Tolstoy’s Three Questions – Reflections (4)

  

In thinking about the king’s question, “Who is the right person to listen to?” we’re considering the Holy Spirit, the Word of God, and trusted men and women who have been given wisdom.

 

Jesus teaches us that the Holy Spirit is our Helper, Comforter, Advocate, Intercessor, Counsellor (all of these are shades of meaning in the Greek word “paracletos”).

 

“I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper [paracletos] that He may be with you forever…He abides with you and will be in you” (John 14:16 – 17; see also 14:26; 15:26; 16:7, 12 – 15).

 

Being led by the Holy Spirit, receiving the Holy Spirit’s counsel, listening to the Holy Spirit, is relational; it is something we learn through relationship, though spending conscious time with Him, with speaking and listening and asking and questioning throughout the day. There is no one experience that makes us mature listeners, nor is there a course we can take, a degree we can obtain, a measured process we can go through, which somehow makes us mature listeners – for we are (hopefully) ever learning and ever growing and our ears are ever being tuned to the Voice of the Father, the Voice of the Lamb, and the Voice of the Holy Spirit.

 

This is not to say that we don’t have experiences, life ought to be an experience in the Trinity. We can have mountain top experiences, just as we can experience the Valley of the Shadow of Death; we can experience the Mount of Transfiguration just as we can experience Gethsemane and Golgotha – and we ought not to teach the one without the other. Let us recall that the Holy Spirit drove Jesus into the Wilderness to be temped by the devil (Mark 1:12). Why don’t the “feel good” preachers teach this when they teach about the Holy Spirit?

 

Being led by the Spirit of God is a mark of the Christian and an element of our sonship in the Father and our inheritance in Christ (Romans 8:14 – 17). This leading is, at its foundation, twofold; it has to do with our doing and our becoming – with our becoming and our doing. Our Father’s desire is that we are conformed “to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren” (Rom. 8:29). This is worked out in our daily lives, at home, at work, in recreation and entertainment and the arts, in the social and civic arenas – this communion with God and engagement with humanity is all encompassing – it is to be our Way of Life in Christ.

 

There are times we “know” we are to do things, and as we respond in obedience to the Holy Spirit we learn and grow into the image of Christ, we become.

 

Then there are times that the Holy Spirit speaks to us about who Jesus is within us, and who we are in Jesus; God’s Word is revealed to us in ever unfolding glory and freshness, both in convicting us and in building us up, and our transformation is marked by the things we do – by the way we are among those around us, by our actions and our prayers and intercessions and words. The more we see Jesus the more we are transformed into His image (2 Cor. 3:17 – 18).

 

We “do” so that we may become, and we become so that we may “do.” We become so that we may “do,” and we “do” so that we may become.

 

As my friend Joe likes to say, “We are becoming who we are in Christ.”

 

Is there any doubt in our minds that we will hear God speaking in eternity future? Well then, if we will hear Him in eternity future, why not learn to hear Him in eternity present? Why not listen to the Holy Spirit today?

Souls on Board

 

 

There has been a lot about airplane crashes and mishaps in the news, including about passengers who seem to have lost their minds. Some of the accounts have happy endings, some are tragic, others are bizarre.

 

When a pilot has an emergency, whether on a large commercial airliner or a small private plane, he or she declares, “Mayday. Mayday. Mayday.” After the Mayday call then the pilot can transmit the nature of the emergency. Protocol dictates that Mayday be declared in an emergency, otherwise Air Traffic Control may think the pilot is just telling them of a problem and that ATC need not give emergency attention to the aircraft, alert emergency personnel, and clear runways for an emergency landing.

 

There are times in which a pilot will tell ATC of a problem and ATC will respond with the question, “Do you want to declare an emergency?” Sometimes the pilot will say “Yes,” sometimes “No.” It is obvious in some instances that ATC thinks a Mayday ought to be declared.

 

After Mayday has been declared, ATC has two standard questions they ask. “How much fuel do you have?” “How many souls on board?”

 

ATC wants to know how much fuel so that it can inform emergency personnel on the ground so they will know how much fuel they are dealing with in the event of a fire. (This will also let ATC know how quickly they need to get the aircraft on the ground or whether, circumstances permitting, the plane needs to burn off or dump fuel prior to landing.)

 

Knowing how many souls are on board is also transmitted to emergency personnel so that they will know the number of people requiring rescue.

 

ATC does not ask how many passengers there are. It does not ask how many crew members are on board. It asks, “Souls on board?” This is simple and straightforward and avoids confusion.

 

I recently heard a recording of an exchange between ATC and the pilot of a large commercial plane which had lost power to an engine shortly after takeoff and was returning to the airport after declaring Mayday. ATC asked, “Please report souls on board.”

 

The pilot responded, “257 passengers.”

 

Vickie and I looked at each other, and I said, “That isn’t going to work. ATC is going to want clarification. That pilot should know better.”

 

Sure enough, ATC followed up, “Please report souls on board.”

 

The pilot came back, “265 souls on board.”

 

The pilot’s first number of 257 failed to account for the crew.

 

An emergency is not the time to ask others to do the math. One total number is what ATC and emergency personnel are looking for, not 257 passengers and 8 crew members.

 

Where did this practice of “souls on board” come from? It seems a bit archaic in our society of nihilism where we are nothing but the products of time, plus matter, plus chance.

 

“Souls on board” is maritime term, a carryover from the world of ships and their crews and passengers, just as we use the maritime terms captain, first officer, and crew in aviation.

 

I suppose at some point “souls on board” will be replaced by a sterile term that fails to acknowledge that we are people who matter. Maybe it will be, “Please advise how many identification numbers you have on board.”

 

When God formed us in His image, he breathed into us “the breath of life” and “man became a living soul” (Genesis 2:7).  Now I think there is much glorious mystery in the Beginning (Christ) in Genesis, and however it is that we sense creation unfolded, we ought not to be distracted that it occurred in and through Jesus Christ and that God made us in His image, and that we are not the products of time plus matter plus chance; we are valuable, we are loved, we are more than our physical parts – we are souls! We are mysterious beings whose genesis is rooted in God.

 

We are so mysterious that, as Pascal and others have observed, one moment we can be as angels, and the next moment devils. We are so mysterious that we have a sense that we ought to be something more than we are. Again, to reference Pascal’s thinking, my dog has never wanted to be a lion or anything other than a dog, the same with (as far as I can tell) cats, cows, and hamsters. Why is it that men and woman generally desire to be more than what they are, than who they are? Why do we have a sense of “greater things”?

 

Might it be that this reflects a sense of loss and that we have a void that we need to fill?

 

A beggar would not know what it is to experience the loss of a throne. A king who had been deposed would know, would remember, would desire restoration to the glory he once had.

 

We are not human resources, we are not commodities, we are not identity numbers, we are souls…even in our confused state, we are souls. We are not accidents looking for a place to happen, nor should we be duped into eating whatever we are given as hogs devour what is thrown into their pens. We are women and men created in the image of God…we are loved…let us recover the truth about who we are and how deeply our Father loves us.

 

To demonstrate the maritime roots of “souls on board” we can gain inspiration from Captain Arthur Henry Roston of the Carpathia. While another ship actually saw the distress flares of the Titanic and ignored them, when the Carpathia picked up Titanic’s distress radio signal Captain Roston had no doubt what he and his passenger liner would do, they would speed to the rescue through dangerous waters. After giving the necessary orders, Henry Roston was observed praying, he knew the danger ahead for his vessel, and he knew the danger facing the souls of the Titanic.

 

Every person whom we meet today is a soul, a person whom God has given life to, a person for whom Jesus Christ died. He or she is not a human resource, is not a commodity, is not even a conservative or liberal or a particular skin color or ethnic group or economic group – but rather a soul created in the image of God – no matter how deeply and sadly that image may be marred and desecrated.

 

I am reminded of Betsy ten Boom telling her sister Corrie that perhaps they would remain as prisoners in the concentration camp until the guards could be taught to love. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn had much the same perspective on the guards in his Soviet prisons, he saw how they were victims and had been dehumanized – beneath their callousness they were still souls.

 

Here is what is written on the tombstone of Captain Arthur Henry Roston:

 

In Loving Memory of

My Dear Husband

Sir Arthur Henry Rostron

K.B.I. R.D. R.N.R.

Aged 71 Years

Also Of

Ethel Minnie

The Beloved Wife Of The Above

Aged 69 Years

Sir Arthur Rostron

Captain of R.M.S. Carpathia

Saved 706 Souls From

SS Titanic 15 April 1912

 

There are souls on board all around us.

 

What will be written about us?  

Tolstoy’s Three Questions – Reflections (3)

 

The king’s second question was, “Who are the right people to listen to, and who should he avoid?” The hermit’s answer was, “The most necessary man is he with whom you are, for no man knows whether he will ever have dealings with anyone else.”

 

It doesn’t appear that the hermit answers the king’s question. What do you think? Is the king asking, “As I live my life, who should I listen to, pay attention to, receive counsel from, and who should I avoid?” Or is he asking, “In a given moment who should I listen to?”

 

The hermit seems to be saying, “The most necessary man to listen to is he with whom you are.” Again, what do you think? Is the hermit answering the king’s question?

 

Let’s look at it both ways, for both ways are important.

Who should we be listening to as a way of life? The answer is a threefold cord, the Holy Spirit, the Word of God, and trusted and wise men and women. To be sure we can learn from many types of people, and we ought to always be learning, but in terms of listening, that is something else. When we listen we receive, we allow into our souls what we are hearing as we allow food into our bodies – at least in our present context. (There are different levels of listening.)

 

While we must not separate the Holy Spirit from the Word of God, because we are human we will first consider one and then the Other – but let us keep in mind that they are a unity, just as Jesus Christ and the Word are One – divine mysteries!

 

“Your testimonies also are my delight; they are my counselors” (Psalm 119:24). The NASB marginal reading for “my” is, “the men of my counsel.” In other words, the author of Psalm 119 has formed a relationship with God’s Word, or we might say that he has been formed into that relationship by the Holy Spirit. The testimonies of the Lord are personal to the man who wrote Psalm 119, so personal that they speak to him and he listens to them.

 

Looking at Scripture this way, we can say that the woman or man who meditates on Scripture and learns the Word of God has a council of sixty-six members who can always be trusted, who will always point her or him to Jesus Christ.

 

Paul writes to Timothy that Scripture is able to “give us wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus,” and that in Scripture we may find “teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness” (see 2 Tim. 3:14 – 17).

 

No matter who or what else may be speaking to us at any given time, we want to hear Scripture, we want our hearts to be tuned to the Word of God. All of life ought to be heard and seen and responded to through the Word of God, through Jesus Christ. Only in Jesus can we see and hear things are they really are.  

 

It is one thing to look at music on a page, it is another thing to play the music. Too many professing Christians carry the Book of divine music but have never played the sixty-six scores they carry. We could also say that God has given us sixty-six instruments to play, some small like the piccolo, others large and weighty; are we learning to play them? Whether it is Obadiah or Isaiah, the Holy Spirit will teach us to play both the instrument and the music.

 

Looking at it another way, in the Bible I have sixty-six friends, trusted counsellors, who all speak to me of our Great Friend, our Lord Jesus Christ, our Friend who demonstrated His “no greater love” by laying down His life for us (John 15:12-13).

 

All of the foregoing is why I believe it is essential to begin each day with the Bible, in the counsel of our dear Lord Jesus. The world throws too much at us. A little thought for the day or a devotional is not enough, deep engagement with Jesus Christ is what we must seek. Yes, devotionals can be helpful, but in and of themselves they are no substitute for a deep and abiding relationship with the Word of God. We will either be formed by the world, including the religious world, or by Jesus Christ and His Word. Which will it be?

 

Who, or what, are we listening to today?

 

For many of us the answer is a particular news outlet, a political leader, an economic leader or economic indicators, entertainment or sports stars (as much as we might deny this), or even religious headliners. This is just as true of professing Christians as of the world. To know the truth of this just listen to what we talk about, we do not speak of Jesus and His Word, we speak of other things, other people, but seldom of Jesus.

 

Perhaps there will be two types of people who arrive at the New Jerusalem, those who have to learn how to see Jesus and listen to Him for the first time, and those for whom the conversation will simply continue.

 

Which of these two people am I?

 

What about our congregations?

 

What about you?