Feeling Good can Kill You!

Newsletter article for August 2004

© 2004 by Rev. Paul A. Wolff

There is a war going on. Actually, there seem to be several wars going on all at the same time. The war that I would like to consider here has been labeled the “Culture War”. This war is being fought between Christianity and Culture. It is not a new battle. It has been fought since the beginning. Holy Scripture describes it as the “great tribulation” (Revelation 7:14).

Although the Culture War is being fought for the hearts and minds of all Christians, it is parents who are engaged in the most important battles. I say that this is the most important because in the culture wars it is the children who are most vulnerable, and it is also vitally important that our children stay on the Christian side of this war, rather than being recruited for the other side.

Why is this called a “war”? Saint Peter describes it in this way, “Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul.” (1 Peter 2:11) Scripture frequently describes antagonism between the world and faithful followers of God. The “world” are those who follow their sinful desires against God’s commands. Christians are those who, though they are also sinners, by the grace of God live by faith in Jesus and by His grace they do what God commands. The war is what happens when the world tries to turn Christians against God through temptation to sin.

Make no mistake, this really is a war. The worldly side in this culture war would like you to believe that it is something completely different, that is, something which is really harmless and benign, when in fact if the battle is lost it is very deadly. Saint Paul describes it in this way, “The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world.…We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” (1 Cor. 10:4-5)

The battles in this war can be most clearly seen in temptations to such sins as sexual immorality and the pleasures of illicit drugs. The world tempts us with such things by trying to get us to believe that such things are good for us because they make us feel good. There is a bit of truth to that, but as they say, “a half truth is a whole lie.” It is true that there is probably nothing that is more pleasurable than drugs such as heroin or cocaine, but the lie in this is shown by the fact that it is a one-time “high,” you can never feel that good again. After the initial pleasure then the person is hooked and driven by a powerful desire to feel that way again, but such a thing can never be attained, and as the person seeks to feel good he or she is destroying their body.

Another front in this culture war is fought concerning sexual sins. God has given us sexuality as a blessing for married couples so that they may “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth” (see Gen. 9:7). Jesus taught that the Holy Scriptures show us that God intended marriage to be as long as they both shall live (see Matt. 19:4-6), but the world says, “if it feels good, then what harm can it do?” The harm that these sins can do is seen in the betrayal of marital vows, or the betrayal of the physical intimacy between lovers, and also in sexually transmitted diseases, in broken families, and fatherless children and orphans.

In a way, these are relatively easy battles for Christian parents to fight. We can easily show our children that if you take drugs then you might wreck your health or die. We can easily show our children that if you commit adultery then your life will be changed in any of a number of ways, none of them worth the momentary pleasure of the sin. Our children may not listen to us, and still may fall into the temptations of these sins, but the consequences of these temptations are easily seen and can be easily taught. The real tough battles in the culture war are the spiritual battles. These are the temptations to sin against the First Commandment (“You shall have no other gods.”)

The difficulty with fighting spiritual battles is that the bad consequences are not seen. Unlike the physical consequences of other sins, the result of losing the spiritual battles cannot be seen by anyone in this life. No one knows what hellish things that others experience, so when people lose the spiritual battles it is hard to point that out to our children and say, “See, if you turn against God in this way then this will happen to you, too.” The worldly culture tempts us to sin against the first commandment in much the same way as it tempts us to sin against the other commandments. We are told, “Try it, you’ll like it. It feels good, and it won’t hurt you one little bit.” In a way, it can be very fun to follow false gods, but again there is a terrible price to pay in the end.

Parents have a difficult job in fighting the war between Christianity and culture. The best weapon we have is God’s Word. As we teach and live according to God’s Word, then we arm our children to fight and become victorious in the culture wars. One simple, useful, practical way to help our children is to use the word, “no.” If we learn to say “no” to our children at the right time then we can teach them to learn some self control to deny themselves some of the pleasures of life. This is important because if we are comfortable denying ourselves some worldly pleasures then we can be comfortable denying ourselves the destructive pleasures of sin. There are many ways that feeling good can kill you, but if we train ourselves and our children to say “no” to the pleasures of the flesh then with the help of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, we can be victorious in the culture war against Christianity.

Rejecting the Survival Instinct

Newsletter article for May 2003
© 2003 by Rev. Paul A. Wolff

Behavioral philosophers (Psychologists and sociologists call themselves scientists, but human behavior is so complex and inscrutable that their work is nothing more than philosophical speculation) describe something which they call “survival instinct”. This is a subconscious drive to preserve one’s own life when faced with life-threatening danger. In some situations this instinct is a gift from God. Many people’s lives have been spared from dangerous situations when they acted on this instinct while their rational minds were paralyzed by fear. However, in God’s kingdom here on earth (i.e. among Christians) this natural instinct must often be overcome in order to remain God’s people and survive in His kingdom.

Proverbs 14:12 tells us that “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.” The way that seems right to us is that we ought to do everything we can to save ourselves both for this life, and in the life to come. However Jesus taught that “whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.” (Matthew 16:25) This goes against all of our natural survival instincts, and yet, Christians know that Jesus loves us and He would never tell us to do anything that isn’t in our best interests, so we accept this as true, and we struggle to understand this paradox and live our lives according to it. So then we need to know, “What does this mean?”

It doesn’t mean that we ought to try and hurt ourselves. Instead Jesus means that we ought to put our lives into God’s hands in all things, and instead of trying to save ourselves we ought to be obedient to God in all things, even if it causes us pain or costs us our lives. In doing this we must rely and trust in God to rescue us from all dangers of body and soul. One of my favorite examples of this in the Old Testament is David. Several times in his life, David acted in a way which was sublimely faithful to God, but from a human perspective was suicidal. The first incident happened when David was only a teenager or a young man. David risked his life in a one-on-one battle with the giant Philistine warrior, Goliath. David trusted that God would give him the victory over the blaspheming pagan, and that is exactly what happened. (1 Samuel 17) Later David allowed King Saul to escape his sword twice even though Saul had sworn to kill David, but David refused to kill the man God had chosen to be king. (1 Samuel 24 & 26) David did this even though Saul had turned against God, and God had already chosen David to replace Saul as the next king.

Other Old Testament examples of risking one’s life in order to save it are shown in the lives of Daniel and his friends, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Each of these four men remained faithful to God in violation of the King’s decree, and would have been executed except for the miraculous power of God who rescued Daniel from the hungry lions (Daniel 6), and Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from the blast-furnace (Daniel 3).

In the New Testament we see faithful believers going even further. Stephen continued to witness to the Lordship of Jesus even while he was being stoned to death, and other Apostles and believers were persecuted and killed for their faithfulness to Jesus.

What is wrong with instinct? Since we are by nature sinful, our natural instincts are basically selfish. Selfishness means that we are more concerned with pleasing ourselves than pleasing God. God doesn’t want us to be selfish because he knows that selfishness will lead us to despise Him and we will be lost forever. Instead God wants us to “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.” (Prov. 3:5) Gideon is a great example of this (Judges 6-8). When God called him to raise an army to defend God’s people against the attacks of the Midianites he started with an army of over 30,000 soldiers. God told Gideon that he had too many soldiers because when they won the victory they would think that it came by their own strength and power, and they would again forget about God (which is why God allowed the Midianites to harass them in the first place). When Gideon’s army was down to only 300 soldiers God was satisfied that it was small enough that they would know that the victory was won by the power of God, and not by their own strength.

If we save our life by losing it then does this mean that we shouldn’t care for others? Not at all! God commands us to “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Lev. 19:18; Matt. 19:19; Matt. 22:39; Mark 12:31& 33; Luke 10:27; Rom. 13:9; Gal. 5:14; James 2:8) However, this command is described as the Second greatest commandment. The First is that we ought to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” (Deut. 6:5, 10:12, 11:13, 13:3, 30:6; Joshua 22:5; Matt. 22:37; Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27) This means that while we do care for the needs of others, we don’t do it above and beyond the will and commands of God. If we try to love our neighbor, but in the process disobey God, then not only are we not loving God, but we really aren’t loving our neighbor either. We can’t despise God and still love our neighbor at the same time.

So what does this mean for the church? Well, in times of trial and testing, as we are presently experiencing, it means that we don’t necessarily take the obvious or easy path. If our problem seems to be a lack of money then we don’t solve the problem by seeking to get more money. God is in control of His church. If God thinks that we are trusting too much in money He can invent ways to relieve us of that problem, and no matter how much we may try to keep up with the bills, it won’t be enough until we learn the lesson that God wants us to learn. In God’s tests the only correct solution is to die to yourself and live for God. This means that we may have to do things which we “know” won’t work. The ways which “seem right” to us, are often wrong in God’s eyes.

If we want to grow the Church then we “know” that if we stand firm on teaching the true Christian doctrine of the Lutheran Church we will drive people away. However, Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:31-32) The Lutheran Church has a marvelous treasure in its doctrine and teaching. It is nothing less than the treasure of heaven itself. If we are to call ourselves by the name “Lutheran” then we should learn exactly what that is all about and know and make use of the great riches which have been entrusted to us. This calls for great faith because it means trusting in God’s Word and Sacraments to work miracles when we would rather trust in ourselves and the way that “seems right” to us. God is faithful (1 Cor. 1:9) and His word will accomplish great miracles that we can’t understand how (Isa. 55:11). Through His Word, God has kept His church alive through all kinds of trials and tribulations for many thousands of years, and He will continue to do so to the end.

Selected to Escape Tribulation

Newsletter Article for November 1996

© 1996 by Rev. Paul A. Wolff

As we approach the end of the Church Year the themes of the Sunday Morning Bible readings begin to focus on the end times, death, judgment, and heaven. This reminds me of a piece of junk mail I received while I was on vicarage. Through a window in the front of the envelope, printed in red, were the words “Escape Tribulation,” and beneath that was printed on the envelope (also in red) “Notification of Selection.” Well, I’m not the sort of person who gets a kick out of tribulation, and I did feel a little honored to be selected to escape it, so I opened the letter.

You can imagine my disappointment when I discovered that the letter was only an offer to subscribe to a magazine. The enclosed letter described the content of the magazine. Apparently the magazine attempts to take Biblical prophesies and apply them directly to present history. This is like taking an oversized square peg and trying to force it through an undersized round hole—even if you get it through you lose something valuable in the process.

This publication seems to claim to be a Christian publication. And they claim that their conclusions are based solely on the Bible, but something doesn’t ring true. Their attempt to make Biblical prophesies correlate to our present history only takes away from the true object of the Biblical prophesies, which is Jesus Christ. Also from the tone of the letter it seems that the underlying message of this magazine is to encourage fear and anxiety over current events. They want us to believe that we are headed toward destruction or tribulation. This is also anti-Christian because it denies that “in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” (Rom. 8:28)

I don’t know what sort of a gospel they are preaching, but from their advertisement, it seems to be a “different gospel” than the one preached in the Bible. This “different gospel” is really no gospel at all (See Galatians 1:6-10). The Bible was written to show us that Jesus is our savior from sin, so that we know what God has done to save us. The Bible gives us hope and confidence in our salvation, it doesn’t lead us to fear and despair.

I have seen these sort of ideas before. I was working as a pizza delivery man back when the Persian Gulf War was going on. On the evening when the bombers began bombing Baghdad one of my co-workers got very excited, like this was the end of the world. He was particularly worried and remained glued to a radio, listening for news. He was pretty much useless for the job at hand, partly because he was enlisted in the reserves, and partly because he thought this was the end. I must admit that I benefited from this because I took nearly all the deliveries that night and made a ton of money. (I honestly tried to reassure my friend that this wasn’t the end of the world, but he didn’t want to listen to me.)

My friend had been told that because ancient Babylon is located in what is now Iraq that they would destroy Israel and the world would shortly come to an end. Of course, nothing like that happened. We defeated Iraq in such a lopsided victory, the likes of which hadn’t been seen since Biblical times. To me the defeat of Iraq is closer to a metaphor for Christ’s victory over sin and evil, than any sign that evil is somehow going to be victorious.

The moral of this story is that there are still people who will pervert God’s word to try and make it say what they want it to say, and not what God intends. God doesn’t want us to be fearful about what the future holds, because the future is in His hands. If God wanted to make us fearful He would not have given us the Holy Scriptures, He would not have told us that He loves us, and He would not have sent Jesus to save us. It is the task of every Christian to keep the Second Commandment and uphold the truth of God’s word, and his name. The best way for us to do that is to study the Bible regularly so that we know what the truth is, and we won’t fall for lies.

No one knows when Jesus will return, and when it happens it will be “like the lightning which flashes and lights up the sky from one end to the other” (Luke 17:24), and it will happen “in the twinkling of an eye.” (1 Corinthians 15:52) Jesus made it a point not to tell us when, so that we will always be prepared. I don’t know what my friends were so worried about. When Jesus really returns we won’t mistake it for anything else, or he will wake us up with trumpets. In the meantime, there is work to be done. We should tell everyone about what Jesus has done for us so that when He returns His coming will be a joyful event for them, just as it is for us who believe, and not a fearful event.