in his own blood.” The same indomitable spirit governed all his days. Towards the end of his life, he had words of advice for pupils at his former school: “Never give up: never, never, never.”
Sometimes the problems of the world can seem insurmountable, but we do not have to be a man on the scale of Winston Churchill to make a difference for God. It is in the small things, the unseen things, the un-remarked acts of kindness and gentleness and love that God is so often revealed. He told St Paul that: “My power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9). In fact, one of the tricks of the enemy is to make us so overwhelmed by what we think needs to be done that we become paralysed by it, or to make us so guilty that we take on more than we should and become crippled by it. The antidote is to start small and build up to something bigger as and when we feel able.
What, then, should we do? This is the question that people asked of John the Baptist when they heard his preaching and of Peter when he preached at Pentecost: see L
uke 3:10, 12 and 14; Acts 2:37. The answer will be different for each of us, but the basic areas for all to consider are the same:
• Are we praying enough? Much prayer brings much power, little prayer little power and no prayer no power.
• Are we listening enough? Like the young Samuel we need to hearken to God’s voice and respond to it: see 1 Samuel 3:2-10.
• Are we doing enough? We need to consider what we can do to give expression to our faith and to show the love of Jesus to others. There is no lack of opportunity, either in the private or the public sphere.
• Are we giving enough? This is not just, or even primarily, a question of money, but also of time: wherever we spend most of our time, there will our heart be. We cannot fool ourselves that we are too busy if we spend hours every week watching television.
Through our prayers, words and actions, we can echo to our nation the call that God places on us and on our lives. Above all, we should not give up. We should not give up on God, we should not give up on ourselves, we should not give up on others and we should not give up on our country. Each of us has a calling. Each of us can help to advance the kingdom of God. Each of us has a part to play in turning around the situation in this land. Rare is the man who has a sense of destiny as strong as Winston Churchill and rare is the man who has a calling like St Paul. If we wait for that kind of certainty we will never achieve anything. The one thing that can be guaranteed is that we will not make a difference unless we make a start. Let today be the day.
50. Tin legs
1 Thessalonians 1.
Key word: conviction.
During the inter-war years a young RAF pilot had a catastrophic crash. Both legs were amputated and his life hung by a thread. In excruciating pain, he lay week after week in a hospital bed: first better, then worse until at length his spirit began to ebb away. As his grip on this world loosened, pain left him and he felt a great sense of peace. Then outside his room he heard one nurse upbraid another: “Be quiet! Don’t you know there’s a dying man in there?” Suddenly his old combativeness asserted itself and he determined that he would not die. He roused himself, the agony returned and he lived.
Douglas Bader proceeded to astound all who met him. He was told that he would never walk again without a stick, but he did. He was told that he would never drive a car again, but he did. He was told that he would never fly an aeroplane again, but he did. So desperate was the need for pilots during the Battle of Britain that Bader managed to wangle a return to combat duty. Given command of a badly demoralised Canadian squadron, he made it one of the best in Fighter Command. Promoted to Wing Commander, he revolutionised RAF fighter tactics. He became one of the most successful aces of the day.
Eventually, he was shot down over St Mâlo in France.[112] To escape from his damaged aircraft, he had to tear one of his false legs loose and leave it behind in the blazing cockpit. The Germans sportingly arranged for the RAF to deliver a spare. As a prisoner of war, Bader then made himself such a nuisance that at one point his captors took away his false legs again. He was sent to the ‘escape-proof’ Colditz castle, reserved for serial escapees and troublemakers, where he remained until liberation by American troops in 1945. After the war he devoted himself to helping and inspiring disabled ex-servicemen.
Being inspired.
Douglas Bader was in the prime of life on the day of his aircraft crash. A man who lived for flying and delighted in his sporting ability was suddenly made a cripple. He was told that he would never more be able to take part in things that up till then had been his all in all. Yet “in spite of severe suffering” (1 Thessalonians 1:6) he did not quietly let go of life when he had the chance, but chose quite deliberately to return to a world of pain and uncertainty. He did so because he was inspired. He was inspired to beat the odds, to prove doubters wrong and to fight on when the cause seemed lost.
St Paul talks of the Christians in Thessalonica as being people who are “inspired” (1 Thessalonians 1:3). Their inspiration comes from “hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Thessalonians 1:3). Indeed, in these early believers as in any Christian, inspiration was quite literal: the word conveys the idea of breathing into someone or something. In a theological sense inspiration connotes supernatural influence, especially that exerted by the Holy Spirit to impart a divine element to what we think and say and do. Inspiration of this kind is seen when “the LORD God formed the [first] man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.” (Genesis 2:7). It is also evident following the resurrection, when Jesus appeared to his disciples and “breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’” (John 20:22).
St Paul knew that the Thessalonians were inspired “because our gospel came to you not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction.” (1 Thessalonians 1:4-5). This same conviction was at work in Jesus’ disciples following the coming of the Holy Spirit at the first Pentecost. Men who hitherto had been afraid and demoralised suddenly began to speak and act fearlessly. Peter, who not long before had been so scared and so determined to save himself that he thrice denied Christ,[113] stood up in front of the crowds in the temple and told them plainly that “God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.” (Acts 2:36).[114] His inspiration and conviction communicated themselves to his hearers, who “were cut to the heart” (Acts 2:37).
Inspiration and conviction inevitably bring about action and reaction. They did so in Peter, they did so in Douglas Bader and they will do so in us. When the gospel comes to us “not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction” (1 Thessalonians 1:4-5), that is evidence that we are “brothers loved by God, [and] that he has chosen [us]” (1 Thessalonians 1:4-5). Where there is an absence of inspiration and conviction, we have to question the spiritual depth of what the lips proclaim.
Being productive.
In what is probably the earliest of his canonical letters, St Paul focuses on three essentials that later form the subject of an expanded discourse in 1 Corinthians 13: faith, hope and love (charity, caritas). These things are not mere abstract concepts, worthless playthings of the mind, but are real and produce effects in the world around us: the effects are manifest in work, labour and endurance.
Salvation is by grace through faith alone, but this faith is no dull intellectual thing. It is nothing if it does not make us act and cause us to be productive for God. St Paul commends his readers for “your work produced by faith, your labour prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope” (1 Thessalonians 1:3). These people did not just listen to what they were taught, they took it to heart. They did not just give intellectual assent to high-minded ideals, they acted upon them. They did not give up at the first sign of trouble, but stuck it out through thick and thin. James encourages us to respond in the same way when he says: “What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? ... In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.” (James 2:14 and 17).
If our work and labour are to be productive and our endurance worthwhile, we need God in our lives – Father, Son and Holy Spirit. In writing to the congregation at Thessalonica, St Paul is conscious of the activity of all three members of the Trinity. The church is said to be “in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thessalonians 1:1), whilst “our gospel came ... with the Holy Spirit” (1 Thessalonians 1:5). In the same way, we need to access the power of God in all its fullness. We need to “be filled with the Spirit” (Ephesians 5:18) and to “keep in step with the Spirit” (Galatians 5:25). If we do not, we will cease to be productive, as Jesus makes clear: “Remain in me and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not remain in me, he is l
ike a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.” (John 15:4-6). This should hardly surprise us: someone who loses the source of their inspiration ends up just going through the motions, living the opposite of “life in all its fullness” (John 10:10). Someone who speaks and acts without conviction achieves nothing lasting or worthwhile, and will have no enduring influence on others.
Being a model.
God wants us to be inspired in every sense of the word, and if we are inspired we can scarcely help being inspirational. The best way of learning is by doing. If we show by our lives what Christianity in action looks like, others will watch and take note. Some might ignore the lesson, but those who pay attention will themselves become an inspiration to others. So it has always been:
• In Thessalonica St Paul provided the first example: “You know how we lived among you for your sake.” (1 Thessalonians 1:5).
• Christian converts watched and learnt from him: “You became imitators of us and of the Lord; in spite of severe suffering, you welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit.” (1 Thessalonians 1:6).
• They in turn inspired others: “And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia.” (1 Thessalonians 1:7).
Redeeming a Nation (Timeless Teaching) Page 36