This is the third devotional in a looks-like-seven-part series based on the movie “We Were Soldiers”. In this devotional, I want to look at several times in the movie when, in the middle of the fight, Mel Gibson’s character, Colonel Moore keeps getting orders to leave the battle. To be airlifted out on the next helicopter. But instead of being eager to get out, he’s determined to stay as long as it takes to win the fight. Ignoring and openly refusing to obey several direct orders to return to base on the next helicopter. In the movie, the reason is that Headquarters doesn’t want to lose Colonel Moore and wants him out of what they consider a lost battle before it’s too late. But instead of getting out, he stands beside his men and fights until the battle is won or he’s killed trying to win it. But he refuses to jump on a helicopter and run because things look bleak.
How often do we do that with the world? We get upset about elections, or tragedies involving kids, or the seemingly ever-decreasing morals in this country and refusal to accept that there IS a right and wrong. Sometimes we start feeling overwhelmed. “The world’s winning.” Are we constantly looking for the helicopter out – “The world is too far gone, I just wish Jesus would hurry up and come back and get me out of here.” Are we looking forward so much to when we’re called home, that we’re like the ostrich with its head stuck in the ground (they don’t really do that) trying ignore what’s happening around us? Are we like the five-year-old that doesn’t want to hear that it’s time to clean up his room, so he sticks his fingers in his ears and yells “La-la-la-la! I can’t hear you! La-la-la-la!” not realizing that by doing that, he’s only making his parents angry? Because that’s almost a perfect analogy.
We’re to “work ‘til Jesus comes” – not throw our hands up and just wait for it all to be over. The Bible is clear that God wants us to work to make this world like Heaven. We’re even told to pray “Thy Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven.” But sometimes we don’t feel like we can make a difference. “What can I do? This whole place is going to pot, how can I stop it?” Congratulate the devil if you’ve ever had that thought. Because he’s succeeded in making you think that you’re doing it alone – when you’re clearly not alone. God is still God over all. Jesus still died to make you Holy. The Holy Spirit is still active trying to help sanctify you. And billions of Christians in the world are praying for God to heal our planet. War, pollution, religious indifference…it’s all the same. They’re all symptoms of a broken planet. So do we roll up our sleeves, and say “Ok God. I’ll need a lot of help, but I’m going to try to fix as much of this as I can!” Or do we see just how big we’ve let the mess get and just say “Ok God. Even YOU can’t clean this up…just come rescue me out of this mess. I’ll be over here with my fingers in my ears la-la-la-ing while I wait for you to get here.”
Hal Moore didn’t give up, and he didn’t get overwhelmed – he fought with his men and beside his men until the battle was won, and then and only then did he leave the battlefield. Now don’t get me wrong – if God shows up in a helicopter and orders me to get on, I’m not arguing with Him. But until then, we have work to do. God created this world and gave it to us. Then look what we’ve let happen to it. When Cameron breaks something or spills something – I’m (finally now getting some patience and am) able to say “hey, things happen” so long as he’s trying to fix it. If he’s spills half a gallon of chocolate milk in the floor, my expectation is, however, that he run and get a towel and try to fix the mess – even if he calls me to help. Not to stand there staring at it waiting for me to come in and clean it up myself after I’ve heard the commotion and come to investigate what’s going on in the kitchen with all the racket. So if God’s given us a planet, and Satan has done a wonderful job spilling chocolate milk all over it – are we going to try and clean it up or are we going to just sit there and look at it waiting for God to come fix it Himself? I think the “good and faithful servants” are the ones that realize that God gave this all to us. And then trusted us to take care of it…and they do what they can to fix as much of what’s wrong with it as they can.
Listen for the Whisper that says that there’s chocolate milk all around us that needs cleaning up. Maybe it’s cleaning up part of a polluted world – or working to keep it from getting worse. Maybe it’s a lost soul that you know that needs to be washed in the blood and made clean. Maybe it’s a group of people that are supposed to be different from the world…but instead they relish in all the worst of what the world offers while they justify their actions or lie to themselves about what it means to be a Christian. Not enjoying the beauty of God’s Creation, but enjoying the perversion we’ve twisted it into being, and you have to be the one in the group to stand up and say “guys, this isn’t right…we’re not supposed to talk/act/be like this.” Don’t just sit around waiting for God to come fix it or to just miracle you away from it. “We’ll work ‘til Jesus comes…THEN we’ll be gathered home.” Pretty sure that’s the right order – even if the song doesn’t use the word “then”. In 2 Timothy 2:15 Paul told Timothy to “Make every effort to present yourself before God as a proven worker”, not “make every effort to ignore as much of the bad stuff as you can for as long as you can, and hope God will come get you so you don’t have to look at it anymore.”
“Well done, good and faithful servant! You were faithful in ignoring the few things that I entrusted to you as they slowly decayed into ruin (partially due to your own complete lack of concern about it), and all you were willing to do to fix it was wish for me to hurry up and come back so I could clean it all up myself.” Is that really what we expect to hear Him say? Revelation tells us that Jesus will create a new Heaven and new Earth – let’s try to make His job a little bit easier by working to make this world and the things in it more like Heaven while we’re waiting eagerly for His return.
~Dwayne
No comments:
Post a Comment