Sermon of the Month |
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When You Find Yourself Under Siege
I Peter 4:1-6, 12-19 (Psalm 46)
There are times in life when we find ourselves under siege. This is a theme and title I chose a little over two weeks ago. We had a series of thefts—six of the outside air conditioning condensing units were stolen in three separate incidents, one of them at four o’clock in the afternoon, in broad daylight. The frustration and anger that I felt was matched by many who certainly care as much as I do. Someone once said, "Show me a helpless person, and I’ll show you an angry person."
Of course, we’re not alone in these kinds of losses. Between September 1–24, in the two districts east of Central Expressway, some eighty-four of these condensing units have been stolen. And, that hardly scratches the surface of the thefts in this city. We are told that the police themselves feel overwhelmed just now. There is a sense of irony in the news report from Saturday a week ago that some $5000 worth of material was stolen from the nearly-completed house that the Chief of Police is building!
It sometimes seems as though we are under siege when we are functionally helpless to protect ourselves. I thought it might be useful to look of siege in the dictionary. Here are the three first definitions:
· the encirclement of a fortified place by an opposing armed force intending to take it,
usually by blockade and bombardment;
· any persistent attempt to gain control, overcome opposition, etc.
· a long, distressing or wearying period…
By those definitions, there are times when many find ourselves under siege—those on the Gulf Coast of parts of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama who have been ravaged by two hurricanes; those in Pakistan, India, and Afghanistan whose lives have been shattered by a powerful earthquake; those who have had the onslaught of one physical malady after another, or are dealing with death itself; those beset by persistent marital, child, parent, or other family problems; those affected by the malfeasance of others in business or financial matters; those struggling under the debts arising from financial challenges. These are the sort of times when we especially need to seek the counsel of God’s Word.
When you find yourself under siege, if you have any knowledge of the New Testament of the Bible, you might be drawn to the epistle of I Peter. There are a variety of opinions about the date, authorship, and circumstances of the epistle. But, the traditionally held one serves us best, and most agree on its general purpose. Whether it was Nero, looking for someone to blame for the burning of Rome, or for some other irrational reason, a wave of persecution of Christians had broken out at the center of the Roman Empire. What was happening at the center would begin to make its way out to the provinces. Christians, simply because they were Christians, were beginning to be or about to be under siege. Show me a helpless person and I’ll show you an angry, a desperate person. According to I Peter, there are some things to remember when you find yourself under siege.
The first thing to remember is that you, as a Christian, are different. (verses 1-6) The symbol of baptism reminds us that we have died to sin, that we are cleansed from it. We are called to wage a battle against sin. That 4th chapter begins with the exhortation: Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh arm yourselves also with the same intention (for whoever has suffered in the flesh has finished with sin), so as to live for the rest of your earthly life no longer by human desires but by the will of God. And that’s not easy to do. This Christian life is nothing to be attempted by a moral pansy.
I remember the time that my school, Hamilton Jr. High, had played Lanier Jr. High in football. Lanier was on the "other side of town" in more ways than one. That’s where the rich folks lived. We called them the "tea sippers," and we considered ourselves superior to them in almost every way. But, they had won the football game!
The two football team buses were parked in fairly close proximity. After the game, as we trudged back to the bus and boarded it, more than a little put out from having been beaten by tea sippers, the other team began to taunt us from their bus. That was too much to endure from a half dozen or so team leaders at the front of our bus. So, they got off and went over to press the point. Just as the rest of us were getting up to go join the fray, there was a stampede as the original six piled back onto the bus. The cause of the stampede was our coach, Tony Ditta. He was also put out by the loss of the game to tea sippers, but he was more infuriated by the actions of his team leaders.
When he reached the inside of the bus, he roared, punctuating his remarks with his usual expletives, "You bunch of ___ ___ hoods; if you can’t be better than they are as football players, you can at least be better sports!" We rode back to the school in utter silence. But, it was in that silence that I learned that believing you were different, especially that you were superior to someone else carried with it some responsibilities.
I Peter reminds us that we cannot just pick and choose what part of being Christians we like and ignore the rest. Christians do not just blend into the background of our culture. As a Christian, you are different. And that carries with it some implications.
There is another idea. There is no safe place. (verses 12-13) Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that is taking place among you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you are sharing Christ’s sufferings…
Somewhere along the line we have convinced ourselves that there is some condition or place where life is safe and fair. Well, it isn’t. As the bumper sticker says, using rather more raw language, Bad Stuff Happens. I Peter asks, "Do you think that being under siege is something strange? Even Christ suffered, and his suffering was anything but just or fair."
Should we sail through life without frustrations because we’re being good? Being followers of Christ is no insurance policy against being under siege. One of the old All In the Family episodes has Edith Bunker fretting because she lost a prized piece of jewelry during a church activity. She laments, "It doesn’t seem right that something bad should happen to you while your are doing something religious."
It may not seem right, and it is sometimes quite the opposite—those who are good and giving are often taken advantage of. Those who are good sometimes act as a conscience for those who aren’t. And people are sometimes hard on conscience.
We keep trying to believe that there is some place where trouble doesn’t exist. We may be tempted to criticize those who lived in the "soup bowl" that is New Orleans, surrounded by water with nothing but a fragile levee offering protection against a disastrous storm surge. We may similarly criticize those whose home is on the West Coast, along a fault line in the earth, with earthquakes always a possibility, and the "big one" coming sooner or later.
Of course, those living further inland in California seem to live under the threat of forest fire. A couple of years ago, those who live in the picturesque mountains of Arizona found that forest fires happen there too. Those who live near the Mississippi or any river may experience devastating floods. We, who make our home in the plains states, live with the possibility of destructive tornadoes. While it behooves us to take reasonable precautions when selecting a place to live, there is no absolutely safe place.
When the great fire broke out in first century Rome and the wave of persecution followed, maybe some of those in the provinces thought they were far enough away to avoid it. We often think of the same thing regarding living in or near the city. Some quarter of a century ago, one of our adolescent members used to come with a friend around the house from time to time. One day the two were lamenting that the friend was going to have to move with his family to a small east Texas town. He said, "My step dad says there are too many drugs in North Mesquite." So they moved. It was about a year-and-a half later that the two friends dropped by the house again. I asked the one who had moved, "Well what brings you to town?" He said, "We are moving back." I replied, "But I thought there were too many drugs in North Mesquite." He answered, "We found that they had a worse drug problem in Edgewood."
Not only is there no ideal place, we sometimes may have unrealistic ideas about who we are better than, as a culture. After we invaded Iraq and captured Baghdad, the news showed the looting that went on. It seemed to give a sense of satisfaction to some Americans who commented about the lack of character of "those people." And then the hurricanes came to the Gulf Coast and we had a chance to see ourselves in the same way. Sometimes we have to admit that "those people" are us!
You never really know what you will do when you find yourself under siege. I remember a family, long departed from here, in which the mother used to shake her head at the irresponsible and egregious behavior she saw in teenagers, and what she considered the lack of backbone on the part of their parents. Then her two small children turned into teenagers. One was a model citizen. The other one was a mess. One day the mother said to me, "I’ll never again say what I would absolutely do if I were in a situation. I have learned that you don’t know until and unless you are there." You see, persecution—being under siege—is a test. It tests your mental attitude and it tests your moral behavior.
Which leads to the next idea—Don’t act like them. (verses 14-16) Do not let other people set your agenda, determine your mood, and influence your responses. If we do, we set ourselves up for just going along with the tide, of taking on a "mob mentality." In the midst of an incident of looting, some people who would never have stolen anything may be drawn into the orgy of what everyone else is doing. The same may be true with mass violence. The same may be true of revenge. I Peter exhorted, But let none of you suffer as a murderer, a thief, a criminal, or even as a mischief maker. In other words, see that you are not guilty of the atrocities that others commit. See that you are not guilty of your own atrocities, because others have committed theirs.
When the facts began to come to light about our military’s treatment of detainees and prisoners in Iraq, at Guantanamo, and in other places (which is, admittedly, less horrendous than we have seen from other cultures), some were appalled. But I don’t know how many people, professing Christians, said, "Look what they do!" It was as though people professing to be Christians were willing to have their behavior determined by Islamic extremists. Of course, the echoes of the ranting of my Junior High School Coach comes back, "If you think you are better than they are, then act like it!"
If you are going to be persecuted or punished, just make sure you don’t deserve it! That incident I have related so often from the life of Matthew Arnold, when he was once mugged, is really on target. He gave four things for which he was thankful in the aftermath, the last of which was, Let me be thankful that it was I who was robbed and not I who robbed.
Finally, and you knew this is where the whole discussion would resolve, entrust yourself to a faithful Creator, while continuing to do good. (verses 17-19) We do not, on our own, successfully resist the siege that would rob us of our peace of mind, erode sense of decency, inhibit ability to keep to our own highest ideals on our own, or deflect us from "keeping on keeping on." That’s why, when we find ourselves under siege, we come back again and again to Psalm 46: God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change, though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea; though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble with its tumult.
We know this psalm meant a lot to Martin Luther in the insecurities of his life. It became the inspiration for A Mighty Fortress is Our God, which may call "the battle hymn of the Reformation." I happened to remember the story of when Luther was in the throes of the Reformation, and the Pope was trying to bring him back to the Catholic Church. He sent a cardinal to deal with Luther and, if all else failed, to try to bribe him to fall back into line. The cardinal wrote the Pontiff, "The fool does not love gold." When he couldn’t bring Luther around, the cardinal finally lost his temper: "What do you think the Pope cares for the opinion of a German boor? The Pope’s little finger is stronger than all of Germany. Do you expect your princes to take up arms to defend you—you, a wretched worm like you? I tell you, NO. And where will you be then?" Luther is said to have quietly replied, "Where I am now…in the hands of Almighty God."
Show me a helpless person and I will show you an angry person. But show me a person whose heart, soul, mind, and strength is fixed upon loving an Almighty God, and I’ll show you someone who realizes that he or she is never helpless. And when we realize that we are never helpless, then we can also do that second part, continuing to do good—showing that we’re different—even when everything around seems to be going bad. It may not be a piece of cake. But with time, and prayer, and courage…it’s possible.