Saint Francis High School Chorus - Sister Act
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Why Does Nearly Every Culture Have a Tradition of a Global Flood?
by John D. Morris, Ph.D.
"Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?" (I Corinthians 1:20)
One of the strongest evidences for the global flood which annihilated all people on Earth except for Noah and his family, has been the ubiquitous presence of flood legends in the folklore of people groups from around the world. And the stories are all so similar. Local geography and cultural aspects may be present but they all seem to be telling the same story.
Over the years I have collected more than 200 of these stories, originally reported by various missionaries, anthropologists, and ethnologists.
While the differences are not always trivial, the common essence of the stories is instructive as compiled below:
Is there a favored family? 88%
Were they forewarned? 66%
Is flood due to wickedness of man? 66%
Is catastrophe only a flood? 95%
Was flood global? 95%
Is survival due to a boat? 70%
Were animals also saved? 67%
Did animals play any part? 73%
Did survivors land on a mountain? 57%
Was the geography local? 82%
Were birds sent out? 35%
Was the rainbow mentioned? 7%
Did survivors offer a sacrifice? 13%
Were specifically eight persons saved? 9%
Putting them all back together, the story would read something like this:
Once there was a worldwide flood, sent by God to judge the wickedness of man. But there was one righteous family which was forewarned of the coming flood. They built a boat on which they survived the flood along with the animals. As the flood ended, their boat landed on a high mountain from which they descended and repopulated the whole earth.
Of course the story sounds much like the Biblical story of the great flood of Noah's day. The most similar accounts are typically from middle eastern cultures, but surprisingly similar legends are found in South America and the Pacific Islands and elsewhere. None of these stories contains the beauty, clarity, and believable detail given in the Bible, but each is meaningful to their own culture.
Anthropologists will tell you that a myth is often the faded memory of a real event. Details may have been added, lost, or obscured in the telling and retelling, but the kernel of truth remains. When two separate cultures have the same "myth" in their body of folklore, their ancestors must have either experienced the same event, or they both descended from a common ancestral source which itself experienced the event.
The only credible way to understand the widespread, similar flood legends is to recognize that all people living today, even though separated geographically, linguistically, and culturally, have descended from the few real people who survived a real global flood, on a real boat which eventually landed on a real mountain. Their descendants now fill the globe, never to forget the real event.
But, of course, this is not the view of most modern scholars. They prefer to believe that something in our commonly evolved psyche forces each culture to invent the same imaginary flood legend with no basis in real history. Instead of scholarship, this is "willful ignorance" of the fact that "the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished" (II Peter 3:5,6).
Lack of Forgiveness - A Scary Thought
When I was doing some research for a writing project, I came across something that jolted me. It was a familiar Bible verse which I’ve read, heard, and even quoted hundreds of times, but when meditating on it, thinking of its practical application and the enormity of the consequences of ignoring it, I more fully realized its importance. And being guilty of this very thing, it frightened me.
Matthew 6:14–15 says:
For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses (ESV).
There’s no wiggle room within these verses. Whether we do or don’t forgive others has adirect effect on whether God does or doesn’t forgive us.[1] This struck me as something to be acutely aware of.
In two other places in the Gospels Jesus makes the same point.
Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven.[2]
And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.[3]
Peter asked the obvious question when he said:
“Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven” (490 times).[4]
Jesus uses a pretty big number to express His thoughts on how many times we should forgive our brother, clearly demonstrating that forgiveness is important and something that we should do.
To further drive home the point, He uses some other very large numbers as He goes on to tell the story of a king who wanted to settle his accounts with his servants.
One man owed the king ten thousand talents. A talent is 125 pounds or 2,000 ounces, so this man owed the king 20 million ounces of either gold or silver. At today’s rates, if it was silver, then it would amount to 560 million dollars; if it was gold, then it would be about 27 billion dollars. In either case, and at any time, that’s an enormous debt. Because the man couldn’t pay, the king ordered that the man and his wife and children and all that he had were to be sold. The man implores the king to have patience, and out of pity the king releases him and pardons his debt.
Sadly, after that, the forgiven servant finds one of his fellow servants who owes him a hundred denarii—one denarii being the equivalent to a day’s wages at the time. (Wikipedia puts a day’s wages at that time at about 20 dollars today, which if correct means the fellow servant’s debt was 2,000 dollars.) The forgiven servant will not pardon the debt of his fellow servant and has him imprisoned.
When the king hears of it, he summons the forgiven servant and says:
“You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?” And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt.[5]
Jesus ends this story with an alarming statement:
So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.[6]
Clearly, forgiving your brother is important, and not forgiving him results in God not forgiving you for your debts and trespasses.
There are times when other people sin against us or hurt us—whether intentionally or unintentionally—just as there are times when we hurt others or sin against them. People may treat us unfairly on occasion, deceive us; perhaps they steal from us, or slander us, speaking behind our back. They may cheat us or cheat on us, or they may break their word. Whatever the case may be, whatever the offense, whatever the hurt, we are commanded to forgive.
Forgiving doesn’t mean the other person was in the right, nor does it mean that the loss or harm caused by their actions is undone. It simply means that rather than focusing on who’s right and who’s wrong, you leave that in God’s hands, along with the repercussion of the person’s actions. You take the high road and forgive.
It’s interesting that the parable of the unforgiving servant uses money to make a point about forgiveness. For some reason, it seems when someone has taken money from you, whether through stealing it or causing damage to your means of support, it’s very difficult to forgive them.
While writing this article I realized that I haven’t truly forgiven someone who years ago took finances that didn’t belong to them. This person wasn’t right in doing so, but in not forgiving in my heart, I have been like the unforgiving servant who, while rejoicing in the King’s forgiveness toward me, failed to forgive someone else.
All of us sin, and each of us falls short of the glory of God. Like the unforgiving servant, because we sin, we each owe a huge debt to God—a debt so large that none of us can ever repay it. But through Jesus, God forgives that debt and then He calls us, in like manner, to forgive others.
Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.[7]
Looking at it from the point of view that if we don’t forgive others when they sin against us, God won’t forgive us when we sin against Him, can be rather frightening. It certainly makes one think. The good part is, we can also see it as a promise: if we forgive others, God will forgive us. If we show mercy, then mercy will be shown to us. If we forgive, we will be forgiven. Who’s right and who’s wrong isn’t the issue; forgiving from the heart is.
Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.[8]
Footnotes:
[1] This is in reference to God forgiving your specific offenses; it’s not referring to salvation.
[2] Luke 6:37 ESV.
[3] Mark 11:25 ESV.
[4] Matthew 18:21–22 ESV.
[5] Matthew 18:32–34 ESV.
[6] Matthew 18:35 ESV.
[7] Ephesians 4:32 ESV.
[8] Colossians 3:12–14 ESV.
The Other Side of the Equation!
In my previous article, I wrote about the importance of forgiveness—bringing out the point that if someone sins against you, you must forgive them if you want to be forgiven by God.
There is, however, another side to the equation. While Jesus made the obligation to forgive quite clear, He was equally clear that one should avoid acting in ways which result in them needing to be forgiven by others. The fact that your brother is bound by Jesus’ words to forgive isn’t a license for you to intentionally hurt your brother. You are still personally accountable before God for your words and actions.
As usual, Jesus put His principle in succinct but powerful terms: Do to others as you would have them do to you.[1] Another version translates this verse as: Treat others the same way you want them to treat you.[2] In the book of Matthew it’s expressed as: So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.[3]
If you are trying to make a decision and aren't sure whether it’s morally right or wrong, ask yourself, “Would I want someone else to do to me what I am thinking of doing to them?” If the answer is no, then you know that it’s most likely the wrong thing to do.
On the other hand, if you imagine yourself being on the receiving end of the action you are about to take, and you think you would be happy about it, that can serve as an indicator as to whether you can safely move forward with that action. If you would be happy to hear what you are going to say about someone else said about you, if you would be happy to accept the financial transaction that you are offering your brother, then move forward with it. But if in your heart you know that what you’re about to do to someone might hurt them, and you wouldn’t be happy with someone doing that to you, then you can be pretty sure you’re sinning against your brother.
The biblical injunctions to treat others the same way you want them to treat you and to love your neighbor as yourself aren't just clichés or self-help advice. They are God’s challenge to us as individuals; they are a yardstick by which we should judge our actions. They are God’s guidelines for us, and we would be wise to consider them a yardstick by which He judges our actions.
It’s not some complicated formula that takes a lifetime of study to comprehend; it’s so simple that even a young child can understand. If you wouldn’t want it done to you, then you shouldn’t do it to others.
The Bible can sometimes seem complex, with many layers of meaning. It contains the deep things of God; it holds treasures old and new. Yet Jesus succinctly expressed its core message using a few simple and easy-to-comprehend words so anyone can understand: love God with all your heart, soul, and mind; and love your neighbor as yourself. This fulfills the Law and the Prophets, meaning it fulfills all that is contained in the Old Testament.
For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”[4]
The fulfilling is in the doing. These aren't just pretty word pictures or good thoughts; they convey principles that are meant to be put into action.—The action that, when faced with the choice of behaving in a hurtful manner or a loving one, you choose to be loving, even if it is to your own hurt. Jesus’ profound statements are meant to be applied. They are guiding principles by which one should make decisions and judge the decisions one makes.
There are consequences, both positive and negative, in the application or non-application of these principles. What we sow, we reap. If we sow love, we reap love; if we sow kindness, we reap the same.
The converse is true as well, as expressed in the book of Job:
According to what I have seen, those who plow iniquity and those who sow trouble harvest it.[5]
There is a correlation between our actions—the way we treat others—and the consequences of those actions. Reaping what we sow is an active principle which can deeply affect our lives. Our personal history will be affected either positively or negatively by how we treat others. Hence, treating others the way we would want them to treat us becomes a principle of great importance, one which we would be wise to apply in our everyday lives.
Footnotes:
[1] Luke 6:31 NIV.
[2] Luke 6:31 NASB.
[3] Matthew 7:12 ESV.
[4] Galatians 5:14 NASB.
[5] Job 4:8 NASB.
Forgiveness and Salvation
In two previous posts on the topic of forgiveness I wrote about 1) forgiving others and 2) avoiding the need to be forgiven, by doing unto others what you would have them do unto you. In this post I’ll address how principles of forgiveness connect with salvation.
When Jesus said, “For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses,” He was not speaking of the forgiveness of sins that we receive when we accept Jesus as our Savior and get saved.[1] Jesus died on the cross for our salvation so that we would be redeemed, so that our sins—past, present, and future—would be forgiven.
Anyone who has received Jesus as their Savior possesses forgiveness for their sins. The saved are justified before God through Jesus’ death on the cross. This does not mean that as Christians we are no longer sinners—for we all sin throughout our lives—but we are justified sinners, sinners for whom Jesus died, who have accepted Him as our Savior, and who are now the holders of everlasting life. Our initial forgiveness, however, does not give us license to continue sinning; rather we are to confess our sins to the Lord, seek His forgiveness, and strive to change those things that we know are not acceptable to Him.
In a sense, accepting Jesus as our Savior brings us into God’s family, and we become adopted children of God. Adoption is a legal term which expresses that a child is now legally part of a family, and similarly, salvation can be seen as a legal right that you possess. Your position in relationship to God changes when you receive salvation—you are no longer someone who is not a child of God, but someone who is now legally part of His family.
John 1:12 expresses it this way: “But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God” (ESV). As justified sinners, we are God’s adopted children, thus we can call God our Father. When we die, we have the legal right to enter heaven as one of His children. So the forgiveness of our sins at salvation can be seen as changing our legal position to that of adopted children. Some call this positional forgiveness. Others call it judicial forgiveness, or forensic forgiveness, or God’s family forgiveness.
Back to the statements in Matthew 6: When Jesus said that if we don’t forgive others, God won’t forgive us, He was not talking about positional forgiveness. He didn’t mean that if we don’t forgive someone who has wronged us, we would lose our salvation. Instead, He was speaking of what can be called relational forgiveness. Even though we are saved and have the legal right of being God’s children through adoption, when we sin it affects our fellowship and personal relationship with God.
When Jesus taught His disciples, in the Lord’s Prayer, to ask the Father to forgive them for their trespasses or debts, He was teaching them to repair any damage their daily sin had caused to their relationship with God. Our sins cause a breach in our personal relationship with God, similar to what occurs when a son knowingly and deeply offends his earthly father. Even though his legal position as son would remain the same and the father’s love toward the child may be unchanged, the relationship between father and son would suffer some damage and would need repair or restoration.
When Jesus said that God won’t forgive our trespasses if we don’t forgive those who trespass against us, He was saying that God’s response to us is connected to how we treat others. When we pray the Lord’s Prayer, we are specifically asking God to forgive us in the same manner as we forgive others. “Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.”[2] We are praying that God will treat us in our sins as we have treated others in theirs. We are meant to then put feet to our prayers and actively forgive others, which positively affects God’s treatment of us.
Sin has an effect on our relationship to God, so it is important to not only forgive others who sin against us, but also to confess our sins to God and ask for His forgiveness on a regular basis. Doing so helps us maintain a right relationship with Him.
The Bible sometimes depicts our relationship with God with language expressing nearness or distance. He is “near” us, or His presence is “with us” when we have a right relationship with Him; and He “departs” from us or is “distant” from us when we distance ourselves from Him through sin.
James 4:8 expresses it in the positive:
“Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.” (ESV).
Then there are scriptures about how we create distance:
“Your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God.”[3]
“The Lord is far from the wicked, but he hears the prayer of the righteous.”[4]
To understand how relational forgiveness works, it might be helpful to think in terms of the relationships you have with others—your spouse or significant other, your close friends, your siblings, your parents, or your children. If you have a big argument or major disagreement with one of them, or if one of you has offended another or has deeply hurt the other in some way, then there is a distance between you. Even if you are still in physical proximity, there is a separation between you emotionally and spiritually. This separation disappears once something is done to repair the relationship, and generally when it’s repaired, the close connection is present once again. However, if the breach is not repaired, then the distance remains and can even increase.
When we sin, we commit an offense against God; we are distancing ourselves from Him, and this hurts our relationship with Him. Like with a friend or a spouse, something needs to be done in order to fix the relationship, and that something is us confessing our sin to Him and asking for His forgiveness, along with working to change our behavior and not continuing to do the same thing that displeased Him. If you have done something to hurt someone you love and you want to make amends, then you generally have to go to that person and say that you were wrong and you are sorry, and ask forgiveness—and try not to do it again. It’s that way with God as well. When we confess, we are forgiven, and the distance between us dissipates. That’s how we repair our relationship with Him when we’ve damaged it with sin.
“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”[5]
But it’s also important to remember what Jesus said about forgiving others:
“For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”[6]
The “nearness” or “distance” of our relationship with God is affected by how we forgive or don’t forgive others. So if someone has offended you, forgive them—no matter what their attitude or whether they continue to transgress against you. Forgiveness benefits both your relationship with others and your relationship with God.
It’s wise to forgive. It’s loving. It’s Christlike. God’s nature is loving, and forgiveness is part of His love. He gave His only Son for the forgiveness of our sins, and Jesus gave His life so that we could be forgiven. If you forgive others, which is an act of love on your part, then you are reflecting God; you are being like Jesus.—And that’s a good thing to be.
To close, here is a beautiful example of a prayer of confession and petition to God for forgiveness, prayed by a man who committed horrible sins, who repented, and whom God called a man after His own heart … King David of old:
Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.
Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!
For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.
Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be
justified in your words and blameless in your judgment.
Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.
Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being, and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.
Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones that you have broken rejoice.
Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities.
Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit.
Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will return to you.
Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God, O God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing
aloud of your righteousness.
O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.
For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; you will not be pleased with a burnt
offering.
The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not
despise.[7]
Footnotes:
[2] Matthew 6:12 ESV.
[3] Isaiah 59:2 ESV
[4] Proverbs 15:29 ESV.
[5] 1 John 1:9 ESV.
[6] Matthew 6:14–15 ESV.
[7] Psalm 51:1–17 ESV.
The Forgiveness Challenge
While forgiving is something that needs to be done for the sake of unity, harmony, and brotherhood, the bottom line is that it’s the means for you to get over the hurt and to move on into the future without the events of your past affecting you negatively. Forgiving someone doesn’t mean that you are saying they weren’t to blame, or that they weren’t wrong. It’s not exonerating them from their actions. It is, however, an important step in your own healing, and without it you may not heal.
You may have things that you’re angry about, things that people have done to you which were wrong. They may have been hurtful or uncaring, they may have caused hardship in your life, but forgiveness is the way to heal—letting go, giving it to the Lord and leaving it in the past. And while you’re in the process of forgiving others, it’s wise to ask the Lord to forgive you for any hurts that you have caused others, either knowingly or unknowingly.
Something else to consider when someone does something that you feel is not right or hurtful is to recognize that people often act a certain way based on something that is going on in their life that you may be unaware of. Someone may do something that seems very selfish, but it isn’t nearly as bad or selfish as you’re assuming. You don’t know the situation they’re in. You don’t know the thought processes that they’re going through. I’ve done that. I’ve wondered why someone acted a certain way or said something that seemed hurtful, and I’ve thought negatively about them. Then later I found out that they had been really sick, or something major had happened in their life or with their kids, and they were really going through it. They were experiencing difficulty, and due to that, they weren’t at the top of their game. The actions that looked selfish to me may have been exactly the right thing for them to have done in their difficult situation. It’s important to be prayerful, to have compassion, and to understand that each person is like a universe and you don’t always know what’s going on in their universe. So it’s wise to not be judgmental.
I’m sure we all try to do our best, and we try to be loving, and we try to be like the Lord, and we try to not hurt people; but the simple fact is that we’re sinners. That’s the whole point of salvation, and that’s why Jesus came—because no matter how hard we try, no matter how much we don’t want to hurt people, no matter how perfect we want to be, no matter how much we want to live in love, we can’t always, because we are human, we are sinners. There’s no one who could do it all right except Jesus. He’s the only one who ever did it all right, and that’s why He came, because He’s the only one who could.
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.[1]
For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.[2]
You know that He appeared to take away sins, and in Him there is no sin.[3]
He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.[4]
The Lord has forgiven our sins. We all sin, we sin every day, but we are forgiven because of Jesus’ death on the cross. Even those who we feel have hurt us or done wrong to us are forgiven by the Lord, and if He has forgiven them, then it makes sense that we should forgive them too. Forgiving others is part of being a Christian. If we want to be Christlike, then we need to forgive those who have wronged us. We all need to forgive, and we all need forgiveness. And I think when you remember the “I need forgiveness” side, it makes it easier to forgive others for the things that they’ve done to you.
If you have deep hurt, and I know that some of you do, today is a good day to let it go. Today is a good day to forgive. Today is also a good day to ask for forgiveness. I’m sure none of us want others to be thinking back on things we’ve done or said that have hurt them. I’m sure you hope they have forgiven you. And if you want that, then it stands to reason that the person who may have done something similar to you wants the same thing. They want forgiveness, just as you do. The biblical principle is that if you want forgiveness, you need to forgive others.
It’s sometimes hard to forgive when someone’s actions have made things difficult for you on the longer term. I have heard people say, “Some things just aren’t fair. There are people who have done things that benefited themselves at my expense. Now they are in a good situation and I am struggling.” Sadly, this may very well be true. There are situations where it looks like everything is so good for the one who has wronged you, and it’s so bad for you. You may have tried to follow the Lord closely, or you tried to be loving and do the right thing, and you are the one who suffered.
Well, you’re right; it’s not fair right now. But it’s important to understand that God is righteous—He is righteousness. He is also just—He is justice. Justice is in His hands. Righteousness is in His hands. He will work in the lives of those who may have hurt you. Your job is to forgive. Let the Lord be the judge. If something is happening in your life and it doesn’t make any sense, remember it makes sense to God. It comes down to your trust in God. Yes, you may be in a difficult situation. But you don’t see it as God sees it.
We look at everything day by day because we live in time. When something happens to us, that’s our reality. Our focus is on “I lost my job” or “I was going to get a house and somebody else got it.” But remember, God knows the future. He knows the end of the story. He knows what the effects of today’s events will be, even when these events seem very negative to you now. He may know that the bad thing that’s happening to you today will be the thing that brings you to a future opportunity that will make things much better for you. We live in time, and time’s kind of crummy that way, because you actually have to go through your life moment by moment, with no knowledge of what is going to happen ahead. You may be negatively affected by someone else’s sins and might suffer some present hardship because of it. God may know that in the long run that experience will lead to something good later in your life, but right now you don’t know that. When this happens you can either harbor ill will toward the person, which will make all you’re going through even worse, or you can forgive, put it into the Lord’s hands, and move on by faith, knowing that the Lord is just and loving.
Leave these things in His all-knowing, all-loving hands. Forgive and move on. Let go of the things that bother you about other people, because they just hold you back. Those things keep you anchored to emotional hurts. They keep you anchored to the past, when God wants to move in your life today and in the future.
When you forgive, in a sense you are saying, “Lord, I take all this hurt and what this person did to me, and I put it into Your hands—into Your righteous hands, into Your just hands. I trust that You will work in this person’s life as You see fit, and I will trust that You know what’s best.” You are also saying, “I let it go. I no longer want it to be part of my life. I no longer want this to affect me. I truly forgive this person for what they have done. It’s over. I give it to You.” Then it’s in God’s hands and you leave it there. Once you’ve given it to the Lord, He can begin to heal the hurt in your heart and make things right for you, even if the other person isn’t sorry and everything isn’t perfectly resolved.
You don’t know how the Lord is going to work in someone else’s life, and maybe from your perspective, you’ll never know that He did. But the Lord has His ways. It’s not your concern anymore, it’s God’s. But if you don't let it go, it remains your problem and it affects you negatively. So I ask that you let any hurts go, no matter who hurt you, no matter what they did.
If you have somebody you want to forgive, please, as we pray, give that to the Lord. Let it go. Holding on to it won’t do you any good spiritually, and it will continue to hurt you throughout your life. It will also hurt the unity of the body.
I think it would also be good if each of us would take a little time of private prayer to ask the Lord to forgive us for the things that we’ve done to others, because we have all done something. We need to both forgive and to ask forgiveness.
(Prayer:) Lord, we all know that we are sinners in need of You and Your forgiveness. We know that we’ve hurt others and need their forgiveness. We also need to forgive those who have hurt us, who have sinned against us. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. There’s none righteous, no, not one.
Things have happened to each of us that have hurt us, and that we have to forgive people for. It can seem so unfair that somebody has done something to us that has affected our life so much, and then they just go on and their life continues and perhaps they even prosper. It looks like everything is going well for them. It looks like they’re being blessed—and we’re not. And that’s just so hard to understand. That just seems so unfair. But Jesus, You are God. You are just. You are righteous. It may not seem fair, it may not even be fair right now, but You see the long term. You know what’s ahead in life. You know what needs to be done in their life, in each of our lives. So we’re just going to have to trust You and Your righteousness and Your justice and Your love and Your mercy.
Those people who hurt us are also Your children and they need Your love and Your forgiveness. They need Your grace. And maybe in some cases they also need Your justice, but that’s up to You. They are in Your hands. So we pray that You will help us to put them into Your hands and to trust You, that You will work in their lives in the way that will bring them to an understanding or to learn whatever it is that they need to learn.
Lord, we give those things to You. We pray that You help us to forgive, and we pray that You help us to be forgiven, and that You forgive us for the hurts that we’ve caused.
We ask for Your blessing as we take communion; we ask that You heal physically any of those who need healing, and that You heal spiritually, mentally, and emotionally any who need healing in these areas, as they partake.
While we are partaking of Your body and Your blood, we also pray for Your Spirit to fill each of us, as it did when Your disciples were together on the Day of Pentecost and Your Spirit fell so strongly on everyone—that infilling of You that brought forth fruit; that brought forth witnessing fruit, mission fruit.
Help each of us to walk in Your light and shine Your light on others. Help each of us to love You, to live You, to preach You, to teach You in the way that we can, in the way that You show us. We pray that You will take away any condemnation or feelings of failure, or feelings of discouragement or lack of faith. Help each one to trust You, to know that You love them, that even if things aren’t going exactly as they would want them, You’re there. Your hand is on their life, and they are not alone. You are there with them, and You will always be there. You will never leave nor forsake them, because You love them. None of us have to earn Your love, Jesus. You just love us because You love us, because we are who we are—Your creation.
Help us to accept Your love, to realize that we don't have to earn it; we already have it. And help us, in that knowledge, to feel free to do what You show us to do, to move with the wind of Your Spirit wherever You lead us. We pray that You lead us to places where we can help others, where we can bring them to You, because that is the call and the commission to us who are disciples. So help us to do that, Lord. Help us to follow You, to follow Your Spirit, to let Your Spirit dwell within us and shine through us, so that our lives can be such that others see You in us and glorify You.
Help us to know that You love us, that You forgive us. Help us to love one another and forgive one another, in Jesus’ name.
For more on the topic of forgiveness, please see the following series of articles, also on Directors’ Corner:
The Other Side of the Equation
Forgiveness and Salvation
Footnotes:
[1] 1 Timothy 1:15 ESV.
[2] Romans 5:7–8 ESV.
[3] 1 John 3:5 ESV.
[4] 2 Corinthians 5:21 NASB.
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
The Importance of Understanding!
Stepcase Lifehack, 13 Jul 2012
Pilots in the early days wore silk scarves and goggles. The scarves and goggles, in fact, became icons of open-cockpit pilots, and to this day souvenir designers put them on teddy bears and ceramic turtles so people can immediately identify them as pilots. The scarves and goggles are wonderfully romantic and iconic fashion symbols, aren’t they?
But do you know why pilots wore them? The radial engines of those early planes were notorious for leaking fuel and oil, and since the pilot sat right behind them in the open cockpit, any leaking fluids ended up right on them and in their faces. They used the silk scarves to wipe the oil or diesel off their goggles in mid-flight, so they could see!
This is just one example of how appearances do not measure up to reality. The scarves seem like a fashion statement, or perhaps for warmth, but their appearance belied their true purpose. We can easily make the same mistake today, in judging things from their appearances.
For example, I knew a pastor of a church who once drove a Cadillac. Seem a bit extravagant for someone whose wages are paid by their hard-working parishioners? It was the cheapest car he ever owned; he bought it second hand and got a very good deal on it. He replaced it with a Jeep Cherokee—the most expensive car he’d ever owned. But it didn’t get second-looks and he didn’t put up with any judgement for owning it.
There is a big danger in judging things we don’t really understand by how they appear. Unless you are really “in the loop,” be wary of things that you see or things others tell you. Remember the old adage “Believe half of what you say, a third of what you see, and none of what you hear.”
There’s a lot of truth in that. Don’t let yourself be spun for a loop over office politics, or rumours and speculation of what management is planning. Steer clear of the gossips and don’t give them any ammunition, that is, don’t say gossipy things to them or even drop hints. This still applies to you if you’re self-employed; don’t believe everything you hear on the news—in particular, speculation and forecasting. A lot of times, those people are only guessing about what’s going to happen and they can cause you a lot of worry that doesn’t do you any good. They are often wrong, something they won’t usually point out in the news at a later date. In some cases, the news can even take on a “gossipy” sound to it, and whenever you get that vibe, be very wary or tune it out.
Practice being slow to form an opinion of someone or something. If something grabs your attention, research it thoroughly before making any conclusions.
“Seek first to understand, then to be understood.”
We can fall into the trap of so earnestly wanting to get our point across, we forget to listen to the person we are speaking to. And even when we listen, how often do we really seek to understand? If you find you have issues understanding those around you, slow down and try to truly understand:
* Where they are coming from.
* What they are going through.
* What is their motivation for doing something.
* What they need or want from you.
Obviously, the answers to these questions vary greatly depending on who you are having communication trouble with. Be objective as you listen, as if you were a detective trying to solve the case, and don’t take anything personally. Once you feel like you understand the other person—why they are wearing that silk scarf—then you can “seek to be understood.”
Pilots in the early days wore silk scarves and goggles. The scarves and goggles, in fact, became icons of open-cockpit pilots, and to this day souvenir designers put them on teddy bears and ceramic turtles so people can immediately identify them as pilots. The scarves and goggles are wonderfully romantic and iconic fashion symbols, aren’t they?
But do you know why pilots wore them? The radial engines of those early planes were notorious for leaking fuel and oil, and since the pilot sat right behind them in the open cockpit, any leaking fluids ended up right on them and in their faces. They used the silk scarves to wipe the oil or diesel off their goggles in mid-flight, so they could see!
This is just one example of how appearances do not measure up to reality. The scarves seem like a fashion statement, or perhaps for warmth, but their appearance belied their true purpose. We can easily make the same mistake today, in judging things from their appearances.
For example, I knew a pastor of a church who once drove a Cadillac. Seem a bit extravagant for someone whose wages are paid by their hard-working parishioners? It was the cheapest car he ever owned; he bought it second hand and got a very good deal on it. He replaced it with a Jeep Cherokee—the most expensive car he’d ever owned. But it didn’t get second-looks and he didn’t put up with any judgement for owning it.
There is a big danger in judging things we don’t really understand by how they appear. Unless you are really “in the loop,” be wary of things that you see or things others tell you. Remember the old adage “Believe half of what you say, a third of what you see, and none of what you hear.”
There’s a lot of truth in that. Don’t let yourself be spun for a loop over office politics, or rumours and speculation of what management is planning. Steer clear of the gossips and don’t give them any ammunition, that is, don’t say gossipy things to them or even drop hints. This still applies to you if you’re self-employed; don’t believe everything you hear on the news—in particular, speculation and forecasting. A lot of times, those people are only guessing about what’s going to happen and they can cause you a lot of worry that doesn’t do you any good. They are often wrong, something they won’t usually point out in the news at a later date. In some cases, the news can even take on a “gossipy” sound to it, and whenever you get that vibe, be very wary or tune it out.
Practice being slow to form an opinion of someone or something. If something grabs your attention, research it thoroughly before making any conclusions.
“Seek first to understand, then to be understood.”
We can fall into the trap of so earnestly wanting to get our point across, we forget to listen to the person we are speaking to. And even when we listen, how often do we really seek to understand? If you find you have issues understanding those around you, slow down and try to truly understand:
* Where they are coming from.
* What they are going through.
* What is their motivation for doing something.
* What they need or want from you.
Obviously, the answers to these questions vary greatly depending on who you are having communication trouble with. Be objective as you listen, as if you were a detective trying to solve the case, and don’t take anything personally. Once you feel like you understand the other person—why they are wearing that silk scarf—then you can “seek to be understood.”
