Ep384. The End of All Things.

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray With Me”.

“The end of all things is near,” says Peter (1 Pet 4:7).  

Wow. What will he tell us about the end? A vision of Armageddon? New insight into the rapture? A prophecy that the world will self-destruct? 

Nope. Listen to the rest of Peter’s statement.

“The end of all things is near. Therefore be clear-minded and self-controlled so that you can pray” (1 Peter 4:7). 

Pray? What a letdown. I want to know what Peter knows about the end of the world. But he’s not telling. Just pray, he says. So today, let’s consider what he says about the motive and two requirements for prayer. 

Two thousand years ago, Peter said our motive for praying should be because the end is near. It must be a lot closer now. Sometimes watching the news, I wonder how long the world can last. 

But Peter is’t peddling conspiracy theories about the end. He’s not suggesting we become preppers, or take hard-line positions on vaccinations, or build fortified retreats in the wilderness. He doesn’t lecture on how to read the signs of the times. No, he suggests we pray. 

So what are his requirements to pray? He says: Be clear-minded. Be self-controlled. 

First, clear-minded. I’m not sure why Peter thinks mental confusion might hinder prayer, though I agree there is much unclear thinking among Christians. I’ve read Christian books on biblical inerrancy, sexuality, abortion, political tribalism, and what the gospels really mean. It’s all a bit confusing.

In my twenties, a friend raised in the same conservative evangelical culture as I rejected Christianity. His take: legalism, an anti-intellectual stance, and the insular culture made Christianity irrelevant in a modern, scientific, evolutionary era.

I said to him, “We were not taught historic Christianity. Not at all! It was a version based on changeable cultural norms and intuitions that suited the way they thought and the way they wanted to live . Even their scripture interpretation was based on an early 20th century conservative way of thinking, not on timeless truth.” 

I continued, “Before rejecting Christianity, look at two thousand years of Christian history and thought, not just a recent, culturally conditioned version of the faith.”

For me, thinking clearly about Christianity has been a life-long project. Trying to separate truth from culture. Wheat from chaff. Gold from gravel.

Peter’s second requirement for prayer? Be self-controlled. This is a problem for moderns like me. Being self-controlled means not overeating, not watching internet porn, not surrendering to empty despair. Not giving way to anger in relationships, or to hate in politics.

To be clear-minded and self-controlled is to choose what I think about and to choose how I act. To follow Paul’s advice to think about what is noble, right, pure, and lovely (Phil 4:8). To choose a way of life that follows Christ.

Let’s pray. 

O father, Peter tells us to pray because the end of all things is near. He urges us to be clear-minded and self-controlled. 

We ask for the gift of clear thinking. Give us discernment when we surf the net and watch the news. Help us see the difference between truth and lies, between news and opinion, between sober judgments and baseless accusations. 

Help us see the difference between our weird and wandering culture and the kind of Christianity you would have us follow.

Give us the grace of self-control. Help us eat healthy, without overeating. Help us to avoid doom scrolling and mindless surfing. Form us, shape us, mold us by your word and your truth and your love until we become fully human, restored into the image of Christ.

And at the end of all things may we find our refuge in you. 

Amen. 

I’m Daniel, on the channel “Pray with Me”.  

YouTube channel: Pray with Me – YouTube

Ep383. Hindrance to Prayer. 

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray With Me”.

I am taken aback by Peter’s instruction when he says to me,
    Husbands, be considerate and treat your wives with respect . . .
          as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, 
          so that nothing will hinder your prayers (1 Pet 3:7). 

Hinder my prayers? I thought prayer was between me and God, not between me and God and my wife.

I experience lots of hindrances to prayer. Laziness is near the top. How much easier to watch YouTube or read a novel than pray. In fact, if you want a good mystery story, my wife and I are enjoying The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman. But I am distracted. Back to prayer.

I hinder my prayers by scrolling social media or puttering around the house or listening to great worship music. And now, Peter adds, by not being careful how I treat my wife. 

Peter and Paul tell wives to submit. Bible interpreters wrap themselves in knots trying to explain, or explain away, what that means. The Message Bible and the Voice don’t even use the word submit when they say how a Christian marriage should work. 

For me, the work of marriage starts with Peter’s warning. If I’m not considerate and respectful, if I don’t treat my wife as an equal heir of salvation, my prayer life will disintegrate. 

What do you think? Is Peter preaching to me? Or is he meddling in my private life? Why doesn’t my prayer life depend on my theology? Or on a high view of scripture? Or on agreement with Peter’s patriarchal view of relationships?

Nope. Out of nowhere, he hits me with a rule of life. If you want to pray, he says, have sympathy with your wife’s difficulties in life and health. Respect her. Honor her. Lose your sense of male superiority and entitlement. Be careful of her preferences and interests. 

Your prayer life depends on it.

Let’s pray. 

O father, you created Eve as a companion for Adam. But how little we moderns understand companionship. 

Today you do not question my theology, but my behavior, how I treat my wife, my companion and partner. Are you suggesting that what I do is more important than what I say I believe?

Like the parable of the sheep and goats. You sent away those who said, “We preached and prophesied and did miracles.” You welcomed those who fed the hungry and helped the poor. 

Help me to lose my culture of privilege. Help me treat all your children with honor and respect, until I can pray wisely and graciously, without hindrance.

Amen. 

I’m Daniel, on the channel “Pray with Me”.  

YouTube channel: Pray with Me – YouTube

Ep382. Suffer. 

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray With Me”.

I knew a lady with soft tissue damage. Car accident. The doctors didn’t have solutions and the insurance company was unfriendly. She felt stuck and I listened to ask that age-old question, Why does God permit this to happen? 

I commented that the church we attended together had a theology of healing, but no theology of suffering. This was a new idea to her: a theology of suffering? 

In the book of 1 Peter, two of the most frequent words are submit and suffer. Peter’s encouragement: endure suffering faithfully.  

He instructs slaves: Submit, even if your master mistreats you. Better to suffer for doing good than for doing evil (1 Pet 2:18-20). He instructs all Christians: Don’t be surprised when a fiery ordeal tests you (1 Pet 4:12). Why? Because all over the world believers experience suffering (1 Pet 5:9). Perhaps we are next in line. 

My preference is not to suffer at all! But Peter explains that Christ suffered for doing good, and so should we (1 Pet 4:13). 

Consider three things that cause us to suffer. 

1. First, we suffer because other people sin. All of us have father-wounds and mother-wounds from parents who were less than perfect. Entire nations endure suffering caused by power-hungry, violent, and corrupt leaders. By design or accident, by sin or carelessness, we humans cause each other to suffer. 

2. The second cause of suffering? Our own sins and misadventures. As Billy Joe Shaver sings,
      The devil made me do it the first time,
      The second time I done it on my own.
                              – Billy Joe Shaver, The Devil Made Me Do It 

It’s no surprise that we suffer from poor choices. A used car I chose required endless repairs and body work, until finally the engine broke beyond repair on a street in front of a liquor store. Too often I hit “send” on angry emails, putting friendships and relationships at risk. I should learn to choose better.

3. And third, suffering is part of living in a broken world. Families wiped out by a hurricane. Crops lost to insects, war, or drought. Race wars, ethnic cleansing, child soldiers. A recently retired couple planned to travel together, but he got Alzheimers. Now she travels to the dementia unit to see him.

I don’t want to end like that! I exercise and eat healthy to slow down aging. Doctors prescribe painkillers and psychology supplies self-help books. But at best I can only delay the end. I don’t get to choose whether my journey will be easy or painful. 

Peter teaches us to endure suffering. Like Christ did. When we cannot eliminate life’s aches and pains, Peter invites us to walk through them with Christ as our companion. 

Let’s pray. 

O father, Jesus wanted to escape the cross. We want to escape our scrapes and pains. 

But wherever we run and wherever we hide, suffering finds us. Give us grace to endure, to take courage because Christ suffered. To take hope because he promises a new world free of pain and tears and decay and death.

Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Where our path leads through fire or flood, as our bodies age and crumble, give us grace to walk with Christ, until at last we meet you face to face. 

Amen. 

I’m Daniel, on the channel “Pray with Me”.  

YouTube channel: Pray with Me – YouTube

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray With Me”.

Today, in the book of 1 Peter, we consider the word “submit”. Not a popular word these days, is it? 

Peter applies this word four groups of people: 
   Slaves, submit to your masters.             (1 Pet 2:18)
   Wives, submit to your husbands.            (1 Pet 3:1)
   Young people, submit to your elders.      (1 Pet 5:5)
   Everyone, submit to the government.     (1 Pet 2:13)

Peter may be keen on the word “submit”, but we’re not. I prefer to grow through expressing myself, becoming assertive, living free. Not much room for submission there! 

Our western culture values freeing slaves from their masters, and citizens from oppressive governments. But Moses didn’t submit to Pharaoh. He led the Israelite slaves away from the Egyptian government and away from their Egyptian slave masters. 

And what about women? Do they have a right to throw off patriarchal oppression, and find their way to a promised land of equality and justice?

Here are three situations where we submit. 

1. First, we submit to the laws of nature. Hiking in the mountains this summer, I climbed over fallen logs instead of waking through them. I went round the lake instead of through it. I walked carefully across the avalanche slope instead of jogging. I submitted to the laws of nature in order to gain the high country with its fresh air and amazing views. 

2. Second, we obey the laws of relationship. These are more fluid and variable laws than those of nature. Gravity pulls in one direction only, but there is push and pull, give and take in friendships, employment, marriages, and politics. The slopes and scree fields of relationships require thoughtful navigation.

As does my relationship with the government. I could show disapproval by not paying taxes. But that wouldn’t turn out well.  Peter’s advice: chill out, submit. 

In my working life, as my colleagues and I grew older, we began reporting to younger managers, who were hired or promoted above us. Several colleagues lost their jobs because they knew better than the young upstarts, and they let them know it. Sometimes I knew better too, but I exercised a submissive caution. 

God also follows the laws of relationship. He doesn’t usually say, “Submit or else”. He loves me, he draws me into a relationship, working with me to change my point of view. 

3. A third form of submission is obedience to the Spirit of God in my life. It’s not always clear when I am hearing God and when I am hearing my own inner voice or preference. But it is important to listen and discern until my way becomes clear. 

Let’s pray. 

Our father, you seek us because you want relationship. 

What return have we made for your great love? 
    Have we been surly slaves, resenting your authority?
    Have we been disobedient children, not trusting your goodness?
    Have we been unfaithful spouses, not welcoming your presence in our inmost lives? 

Teach us the grace of submission. To keep rules we need to keep. To move beyond the rules to a new heart that makes us friends and partners, in love with you and your family.  

Amen. 

I’m Daniel, on the channel “Pray with Me”.  

YouTube channel: Pray with Me – YouTube

Ep380. Holy War.

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray With Me”.

After discussing how Christians should crave milk like babies and grow up into a spiritual house, Peter presents another metaphor: holy war. 

He tells us to abstain from evil desires which wage war against our souls (1 Pet 2:11).  What? Is he telling me to take up a sword against myself?

War is ugly. Gaza wrecked by Israeli bombs and missiles. In Ukraine,  body bags and dead soldiers. Everywhere, veterans crippled physically and emotionally. Is that how Peter pictures my soul?

I have long been uncomfortable with bloody Old Testament war stories, and for years I resisted metaphors of the Christian life as war. Struggling with depression, fear, and loneliness, I steadfastly refused to interpret my life as a spiritual battle. But I regularly prayed the Apostle Paul’s armor of God for myself–the bulletproof vest, the battle boots and battle belt, war helmet, shield, and sword (Eph 6:10-18). 

What’s that, you say? I engaged in spiritual warfare while refusing to believe in it? Indeed I did.

Scripture is full of war stories, from the Battle of Nine Kings in Genesis 14 to the Battle of Armageddon at the end of history. Between these bookends, Jesus said, “I didn’t come to bring peace, but a sword” (Mat 10:34). Paul wrote, “We don’t war against flesh and blood, but against spiritual forces of darkness” (Eph 6:12). And in today’s scripture Peter warns, “Abstain from evil desires that wage war against your soul.” 

Peter doesn’t linger long on his war metaphor. He just briefly mentions that two parts of me are at war: my evil desires in conflict with my soul.   

Do you think he means that my evil desires of lust, greed, revenge, resentments, obsessions, and fears are tossing grenades at my self-control? And that my self control should shoot them down or toss them back? Like a movie where you count the action in explosions per minute?

Not a pretty picture of my interior life. But realistic, I think. 

“Abstain from evil desires that wage war,” Peter says. His metaphor warns that our evil desires are soul-destroying superpowers if we let them loose.  

Let’s pray. 

Our father, the Old Testament is full of people with evil desires, at war with themselves and each other. The Israelites, the Philistines, Assyria, Egypt, Babylon: violent actors on the stage of history where you are working out the salvation of our world. 

The New Testament, written during Rome’s violent domination of the world, tells us about Christ’s torture and death, and uses war metaphors to explain our Christian life.

Teach us to live out our personal war with evil. Teach us to war against evils everywhere. Teach us to wear the full armor of God.  

Amen. 

I’m Daniel, on the channel “Pray with Me”.  

YouTube channel: Pray with Me – YouTube