A New Wise Saying

01.21.13

Luke 21.19 19 Stand firm, and you will win life. (NIV)

There is an expression that gets thrown around that goes something like this: if you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything. When we’re feeling especially wise we use phrases like that one. Another is: too heavenly minded to be of any earthly good. And then there’s the good old standby: can’t see the forest for the trees. I occasionally like to use all three especially when I want to play my Will Rogers-card and be the folksy common-sense purveyor. Shallow perhaps, but winsome and wise and folksy nonetheless…

But Jesus wasn’t being winsome and wise. He was at times, but never to put on some kind of air that He was cute: Jesus was always dead serious and absolutely truly genuine. He didn’t put on airs that He didn’t have. He flatly told His followers in Jerusalem that day that their beautiful Temple was going to be razed and not one precious stone that adorned it would be left for anyone to admire. (During its long history, Jerusalem has been destroyed twice, besieged 23 times, attacked 52 times, and captured and recaptured 44 times.) In 70 AD Titus, the Roman general, besieged and captured Jerusalem and razed it, along with their Temple.

Jesus was explaining to His followers that tough times were in the horizon; times that were going to include, the razing of Jerusalem, the invasion of foreign armies, and more than anything else: the persecution of the Church, the harassment and killing of the followers of Christ. He told them their biggest enemies would be their fellow Jews who didn’t accept His Messiah-ship or the tenets of the Kingdom of God. And Jesus said, “Stand firm, and you will win life.”

If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything. Stand firm in your belief that God is who He says He is, and you will win life. Anything else will be the loss of everything else. Maybe that will be my new wise saying: belief in just anything will result in the loss of just everything.

I am called to stand firm. I am called to trust Jesus when it all goes to crap. And go to crap it will. “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be great earthquakes, famines and pestilences in various places, and fearful events and great signs from heaven.” (Luke 21.10-11) The greatest threat will be giving into the temptation to conform to the culture du jour to escape the trials that stand on the horizon. Many will attempt to be “un-affiliated” in order to cause the wave of turmoil to wash around them but not wash them away. One Jesus says we’re going to be called to choose sides and anyone who isn’t for Him is against Him (Luke 11.33). “Stand firm, and you will win life.”

I am called to choose and choose I will. I want to win life – that’s a prize worth fighting for. So despite the culture and the empty promises of what is important now, Jesus tells me “Stand firm Paul and you will win life.” It calls for radical belief that resists the push and pull of earth-life which tries its damnedest to dictate what the priorities are. And in a materialistic and politically correct culture that may be hard to do, but Jesus promises: Stand firm and you will win life. Jesus is bigger than any current culture…