The Blessed Life

The Blessed Life

As I've been reading the City of God, I see a lot of interesting stuff, and I'm going to be writing about it. Join me in my thoughts, won't you? Here's what I came up with yesterday:

One of the ideas that comes up again and again in Augustine's writing is the idea of the blessed life. This seems to have been a greater and more important concept in that ancient Roman world than today. Today, people want to be happy and content, but few would question and speak about a blessed life in the way Augustine does so. He refers to a state of absolute happiness. I get the idea that he would not say that even the most happy on earth have yet attained the blessed life.

To Augustine, this state is held most completely by God himself. 10:11: “...Though doubtless He is so truly blessed that greater blessedness cannot be...” Blessedness was held by Adam and Eve in the garden before they fell. It is also a thing that we who are redeemed shall have in Heaven, eternally.

The discussion of the blessed life is darn important today, because people in America actively seek it. It's darn important in Japan because people want it, even though they don't ever stop long enough to admit it and to think if the course of their life is actually aiming them towards it. I believe that Augustine's discussion of it closely mirrors the idea of eternal life in the scriptures. Eternal life is not just life without end, it is the blessed life, and that eternal. We see and gain it in part here in earth and fully in eternity.

To those so focused on this world that they don't care about the afterlife, Christians can still lay hold of the claim that we have the keys to the blessed life and all others are illusions. We can do so because this blessed life has its root in God, the perfectly and truly happy being, who gives the blessed life to us. All pursuit of happiness that shuts God out of the picture is doomed to to be short-lived, because all happiness flows from the supremely happy God. All other pursuit of happiness relies on “common grace,” that is, the blessings that God has given to everyone, which come and go. But blessed life in Christ relies on the specific grace which is given to us at the cross and cannot be taken away.

This is important for how we share the gospel. For if we focus entirely on heaven and hell as the rewards of following Christ, we lose many people, especially in Japan, where they don't even think about or talk about life after death. People in this modern age have lost perspective and focus only on the short-term. So, we need to show them the rewards in this life of following Christ in order to hold their attention.

One of these benefits is our hope in God that sustains us through all trials, for trials are a part of the common grace that we all draw from. This hope is something that rescues us from despair and torment. Those who pursue the blessed life out of Christ have no such hope. Because our hope is in the immutable God, whenever we face trials, we know that they are but a passing storm cloud, no matter how terrible they are. We know that behind a stormy providence, He hides a smiling face. We know that He will work it to the good (Romans 8:28), so that in 2 years, 5 years, or 10 years, we will have doubled joy when God has freed us from the trials. When we talk like that, and we live it, we show that we are the recipients of the blessed life now.

Augustine on spiritual warfare

More thoughts from The City of God:

Book 10, section 22 – “It is by true piety that men of God cast out the hostile power of the air which opposes godliness; it is by exorcizing it, not by propitiating it; and they overcome all the temptations of the adversary by praying, not to him, but to their own God against him. For the devil cannot conquer or subdue any but those who are in league with sin; and therefore he is conquered in the name of Him who assumed humanity, and that without sin, that Himself being both Priest and Sacrifice, He might bring about the remission of sins...”

The idea of overcoming the devil in the name of Jesus is not new. Though in the modern charismatic movement, it may look a little different, the fighting of spiritual warfare in the name of Jesus goes back all the way to Christ Himself. Augustine, writing around 400 AD, says basically the same thing as many charismatics.

“Rebuke the devil in the name of Jesus.” -Charismatic lingo

“They overcome all the temptations of the adversary by praying, not to him, but to their own God against him.” - Augustine

The only real difference is Augustine saying to pray to God in the name of Jesus, versus directly confronting the devil in the name of Jesus. Interesting.

A similar idea to a “spiritual stronghold” (as we often say nowadays) is basically captured in the phrase “For the devil cannot conquer or subdue any but those who are in league with sin; and therefore he is conquered in the name of Him who assumed humanity...” As we sin, we open ourselves to spiritual attack and the devil gains a foothold. As we conquer sin, he has less and less power in our lives. Ultimately, the victory has already been won decisively by Jesus on the cross, so we are totally cleansed from sin. And now, as me march forth in His name, we continue to remove the last vestiges of sin from our lives through the power of the Spirit, that every last window should be shut to the devil.

Augustine of Hippo

I've been reading the City of God, an epic book if ever there was one, by Saint Augustine. Here's some thoughts on it from what I read today:

In book 10, section 6, he writes: “This is the sacrifice of Christians: we, being many, are one body in Chrust, And this also is the sacrifice which the Church continually celebrates in the sacrament of the altar, known to the faithful, in which she teaches that she herself is offered in the offering she makes to God.”

This is a fascinating idea to me, that Chrstians celebrate their own sacrifice (Romans 12:1) as they celebrate the sacrifice of Christ when they eat communion. When we eat the bread of communion, not only do we celebrate Christ's death for our sin, but we celebrate His call to come and bear our own cross. We celebrate the union of justification of faith working itself out in a progressive sanctification: bearing our own cross because Jesus bore His to reconcile us to God.

Here's two great quotes from Book 10, section 3 (I'm not sure if these section demarkations are particular to the print of the book that I am reading):

"For He is the fountain of all our happiness, He is the end of all our desires."

"For our good, about which philosophers have so keenly contended, is nothing else than to be united to God."

Increased capacity for Joy

Since coming back from Japan, I've found that I have an increased capacity for joy and happiness.

When you go through something really tough and then it ends, it's easier to be content and happy in simple things. For instance, when you have a sore throat, you just want your throat to get better, and that's all you can think about. When it's better, for a time you may actually realize how nice it is just to have a throat that doesn't hurt. I'm in that stage when it comes to things being back in a stable situation.

I'd say there are a few speicfic things that I rejoice in even more. One is my relationship with God and the time I get to spend with Him every morning. This is a rich season for such. A second is singing to God in English in church. Another would be just being around people, again.

By enduring a season of hardship, I have increased my capacity for happiness.

It is like emerging from a dark tunnel where the light is so small that you cannot see color into a world of green hills and cloudy blue skies.

Loss of gifts

April 4, 2010

Loss of Gifts

One of the hardest parts about entering a foreign culture as a missionary is that you lose all your gifts. Teaching... counseling or comforting others... prophesy... you lose all of these! Teaching through an interpretor is just not the same! In fact, I would say that almost all the spiritual gifts that are listed in scripture require a fairly high degree of language proficiency to be fully excercized. Even intercessory prayer can't be expressed to the the fullest – leading others in prayer – without a lot of fluency.

Perhaps one of the hardest parts of the early missionary career is this inability to serve others. Especially in an advanced and independent culture like Japan, it's hard to help anyone, and you are the recipient of so much help. And in Japanese culture, which is based on unspoken obligation, it really gets to you that others always help you, but you can do so little. You begin to wonder if people get tired of taking care of you.

I do believe that in addition to the need to be loved by and encouraged by others, people have a need to love and encourage others. You will not be emotionally fulfilled if you don't feel that you are able to really help others. In fact, if you are down, I think that one of the best things you can do for yourself is to comfort someone else. It gets your mind off your own troubles, so that you don't fall into a negative spiral of self-focused depression.

However, with the language barrier, it's so hard to help others. Unless there are other English-speakers that you can minister to, you feel like you can't minister to anyone. And if you are a younger, junior missionary, as I was, around very strong-seeming missionaries who don't need your help, then you may not even be able to comfort the other foreigners around you. For me, I think that perhaps even more than someone to comfort me in my distress when I was in Japan, I needed someone to comfort. It made the loneliness that much thicker.

I remember an American friend who I met while I was on a two-week vacation. She was feeling down about Japan, and during our conversation, I was able to comfort her. I feel as though that gave me a deeper sense of satisfaction that nearly anything else I did while in Japan. Ahh, it is good to be back in my own culture where I can serve others. Being focused on yourself is a terrible fate.

God has a Path

Here is a poem I wrote a few weeks ago. Truly, it is borne from my time in Kagawa. Anyone good at writing melodies and want to give this hymn a tune?

March 19, 2010

God has a Path

Dark days I see, my purpose lost,
Where is the road that once was clear?
Where is the light, so bright ahead?
Where is my path, so straight with ease?

God has a way, God has a path.
When darkness looms, He does not move.
When shadows fall, He does not change.
They only serve to hide His face.

As youths we run and soar the skies,
The world is clear, easy to see.
So swifly we fall, we see no more,
Uncertain with doubt and made unsure.

But God has a way, God has a path.
When darkness looms, He does not move.
When shadows fall, He does not change.
They scarcely serve to hide His face.

Every man doubts, is sometimes blind.
All hopes are crushed, all dreams are slain,
But in Christ the dead shall live again.
In Christ the crushed shall breathe anew.

For God has a way, God has a path.
When darkness looms, He does not move.
When shadows fall, He does not change.
Behind the clouds, we see His face.

The lame can walk, the blind shall see,
All beaten saints, with joy shall leap.
Our nights are short, our days as years,
Each crying child, the Father hears.

God has a way, God has a path.
When darkness looms, He does not move.
When shadows fall, He does not change.
No darkness shall ever hide His face.

He cannot change, we are not lost,
We ever-see by the light of His cross.
Each cloud shall pass, each mist shall fade,
For God has a path, He has a way.