"Give us help from trouble, for vain is the help of man. Through God we shall do valiantly, for it is He that shall tread down our enemies." Ps. 108:12-13
Oft times the mountain that we must assail seems utterly impassable, insurmountable. I have had that feeling most noticeably in bookstores. The "Classics" section offers me some reprieve (and thus often becomes my hiding spot), but I invariably must walk past and wade through a bombardment of contemporary literature whose covers alone assault my senses and sensibilities like waves pounding a beach. Despite varied subject matters, all are essentially the same book: this or that person of various respectability and/or prestige (or lack thereof) is espousing this or that doctrine or idea or opinion that sounds really good to them and their close friends (and maybe even a few amiable strangers), but ultimately is a heaping pile of absurdities and hubris, an adamant yet unintentional demonstration of Romans 1:22.
Now, it is not that these trivial treatises, in and of themselves, pose an actual threat to Christian truth. With time, even a small child of the faith could answer their nonsense. The colorful myriad (like spewed vomit) of contemporary thought looks good only on paper. With some careful thought (a rarity these days), however, their internal and external consistencies (the validity of its logic and the practicality of its application) being to unravel quite humorously (and pathetically); for the only true test of any worldview is to test its internal/external consistencies, and many fail on one or both counts.
It is not, therefore, any truth on their part that can cause one to despair; rather, it is the sheer volume of them that can. Some would dare curse the invention of the printing press: if only Gutenberg knew the number of lunacies that we would be inundated with! Our shelves seem crammed to bursting with a variety of opinions on "what's wrong," "who's wrong," "why its/their wrong," "why I'm right," and (their favorite subject) "how to fix it". With so many subjective preferences, devoid of (and yet masquerading as) objective fact, floating about us like sharks, it is easy to see how a non-intellectual life behind a picket fence would be a preferable life. When filled with such a deluge of counter-claims (many of them foolish), the task of being a light in the world very quickly seems impossible; we do not even know where to beginning.
Yet, we are told where to beginning quite explicitly, and it is summed up in one prepositional phrase: "Through God" (vs. 13). Herein is our comfort, our weapon against despair: it is God, the infinite and almighty one, and not us, who shall answer to lunacies, correct the foolishness, and check the absurdities. Here is our hope: we are not the ones to assail the mountain; God is. It is God's power, God's light, God Himself that is given to us in Christ. He fights His war through us; we have our small part to play, but the actual triumph is all on His shoulders, and they are strong shoulders, thick and broad. They bore the Sin of the world; they can bare its nonsense as well.
Our situation before this mountain, therefore, is like Nehemiah rebuilding the wall; each man had their own task: some repaired this part, others this part, and others that part, and others still stood guard rather than build. God rebuilt the wall because each individual put their brick in the wall; a myriad of small task united together into one glorious success. That is the reality of our situation: we have not a mountain to assail; we have our brick to put in the wall, our one small yet invaluable piece in the mosaic of God's ultimate victory. The darkness is thick due to its great number, but through God we shall do valiantly, for He who is with us and in us is greater than all our enemies and their perilous yet innocuous noise (I John 4:4).
-Jon Vowell
Oft times the mountain that we must assail seems utterly impassable, insurmountable. I have had that feeling most noticeably in bookstores. The "Classics" section offers me some reprieve (and thus often becomes my hiding spot), but I invariably must walk past and wade through a bombardment of contemporary literature whose covers alone assault my senses and sensibilities like waves pounding a beach. Despite varied subject matters, all are essentially the same book: this or that person of various respectability and/or prestige (or lack thereof) is espousing this or that doctrine or idea or opinion that sounds really good to them and their close friends (and maybe even a few amiable strangers), but ultimately is a heaping pile of absurdities and hubris, an adamant yet unintentional demonstration of Romans 1:22.
Now, it is not that these trivial treatises, in and of themselves, pose an actual threat to Christian truth. With time, even a small child of the faith could answer their nonsense. The colorful myriad (like spewed vomit) of contemporary thought looks good only on paper. With some careful thought (a rarity these days), however, their internal and external consistencies (the validity of its logic and the practicality of its application) being to unravel quite humorously (and pathetically); for the only true test of any worldview is to test its internal/external consistencies, and many fail on one or both counts.
It is not, therefore, any truth on their part that can cause one to despair; rather, it is the sheer volume of them that can. Some would dare curse the invention of the printing press: if only Gutenberg knew the number of lunacies that we would be inundated with! Our shelves seem crammed to bursting with a variety of opinions on "what's wrong," "who's wrong," "why its/their wrong," "why I'm right," and (their favorite subject) "how to fix it". With so many subjective preferences, devoid of (and yet masquerading as) objective fact, floating about us like sharks, it is easy to see how a non-intellectual life behind a picket fence would be a preferable life. When filled with such a deluge of counter-claims (many of them foolish), the task of being a light in the world very quickly seems impossible; we do not even know where to beginning.
Yet, we are told where to beginning quite explicitly, and it is summed up in one prepositional phrase: "Through God" (vs. 13). Herein is our comfort, our weapon against despair: it is God, the infinite and almighty one, and not us, who shall answer to lunacies, correct the foolishness, and check the absurdities. Here is our hope: we are not the ones to assail the mountain; God is. It is God's power, God's light, God Himself that is given to us in Christ. He fights His war through us; we have our small part to play, but the actual triumph is all on His shoulders, and they are strong shoulders, thick and broad. They bore the Sin of the world; they can bare its nonsense as well.
Our situation before this mountain, therefore, is like Nehemiah rebuilding the wall; each man had their own task: some repaired this part, others this part, and others that part, and others still stood guard rather than build. God rebuilt the wall because each individual put their brick in the wall; a myriad of small task united together into one glorious success. That is the reality of our situation: we have not a mountain to assail; we have our brick to put in the wall, our one small yet invaluable piece in the mosaic of God's ultimate victory. The darkness is thick due to its great number, but through God we shall do valiantly, for He who is with us and in us is greater than all our enemies and their perilous yet innocuous noise (I John 4:4).
-Jon Vowell
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