Pride, Patience & Humility

Spirituality Column #33
June 26, 2007
Current! In Carmel (IN) newspaper

Pride, Patience and Humilty
By Bob Walters

I hate to admit it, but I know more about pride than patience or humility.

That's exactly the reverse of what Christ tells us about living a Godly life.

As our perfect example, Christ is without pride, has unlimited patience and lived on this earth in total humility.

The Bible gives us many standards for a faith-based, Godly life:

Abide in Christ. Be humble. Serve the Lord. Have faith. Love one another.

Pride means we are trusting our self instead of God, and therefore very likely bearing a burden or anxiety – unnecessarily – that Christ’s death has already removed.

Patience means we are trusting the Lord; and truly trusting in the Lord means you’ll never have a problem with pride or fear or doubt because you know that God, not you, is in control and you trust Him totally. (That’s a really tough one.)

Humility means you don’t worry about yourself; you worry only about God’s will.

This is gibberish to a non-believer, I realize. Christians – because Christ the perfect God / perfect man is eternally interceding with God – believe God is in control of their individual lives. “God is in control” is an especially tough truth when you or a loved one is hurting. Or even if you’re just impatient.

Pride is the king of sins because we strongly pursue our self interest instead of God’s commands. That’s what happened in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3) when Adam and Eve were tempted to doubt God’s goodness.

Impatience is my personal specialty, because when I see something I want …

Uh, good time to bring up humility – what “I want” isn’t important. How can I figure out what God wants?

Reading the Bible, asking God in prayer, and then listening for His voice, is a great place to start.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com), a Carmel resident, reads Philippians 4:4-7 every day. Also, see Galatians 5:22-23.

Big City, Big God Problem

Spirituality Column #32
June 19, 2007
Current In Carmel (IN) newspaper

Big City, Big God Problem?
By Bob Walters

The Economist, that staid yet cutting edge British magazine of business and trends worldwide, reported last month that 50 percent of human beings now live in big cities.

In 1800, the number was 3 percent; in 1900, 13 percent.

This shift toward cities will affect how Christian missionaries will fulfill Christ’s “Great Commission” (Romans 28:19-20) to “baptize … and teach all the world” about the love of Jesus. The thing is, no one is sure exactly how to do that.

History teaches us it is difficult to evangelize cities.

The Economist article notes that cities originally were organized around farming, commerce, transportation, water, security and, significantly, a religion or temple. Yet considering a list of cities in the Bible – Babylon, Ninevah, Tyre, Sodom, Gomorrah – makes me think God isn’t much of a fan of big cities.

The article says that today cities are organized around and nurture secular culture. In the megacities – think New York, Tokyo, Mexico City, New Delhi, Sao Paulo, etc. – religion’s influence has all but disappeared. The organizing community expression is culture, not God.

It occurs to me that culture, in this sense, is the culture that provides enjoyment – the arts, museums, urbane pleasures, 150 cable channels, broadband and the like. Bigger cities equals bigger culture equals bigger enjoyment.

The Christian religion would call that kind of big culture “temptation.”

A Christian’s hope and faith, a Christian’s joy, is in the Lord; in working our faith and being involved in it; in personally engaging and endeavoring to produce spiritual fruit.

This rush toward cities, even in the poorest cultures where urban squalor is preferable to rural hopelessness, shows that people simply banding together – whether for richer or for poorer – has little to do with producing spiritual fruit.

To figure out how to evangelize megacities, it will take a greater power than us.

Hey, now there’s a thought …

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com), a Carmel resident, doesn’t think having more people standing on busy street corners shouting about Jesus is the answer.

Confusion, Mystery and Trust

Spirituality Column #31
June 12, 2007
Current in Carmel (IN) newspaper

Confusion, Mystery and TrustBy Bob Walters

I grew up going to church until my mid-teens, and then spent several years – my spiritual confusion years – not going to church.

When I reconnected with God a few years ago, Christ suddenly became to me a very rich mystery and stopped being a point of spiritual confusion.

The difference was that I had learned that I was supposed to trust God.

Confusion defeats reason and trust, and picks at our rational being. Confusion is uncomfortable and something we avoid. I was confused so I avoided Christ.

Mystery, and its close sibling, wonder, however, can hold us rationally in their limitless arms with comfort and peace even in the absence of understanding. This is the gift Christ offers to us when we engage our faith and trust that He is Who He says He is.

None of this will make sense to a non-Christian, because – and I’ve been there – if Christ is so good and God is a loving God, how come this or that really terrible thing just happened to me, to my loved one, to my neighbor … to something I cherish. And why should I give my life to Christ when I can trust what I see, not what I can’t see.

Scripture says the opposite.

“So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” (2 Corinthians 4:18, NIV).

When we pray to God for understanding, wisdom and discernment – of divine or earthly things – what we can legitimately expect from God in return is inner peace, not information. Sometimes God spells it out; sometimes He doesn’t.

But when we trust God; I mean truly give ourselves completely over to trusting Him, only then can we enjoy the mystery and wonder of His hand.

No matter what happens.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) is better at writing about trusting God than actually trusting God. It’ll be OK, whether I believe it or not.

Falwell's Fundamentals

Spirituality Column #30
Current! In Carmel (IN) Newspaper
June 5, 2007

Falwell’s Fundamentals
By Bob Walters

After reading numerous obituaries following Jerry Falwell’s death May 15, this news surprised me:

How well liked and admired Falwell was by people who actually knew him.

I guess that explains how Falwell built Thomas Road Baptist Church, Liberty University and the Moral Majority when so much of the world saw him only as a big pain in the neck.

You wouldn’t necessarily pick up this virtue from watching him preach on TV, because he seemed harsh and unyielding, if truthful and faithful. On that score, TV didn’t do him justice. Yet I am glad some writers took the time to point out that he was a warm, personable and eminently likable guy. Up close he was so obviously and profoundly a good man on a mission for Christ.

I’m sure he was warmly welcomed Home.

Falwell won the respect of his enemies, most notably the profane and recalcitrant Larry Flynt. Falwell seemed like the type who held a grudge. He wasn’t. What a great witness for Christ.

Of all the obits I read – suffering the many “we’re glad he’s gone” sentiments – I thought the best (and most fun) apologetic came from Ann Coulter in her May 16 column (anncoulter.com, archives), “Jerry Falwell, Meet Ronald Reagan.”

Sadly, “Fundamentalist Preacher” has become an invective used to describe Falwell, as if there were something wrong with believing in and preaching the truth of the Bible; The Holy Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Spirit), the Deity of Christ; the virgin birth, the fact of Christ’s death, burial, resurrection and ascension; the reality and presence of the Holy Spirit; and that Christ died for our sins, defeated death and gives us everlasting life with God the Father in Heaven.

Falwell preached that you have to have faith in Christ, and follow Christ, in order to enter into the joys of Christ.

Too many of us want the joys, without faith and following.

Yet, those are the fundamentals.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com), a Carmel resident, wonders where the country would be spiritually if Falwell hadn’t created The Moral Majority.

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