When Dislike and Complaining Are Good Things

This past Sunday, the parish priest in his homily expounded upon the Gospel reading of the day, which was based on the passage in Luke 10:38-42.  The priest, Fr. Larry Donohoo, brought out a couple of profound points about this passage that most have never considered, and there is a certain amount of liberation in hearing these insights.  I wanted to do my own lesson on this today based on the information I gleaned from Fr. Larry's homily this past Sunday, and it will hopefully give some perspective to others as well.

Let us first look at the Gospel passage itself.  In it, Jesus is invited to the house of his friends, Mary and Martha and their brother Lazarus (the same Lazarus Jesus would raise from the dead).  At this visit, apparently Jesus was invited by his hosts to share dinner with them, and while Martha is rushing about getting everything ready, her sister decides to "sit at the feet" of Jesus and sort of drink in His wisdom.  Martha, like any hardworking woman who is trying to prepare a nice dinner, is by this point getting exasperated and she then lets her feelings be known by complaining to Jesus about Mary's apparent laziness and asking Him if He even cares (a little rude for a host to ask a guest, in my observation) that this is going on.  Jesus, in effect, tells Martha to sort of "chill out," and that there is something greater going on here than merely a dinner or Mary shirking her responsibilities to help her sister - as verse 42 of the passage records, He essentially says "You are worried and upset about all these minor details, but your sister is seeing the bigger picture here - you should maybe stop, take a breath, and maybe soak up a little of this great wisdom yourself."  That is not exactly what the text says, but it is the message Jesus is getting across.  Martha's problem, in this case, was fussing over the minor details while missing the bigger picture, which is one application we get from the passage.  It also communicates that Martha was not exactly happy with her sister either, and although we cannot concretely draw a conclusion, perhaps some sibling rivalry and other things were involved, which now leads to what the core dimension I am taking from this entails.

If you will note the passage, although Jesus tells Martha to essentially "chill out," He is not condemning her for complaining.  He also doesn't focus on the aggravation that was between the sisters either - we read nothing of that in the passage either.  However, what we do get from the passage in retrospect is this - there is a sense of familiarity to us about the situation, as many of us have been there at some point.  As a matter of fact, if we read this passage within the overarching context of all Scripture, it makes a couple of enlightening insights to us that Fr. Larry pointed out in his homily and that I intend to expand on shortly.  But, the big takeaway from all this is simply that it is not wrong to be human, and to have human feelings about things.  It means that God is big enough to handle our limitations because he created us.  And, on occasion, he can even use those limitations for his ultimate purpose.  We can now expand on this at this point.

Fr. Larry made two important points about this passage that many of us who have read it over and over throughout the years often miss, and let's take a look at them:

1.  You can dislike someone and still love them - you don't have to like everyone to demonstrate Christian charity.

2.  It is also OK to complain to God about what is bugging you - our prayers don't have to be flowery, poetic, and nice all the time - the prayer of the heart can at times express frustration and even anger, and God is big enough to take it.

Growing up as I did in a fairly traditional Holiness/Pentecostal environment and later converting to the Catholic Church, I too have displayed a flawed sense of what it means to relate to people and to God.  We at times are almost altruistic in the way we deal with others if we are Christians, as we feel an obligation to "be sweet" to everyone and "play nice" even when it drives us out of our minds to do so.  Likewise, in our prayers as well often we think that we always have to sound "religious" in our prayers and that we should emulate some sort of saintly piety, even when we feel otherwise.  When we do that however, we are not being honest with God, and that can create bigger problems.  As Fr. Larry pointed out in his homily, many of the Psalms themselves, as well as even the prayers of some in Scripture, were of a complaining nature - the people praying them were limited human beings with a finite human nature, and often were far from perfect.  And, to be honest, they were not expected to be.  Our dislikes of certain individuals therefore and the frustration we need to vent are also intimately connected, which now leads to some individual insights on both issues.

Let's take the fact that not everyone is likeable, and realistically we should not be expected to like every human being in the world.  To be honest, some people are just, well, a pain you-know-where, and to be honest you want to fish-slap them when you even look at some of these people.  That is natural, and perfectly understandable, because we all have been there if we're honest with ourselves.  It is a universal fact that you are not going to like everyone you encounter, and likewise not everyone is going to like you either - just being you at times will rub people the wrong way, even if you don't intend it to be so.  It is not even that you are necessarily doing anything wrong, but someone just decides you are a person they dislike, and you will be viewed that way by them regardless of how nice you try to be or how friendly you are with them.  And, there are people like that who do that to you as well - you don't know why you cannot stand them, but you just cannot.  In a situation like that however, you ask yourself this question - if that person was to be in a situation where they were in immediate danger, would you try to help them?  If you could honestly answer "yes" to that, then you are actually better off than you thought, because what that means is that as much as you cannot stand them or even intensely dislike that person, you still value them as a human being, and would not deny charity to them if they were in that situation.  Respecting dignity of personhood and valuing any human life transcends a dislike of a person's individual quirks, and if you can see that, you then would actually love that person while not liking them.  Let's now take it to a more personal level.

I am going to talk about my experience with this, as it may help someone else.  As many who know my story have heard, my parents divorced when I was quite young, and for the majority of my childhood I was raised by my divorced mother.  Although my parents are my parents, they were not pleasant people - my father tends to be manipulative and controlling, and even is slightly racist, while my mother is a person who doesn't really care about anyone but herself and does everything she can to make herself as obnoxious and unpleasant to people as she can.  God knows why they are like this, but I have a personal confession to make about them - I dislike both my parents as individuals because neither of them were exactly supportive of me as a kid and to this day I don't feel really all that comfortable being around either one of them.  But, do I love them?  Of course - they are my parents after all, and they are also fellow human beings created in God's image, and in that regard they also share genetic and biological roots with me.  While it can be hoped that they will one day straighten themselves out, at this point both are in their 70's and the likelihood of that happening is negligible at best.   And, that is how I deal with my own struggles in this area.  I also have some very disagreeable in-laws as well that have caused some problems over the years, and the same thing applies to them as well - I cannot stand them personally, but if they were in a bad way I would offer a hand to them.  The crux of Christian charity is rising above the personal feelings without denying them and doing the right thing, even when it involves a person who you cannot stand.  We often hear the phrase that "Jesus loved everybody, and so should we," and indeed that is true - but, Jesus was also fully human as well as being fully God, and there were some people even He could not stand.  Do you think He really liked the Pharisees and scribes who were constantly bugging Him like bothersome gnats?  When you read in Scripture about those accounts, He was not overly thrilled about them honestly, as they disgusted Him with their behaviour, but that didn't mean He didn't love them and indeed, a couple of them (Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea) actually become His disciples later, while another, a guy named Saul, undergoes a dramatic conversion in the Book of Acts and becomes St. Paul, the great Apostle of the the early Church.  Love entails honesty as well as charity, and we have to get the stones as Christians to love people honestly and not just merely "put on the happy face" because of a misconception of the common excuse "that's what Jesus would do."  In other words, Jesus disliked some too, and it is something we inevitably will do ourselves, so let us at least do so with honesty and in time who knows what witness that will be?   A harsh word in honesty will often go further than a dishonest smiley-faced front. 

Nadia Bolz-Webber, the eccentric and somewhat theologically liberal Lutheran pastor who has generated a lot of her own controversy over the years, also has said some things on this subject I personally agree with, although she did so in a somewhat unorthodox and volatile way.  In particular, she did a sermon once called (and forgive me, but I am quoting her title - disclaimer alert!) "God Forgives Assholes."  The gist of that message was simply this - we can forgive but that doesn't mean we have to be the person's best friend.  Dislike can entail forgiveness in other words, and disliking someone is not the sin - it is what we do because of the dislike which determines a lot.  Bolz-Weber herself for instance is someone I actually dislike - her theology is off, she's outlandish in her presentation, and she can come across abrasive and nasty.  Yet, I also have enough Christian charity to acknowledge where she is right (even with strong language in this case) and see a kernel of truth.  Also, Bolz-Webber is not a person I dislike so much I couldn't talk to her - it would be good to maybe sit and have a conversation with her sometime over coffee and a scone and it is possible to even be friendly with those one disagrees with, which is a whole other issue I want to now move to. 

The whole like/dislike thing also has another dimension to it as well - there are some people we may be 100% in agreement with as far as politics, theology, worldview, etc., are concerned, but for some reason we may not be able to stand to be around them.  On the other hand, there are people who may be polar opposites of the spectrum from us, yet for some reason they can become some of our dearest friends.  Especially among those of us who are more conservative theologically and socially (as I am), this has generated a lot of debate and controversy over the years, and I am going to cite a couple of historic examples.  I have gained a lot in recent years from reading the works of Catholic philosopher Jacques Maritain (1882-1973), and his seminal text The Twilight of Civilization (1939) is one of the most profound things I have read (in the future, I have a few insights I want to share from it too here).  He is fairly orthodox as a Catholic scholar, and much of his material has great relevance for our time.  But, when talking with fellow conservatives and traditionalists, an issue regarding Maritain comes up - one of his best friends was Saul Alinsky (1909-1972), who was a cultural Marxist and also exerted a lot of influence over many people - Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and others - who have been responsible for the detriment in our society in recent decades.  Does Maritain's friendship with Alinsky nullify the relevance of his works for orthodox Catholic writers?   I would say personally for me it wouldn't.  While his friendship is not one of the best highlights of his legacy, Maritain was still a great philosopher and he wrote many good works that a Catholic in good faith can glean wisdom from.  Likewise, there is the great Jesuit theologian Henri de Lubac (1896-1991), who has two very good (and solidly orthodox) texts I use frequently entitled Catholicism (1938) and The Splendor of the Church (1956), which was quite insightful in my understanding of the Creeds.  However, de Lubac also had a controversial association with another Jesuit cleric by the name of Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955), a quasi-heretical theologian who unfortunately pushed transhumanism, modernism, and theistic evolution onto Catholic thought, and has done some serious damage.  By all indications, I don't note any Teilhardism in de Lubac's writings that I have read, but they were noted as being good friends regardless.  So, does that mean that I cannot use de Lubac's works for insights?  Not at all - as a matter of fact, the rule of thumb I have with anything is that where it is consistent with historic faith, it is to be preserved, while anything in opposition to historic faith is to be chucked out.  Other controversial friendships over the years have included famed Southern Catholic writer Flannery O'Connor's association with mystic and questionable theologian Thomas Merton, and also Catholic theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar's friendship with Protestant theologian Karl Barth.  Even in the political spectrum too, many unlikely allies can be found on occasion - two of note are the openly gay Milo Yiannapolis and transgender Blaire White, who surprisingly are also aligned with the conservative political position on many things.  Yet, on the other end of that argument, I often see some of the nastiest people who otherwise share my views on many things too, but I cannot stand to be around them - one that comes to mind here is evangelist Jimmy Swaggart.  I could also add others from "televangelist land" to that list, such as Pat Robertson or John Hagee, not to mention a number of what we call "rad-Trad" Catholics who are openly anti-semitic and uncharitable despite their being orthodox and correct in many other areas.  The complexities of human relationships make the subject of like/dislike somewhat more complicated that surface impressions - it is highly possible to like those who have radically different worldviews as friends while disliking others who may share your convictions but may be total jackasses as human beings.  But, while it is natural and not wrong to like or dislike different individuals, it is imperative that we love them as fellow human beings regardless who they are as individuals, and an extreme situation such as a natural disaster or an accident on the highway will determine that quickly. 

The second point that Fr. Larry brought up in this whole discussion is the idea of complaining.  When it comes to prayer, many of us have a preconceived notion of what constitutes an authentic prayer, and we think that if we stray from those conventions somehow we dishonor God.  However, in looking at both the accounts in Scripture as well as just practical everyday life, we as human beings are not always holy and sanctimonious, and we deprive ourselves of many things when we try to put up fronts and avoid honesty about ourselves.  God wants us to be open with him, and to be honest we have nothing to lose with doing so because he already knows us better than we do ourselves.  What that means then is that we go to him with our needs, and we do so as honestly and openly as possible, and sometimes that may not be pretty!  Over the years, I have had more shouting matches and fights with God than many will ever know, and I have cussed him out on occasion, given him ultimatums, and threw some nasty tantrums at him - I wouldn't dare divulge that to everyone in detail obviously, and let me just say that if someone were ever to hear one of those moments, I would probably have my own Christianity questioned.   Thankfully, God doesn't see it that way, and often things are not as they appear - often, the most intense, seemingly hostile fits we throw in our prayers at times are the very things that remind us of how much we do rely on God, and the fact we would not be even talking to him at all if we didn't believe in him.  Faith is a mysterious thing that can take a lot of manifestations, and that may even be anger and frustration at times - remember, for instance, the story of Jacob wrestling with the angel in Genesis 32:22-32?  Jacob said he wasn't going to let go of the mysterious stranger (seen by the Church as an early typology of Jesus) until he was blessed, and he walked with a limp after that "prayer meeting!"  Also, just like with our spouses and other loved ones, conflict happens, and the arguments at some point are inevitable as you are not always going to agree on everything with even the person you love the most - why should God be any different in that regard?  Difference is though, usually God ends up being right anyway, and just like that spat with our spouse that happens, once everyone cools down apologies happen and life goes on - I have had to apologize to God a lot on occasion, and thankfully he is always forgiving of me, perhaps more than I am of myself.  So, the next time you don't feel the "joy, joy, joy down in your heart" when you pray and you instead feel like giving God a tongue-lashing, it doesn't mean you are any less spiritual or reverent toward God - you still love him, he still loves you, and perhaps he allows you to vent in order for you to ultimately feel better.  Or, in the case of Job when Job was complaining, God gently will remind us once we cool down that perhaps we didn't see the full picture, and that maybe we acted out of haste before we thought things out - I do that, you do that, and practically every human being alive has done it if we are all honest with ourselves.  So, yes, you can complain as a form of prayer too, and there would be something seriously wrong with you honestly if you didn't at least once in your lifetime.  Your love for God, just like your love for your spouse, should go deeper than any emotional outburst, and at the end of the day you know the love is there despite how ticked off you might get.  And, without sounding silly and somewhat formulaic, I will nonetheless say that God is also a big boy, and he can take it - he transcends us on so many levels anyway, and he sees past the frustration we may feel and will deal often with the root issue that the frustration stems from in the first place.

I am hoping that this series of rambling observations will be encouraging for you, as I know that some reading this may have struggled in these areas.  It's OK, in other words, and perhaps this is the very bit of wisdom you need at this moment, or perhaps you have a past situation that now in retrospect you can see you were probably better off than you thought you were at the time - no, God is not going to deep-fry you in the grease pit of hell just for getting a little emotional or not being able to stand to be around someone else.  Those feelings are completely normal, and as long as you have the wisdom to know the difference for instance between dislike and hate, you will be fine.  Thanks again for allowing me to share, and will see you soon.

Pleading the Blood - The Truth

As a convert to the Catholic Church from the Pentecostal tradition, there is something I have been pondering for some time that needs a solid teaching, and that is this whole idea that many Pentecostals and Charismatics have about "pleading the Blood of Jesus" over everything and anything.   The question here is - is "pleading the Blood" even Biblical?   That is what we want to explore. 

Among Pentecostal and Charismatic circles, the practice of "pleading the Blood" is a common one, and almost a tradition among them.  For years, I even prayed that sort of stuff myself even.  But, even as I participated in it, something in the back of my mind - a still, small voice if you will - kept gnawing at me and asking, is this right to do?  The more that voice asserted itself, the more I was coming to realize that perhaps the Holy Spirit was trying to say something to me about it, so I thought I had better explore the question a little more.  And, so I did.  Here is what I came up with.

When the Blood of Christ is mentioned in Scripture, it essentially is in reference to two things:

1.  The forgiveness of sins through the Atonement.
2.  Healing of the physical body as another promise of the Atonement.

The application of the Blood of Jesus then is tied to what we as Catholics would understand as sacramental grace - due to the fact it entails both the forgiveness of our sins and the healing of our bodies, for the Catholic the Blood is tied into at least three of the seven Sacraments of the Church - the Eucharist, Confession, and Unction.  If that is the case then, why do so many of our Pentecostal brethren attempt to "plead the Blood" over their cars, finances, and other things then?   That is where we need to consult the pages of Scripture to see where this idea comes from.

Many Pentecostals who engage in this practice point to one thing in particular that they can gain some justification for their idea from, and that is Exodus 12:7 - prior to the event of the Exodus itself, the Israelites in Egypt were instructed at the first Passover to slaughter an unblemished lamb and sprinkle its blood on the doorposts of every home to protect it from the judgment God was about to mete out on the Egyptians, in this case the death of the first-born son of every house.  The Exodus was indeed a foreshadowing of the coming of Christ, but it doesn't mean that every event deserves repetition - what God told Israel to do literally at that time has no bearing on the promises of the Atonement, as rather we see it as a typology of the Atonement in that it symbolized God's salvation of His people from destruction, that is all.  For the ancient Israelites, it was a literal deliverance and salvation from the bondage of Egyptian slavery, but for us as Christians it is the liberation from the effects of death and sin.   It must be understood that everything that happened in the Old Testament were real events, but at the same time God used real events to point people to Christ - that is the bottom line of why Scripture is important to us in retrospect.  Christ is at the center of all Scripture, and thus everything points to His personhood and His divinity.  It doesn't mean though that we as modern Christians have to repeat every single action we read about in Scripture though, which is a major weakness with many faithful Pentecostal people.

Pentecostals often try to bring into the present a past event like the Exodus by pointing to some New Testament references for their justification, such as I Corinthians 5:7, where Jesus is rightly called our "New Passover Lamb."  They also take passages such as Hebrews 12:24 and I Peter 9:26-28, both of which refer to the sacrifice of Himself Christ did for us to redeem us and forgive us our sins, as a model for their practice.  Other passages, such as Romans 3:25, are used as well in speaking metaphorically of Jesus as a lamb, and these things are taken as a mandate by some Pentecostals to do exactly what the passage says - applying the Blood - to every aspect of life in order to gain some sort of special merit.  They however fall short here, as the references in Scripture would more aptly point to the Passion of Christ, and thus would be more in line with the Catholic position of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, which is for our salvation.   And, it therefore reduces the Precious Blood to a talisman or a mere pious superstition, which is what I want to talk about now.

It is important to understand that trivializing holy things and reducing them to some sort of magic act is tantamount to blasphemy, and many well-meaning Pentecostals who "plead the blood" over everything from their doorposts to their diamond rings don't realize what they are truly doing when they do that.  It in essence reduces the Blood to a mere pious "tradition of men" and a quasi-occultic talisman and it makes those who do such things minimize the true benefits of Christ's sacrificial act for us.  I have talked in the past of various manifestations of what is known as "charismatic witchcraft," and the more I understand how erroneous this whole "plead the blood" practice is, the more I am becoming convinced that it is a form of witchcraft.  If anyone reading this is doing it, stop immediately - by denigrating the ultimate gift of God to save us in such a way, you commit blasphemy without knowing it.  This leads to one final observation before I conclude.

Many people who are engaged in this practice of "pleading the blood" are often also some of the most virulently anti-Catholic individuals - they mock the Eucharist, and make allegations against Catholics by saying we supposedly "crucify Jesus all over again."  In reality, that is not what the doctrine of the Eucharist is about, and as I explained in my studies on Scott Hahn's The Lamb's Supper, it doesn't have anything to do with that.  But, to humor those who would say such a thing and make dumb accusations, let's say that it did - they criticize Catholics for the Eucharist, yet they throw the blood of Christ around like beads at a Mardi Gras parade, so who is being more disrespectful?   As we have noted several times before, the Eucharist is Biblically-based, and it also has substantiation for its observance over two thousand years of Church history.  The whole "pleading the blood" practice though does not - it is less than a century old, and many of those who teach it are also dubious in other areas as well, as they are mostly televangelists on religious television who do a number of other outlandish things and try to blame the Holy Spirit for it.  Some Pentecostals and Charismatics like painting themselves as "spiritually elite," yet in this and so many other areas, they often show a woeful lack of spiritual maturity, and as a result many of them fall away fast when the pressures of life challenge them.  A good recent example is a former classmate of mine from my undergraduate days who recently has taken a shocking turn in his life.  When we were in school together over 20 years ago, this guy was noted for being a super-charismatic - he was on staff at one of the biggest megachurches around then, and he was so Charismatic in his practice that people got the impression that he was some sort of spiritual powerhouse.  This guy was also a good friend back in the day too - we talked a lot about many things, and when he later became a priest in an Old Catholic group of some sort, he often would call me to "pick my brain" on things regarding the Eastern Church and such.  However, only a few short years ago, it was almost as if he fell off the face of the earth, as I lost touch with him.  When I found him on social media some years later, he had drastically changed - he ended up divorcing his wife, moving to Asia, and by all appearances he has embraced the "gay lifestyle" and spends a lot of time photographing semi-nude male models in weird poses.   This was one of those people who engaged in the practice of "pleading the blood" at one point, and at this time he is engaging now in a sort of revisionism of the lives of the saints and of Christian doctrine itself by making it more "gay-friendly" - one of his recent things he wrote about was part of the whole "gay Christian" appropriation, for instance, of certain saints of the Church (in this case, Saints Sergius and Bacchus) by recasting them as "gay lovers" based on the mis-translation of some Greek word.  One of what used to be the most on-fire Pentecostals I knew, in other words, is now an activist for the LGBT community and is resorting to blasphemy and historical revisionism to justify himself.   It is a slippery slope to base faith and religious belief on emotions, as it can have some catastrophic consequences, and the whole "pleading the blood" idea sounds good, but in reality it can cause a lot of damage, as can any blasphemous or heretical practice. 

I may have gotten a bit harsh toward the end of the last paragraph, but I do so with good reason - the miracle of salvation and of the fact that God Himself became man to save us is a precious thing, and I would even go as far as to say that the decision one makes to follow Christ is the most important life choice one could ever make, as it is for eternity (or, more correctly, has eternal consequence).  Especially in a society that grows more irreligious and secular (the culmination of almost 400 years of Enlightenment influence), it is vital that we approach Christ with a spirit of humility and of reverence, two things sorely lacking among many who profess Christianity of any sort today.   One reason I am no longer Pentecostal myself is due to that very thing - while there are many fine people who are devout Christians in Pentecostal groups to which this doesn't apply, there are also many more who display an arrogance and just a nasty attitude that in no way reflects the Lord they claim to serve, and also lacks the fruit of the Holy Spirit they claim to revere.  They turn out to be obnoxious jackasses to be honest, and anyone who is around such people quickly picks up on that too - it nullifies any potential Christian witness that such people could have had.  Often it is these sort of people who flippantly throw around the whole "plead the blood" schtick as part of their own little pious masquerade, and they don't understand the implications of their behavior.  They will one day have blood, in other words - the blood of many people they could have reached but did not crying from their own hands.   That blood will have a different sort of plea - the plea of those who died in their sins for justice against those who could have showed them the way but didn't.   That is frankly not a plea one should desire to hear, as it is a hallmark of shame.   On that note, I want to now conclude with a few challenges for some different groups of people.

If you are one of those Pentecostals, Charismatics, or even Evangelicals or Catholics who has gotten caught up in the whole "pleading the blood" practice, I challenge you as Saint Paul did young Timothy to "study to show yourselves approved" by educating yourself on what the true purpose of Christ's Blood is about.  As you do so, renounce what you have been doing, and ask God to forgive you for it, as you need to get this right.  If you are a person who has been hurt by this sort of thinking and either have come to your senses or maybe were at the receiving end of some Pentecostal nut throwing the Blood around flippantly, I first offer an apology to you on behalf of Christians as a whole, and also would ask that you not let this color your perception of Christians nor hinder you from examining the claims of Scripture and of Christ for yourself.   "Traditions of men" such as "pleading the blood" over one's favorite shoes and other such nonsense have done more harm to the evangelistic mission of the Church than many realize, and it is important to discard those things and focus on true belief and faith instead.  NO ONE should be hindered from receiving a chance to accept Jesus Christ and believe in Him, and no fruity, overly-pious, goofy Charismatic fad should hinder anyone in doing so either.  The time has come for Christians to stop playing games with their faith and with the fates of others, as we live in a world that is increasingly hostile to the truth of God's Revelation, and we cannot afford any messing around, as that could create innocent martyrs.   This was a tough message to write today, but hopefully it will impact others who read it.  God bless until next time. 

The Three Promises

When someone accepts the claims of Christ and trusts in Him for the ultimate promise of salvation, a covenantal relationship happens.  Christ promises several things based on that relationship to those who follow Him, and there are three promises, in particular, I wanted to deal with today.  First, however, I wanted to clarify some things prior to getting into the actual discussion.

To begin, it must be understood that the promises I will be talking about are not contingent upon salvation, but are rather fruits of salvation.  There are actually a couple of promises though that are contingent upon salvation, and they are made possible through sacramental grace - the first is forgiveness of sins (which is represented through both the sacraments of baptism and reconciliation) and healing of the whole person (primarily represented by the sacrament of unction).  The two of those are always tied together, as they both represent a type of restoration that Christ fulfilled in His Atonement.  As we go through our pilgrimage of faith though, it doesn't take a degree in rocket science to understand that we are still in this natural world, and thus are still subject to certain necessities that are warranted by the process of life and survival itself.  Those promises are given by God throughout Scripture in many places we will be discussing, and they are the result of the covenantal relationship of faith we have in Christ.  There are three of those promises that are specific to our discussion, and each will be discussed at length momentarily - provision for our needs, protection from damage of adversity, and direction for important decisions and choices we make.  Upon those three promises are what rest our trust in God beyond the grace of salvation, and are not conditional to salvation but are residual benefits we receive.

Over the years, teachings on similar things have been taken out of focus, and we will deal with specific cases of that later as we discuss each of these three promises individually.  However, the purpose of those three promises is to provide the stability to do that which God has called each of us to.  Especially if you are in full-time service to the Church, these promises are crucial, as often a sacred vocation is not something that will land one in the "Fortune 500" or on a high-society registry.  With that being established, let us now take each promise and initiate our discussion on them individually.

A.  Provision of Needs

If you are like me, you often find yourself placing a priority on financial concerns and other needs in your daily prayers, and in this day and age finances seem to dominate our prayers for some reason.  Does God grant material needs?  Looking at Philippians 4:19, we see our first and pivotal verse about this - it says "God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory."   Let us unpack this a little, as at times this is a big one which has generated its own plethora of misunderstandings and misapplications.  The first thing that comes to mind for many is the stereotypical image of the televangelist on religious television programs making statements such as "if you sow a seed, you'll meet a need."  The term for this type of "teaching" is either Positive Confession or "Word of Faith," and its detractors call it "Name it and claim it" or "blab it and grab it."  This faulty application, as we discussed earlier, has its genesis in what is known as the New Thought movement, which itself was a derivative of Christian Science.  In the early 1900s, a Baptist minister by the name of Esseck William (E.W.) Kenyon (1867-1948), who began teaching some ideas that were similar to the New Thought understanding of words creating reality (R.M. Riss, "Kenyon, Esseck William," in Burgess, Alexander, McGee, Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements.  Grand Rapids:  Zondervan, 1988. p. 517).  This later entered the Salvation/Healing Movement among American Pentecostals via first Oral Roberts, who first taught the idea of "sowing seed," and later was more associated with Kenneth Hagin (1917-2003), who was a tent-revival Assemblies of God evangelist who later was considered the "founding father" of the Word of Faith movement.   Hagin, and the dozens of his proteges such as Kenneth Copeland, Frederick Price, and others, emphasized a teaching that centered on an uncompromising faith via "positive confession" (meaning speaking things essentially into existence that are not there as a work of exercising that faith) in God's desire to bless in every area of life provided no doubt entered the picture.  This has at its core a Biblical truth (based on Philippians 4:19 and other such passages) that was taken, twisted, and made to be something it was never originally intended.  It is important to understand that the key word in the Philippians verse is needs.   Over the years, Hagin and his myriad of successors and imitators (most prominent today being Joel Osteen) have twisted this idea in such a way that essentially they thought it was possible for God to even grant wants (or more aptly and rhythmically, greeds) and they taught people to treat this promise as if it were a quasi-occultic talisman or something, and that is where we have some serious problems.  I want to spend a little time on this now, as it is pivotal to the discussion.

If what Hagin and others like him taught were true, a little common sense would dictate that results would be obvious - the mega-church parking lots where many of these people spout this stuff should be overflowing with Mercedes Benzes, Lamborghinis, and Lincolns, and instead of asking for more money, those preaching that message would supposedly have so much that they'd be giving it away and living by "sowing their own seeds," would they not?   Sadly, this is not the reality - oftentimes, those who are sucked in by the heretical "Word of Faith" teachings are often among the poorest, and those who teach it are the only ones benefitting from it, as they fly around in multi-million dollar private planes and live in palatial estates that were financed by people who often cannot even afford a bicycle, much less an Oldsmobile.  And, it also begs the question too - I am in no position to judge the hearts or intentions of such "teachers," but it seems to me that if they truly believed what they tell others, they would be handing out cash to everyone because they would have more of it than they know what to do with.  Yet, I don't see that - people who "sow a seed" to these people are often on the verge of losing their homes, or cannot afford to feed their families or pay their bills, yet they are not seeing Kenneth Copeland knocking on their door to help them, do they?   Hence, in the well-worn but appropriate axiom, the emperor has no clothes.  However, there is a more balanced way to look at this, and that is where the crux of my teaching here rests.

In Philippians 4:19, we are told that God will supply all of our needs, and this generates some questions.  First, what is a need?  To answer that,  a need is something that is vital to a person's stability and survival, while a want is a luxury that someone could actually live without.  Needs like this include food, shelter, utilities, reliable transportation, and financial resources to cover those things.  They may not be anything pretty - for instance, you may have a need for transportation, but God provides either a 1980 Chevy with a bad paint job or enough cash to provide a bus ticket - but it is a need that is met.   When we look in Scripture, we see a lot of examples of that type of provision being made, notably in I Kings 17:2-16, where Elijah is fed by ravens in a cave, or in 2 Kings 4 where his disciple Elisha stays with a poor widow and she manages on meager rations to have enough to feed her son and Elisha while the latter stays with her.  We also see it even with Jesus Himself, in the feeding of the five thousand - a couple of loaves and a few stinky fish feed a huge number of people and provide a need for satisfying a pang of hunger.  These are examples of God supplying needs.  One could also point out in Exodus the manna and quails God provided for the Israelites to eat in the wilderness - although they were not satisfied with it, those manna bits and quails supplied a need.  These Scriptural examples are something that should show us the perspective God comes from on this - he does care for us, and because he created the natural order he knows very well those things we need to survive, and if we put our trust in Him, He will take care of us.  And, that is the proper context of the idea.

Also in the context of supplying needs, there is a sort of meritocracy involved.  This meritocracy has nothing to do however with our salvation, as that cannot be earned, but rather it has to do with being awarded the fruits of our labor.  If you have a certain level of skill, education, or experience, then you deserve to have an occupation that provides dividends.  To divert any confusion on this, it in no way is the same sort of nonsense that Kenneth Hagin and his successors proclaim - you don't just get something for nothing, as that is not how the natural order of things works.  However, if you work toward something, then doors can open, and you deserve to harvest the fruits of your labor - this is reminiscent of a truth embodied in James 2:20 which is wrongly applied by some sects as being soteriological but rather is meritocratic - "faith without works is dead."  It also doesn't mean the incorrect saying "God helps those who help themselves" either, as that comes from Enlightenment-era Deism and Freemasonry and is not Biblical, although there is a valid principle at its core.  What it means simply is this - if you do your part, God will provide the increase to it, rewarding faithful labor.  Personal success then doesn't get handed to someone on a silver platter - you work toward it, and thus it is cultivated fruit and not a "faith promise." 

Noting all of these things, the provision of our needs then summarily consists of two dimensions:

1.  Our basic necessities will be covered if we trust in God to do so, but they may not be luxurious provisions yet will meet the need we have.

2.  Personal success cannot be "confessed," but rather is the result of merit in the area we are striving to achieve something, be it the promotion at work we have invested a lot of hard work into earning, or that graduate degree we have studied hard to achieve.  This is not a "positive confession," but rather a cultivated fruit that will not be given to someone who doesn't invest the effort into it on a silver platter.

3.  Provision of our needs is not a clause of our salvation, but rather is a fruit of walking in our salvation.

B.  Protection From the Damages of Adversity

This is another interesting promise God has made, and again, what it entails is not freedom from adversity, but rather the strength to overcome it and come out better.  Adversity is a fact of life we all face - as a consequence of the Fall, adversity is a sure bet at some point in all of our lives, and it is inescapable.  The question is not if we face adversity, but rather when, and how we face it.  The primary passage in Scripture that addresses this is the famous "Armor of God" passage in Ephesians 6:10-18, and accompanying that is another verse from Isaiah 54:17 - "No weapon formed against me will prosper."  In my personal prayer time every morning, I always "put on" the armor of God based on the promise in Isaiah that weapons pointed at me will not take me down, and it's actually a good prayer to have.  Let us unpack this some more, shall we?

What is the purpose of wearing armor after all?  It is to protect the soldier in battle, not to help the soldier avoid battle.  If the battle could be avoided, the armor would not be needed - that is just plain common sense, right?   Within the passage of Ephesians 6 that deals with this, the reason for the armor is given from the outset, that we might stand in the "evil day."  So, what is an "evil day" then?  It is not a collective event, as every one of us faces an "evil day" at some point.  If you are on social media, for instance, and you are standing up for your faith and traditional values, inevitably someone will get "triggered" and go on the attack - the moment that happens is an "evil day."  Or, it could be while you are shopping and a thug attempts to mug you at an ATM - that also is an "evil day" when it happens.  The "evil day" when is that moment when we face adversity of some sort, and it may scare and intimidate us.  But, if we trust in God, eventually it works out, because as Romans 8:28, all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to His purpose.  Even a bad situation can be clay in the Master Potter's hand, and He can use that to mold and shape our character.  I want to now go to two prime examples of this in Scripture, and then I want to share how in retrospect this has worked in my life.

Let's first look at the story of Joseph, one of the progenitors of the Twelve Tribes of Israel and a son of Jacob (his favorite actually) which we begin to read about in Genesis 37 and continues until the end of the book, as the story of Joseph is even longer in some aspects than that of Abraham, his great-grandfather.  Joseph is essentially spoiled rotten and protected by his father Jacob, so much so that he is given special treatment and even given a very expensive piece of clothing.   This arouses the jealousy of his brothers, who actually entrap him and sell him to some Arab slave-traders who in turn sell him to Potiphar, a high official in the Pharaoh's government.  God uses this experience to bring Joseph to where he wants him to be, as Joseph had a lot of bizarre dreams and they led him to this point.  However, adversity strikes again when that hussey of a wife of Potiphar's tries to molest Joseph, and he flees but is falsely accused of trying to molest her - this lands him in prison, where he has a series of dreams that get the attention of the Pharaoh eventually (I am abbreviating details of the story of the butler and baker), and he ends up in effect becoming the Pharaoh's prime minister - not bad for a nomad's son from Palestine, is it?   Adversity struck Joseph hard, in other words, but God preserved him.  We also see a similar situation in the story of Job too, in which Job is attacked mercilessly by Satan to try to prove God wrong, but Job prevails and is abundantly blessed later for it.  Again, that whole Romans 8:28 thing comes in.

It is true also in my own life too - when I was around 9 years old, my mother and I ended up in a chaotic situation that left us dirt-poor and destitute for a number of years.  Yet, during that time, I worked at my studies, and eventually, I was able to complete both my Bachelor's and Master's degrees.  God made the way possible, and often in lieu of less-extreme circumstances I admittedly forget that and get impatient with Him, but He reminds me of where I came from.  One other aspect of adversity is that it is in a sense the fertilizer in which character grows.  The sweet-smelling roses or succulent tomatoes we often enjoy from our gardens and flower boxes are often nourished by the foulest and nastiest fertilizer - ground-up cow dung, decaying animal carcasses, etc.  Yet, out of that mess grows the beautiful rose or the succulent vegetable.  That is how the adversity we face in life often works to our benefit.  It is also why we pray for God to protect us - we don't pray necessarily for him to protect us from the adversity, but rather from being destroyed by the adversity.  What often is meant for our destruction can actually be exactly what we need to grow us, and that is one reason God allows the adversity to happen, but he also will help us navigate through it. 

In summary, there are two things to glean from God's promise of protection:

1.  We are often not spared from going through the adversity itself but are equipped to go through it without lasting damage.

2.  Adversity is not necessarily evil, although it may have initially been intended to be so - rather, it is a chance to cultivate and grow our character.

C.  Direction for Important Decisions and Choices

Have you ever been in a position where a life-changing decision has faced you, and you are not sure what to do?  If you go one direction, it may have one consequence, yet if you go another, it could have other consequences.  The permanence of the consequences for whatever decisions we make can make or break us, and thus they are things that cannot be entered into lightly.  As Christians, God has clearly promised to guide and direct us in all we do, and it is our responsibility to trust him to keep that promise.  Again, Romans 8:28 comes into play,  as all things do work together for our good.  In this context, the rightness or wrongness of our decision is not the factor, as even when we screw up God can use that to bring us to the place he wants us.  Rather, it is about relying on God to make the appropriate decision for the current situation, and in doing so it requires a lot of trust.

There are two main passages besides Romans 8:28 that relate to this promise.  The first is in Psalm 119:105 - "Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path."  The second is Psalm 37:23 - "the steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord."  A third and very important verse is also related to this, in that we should expect and accept nothing less than clear spiritual direction, and that verse is in I Corinthians 14:33 - God is not the author of confusion.  I am going to discuss various aspects of this now, as they are very important to the study.

We as human beings are limited, and as a result, bad decision-making at some point is inevitable.  A bad choice or decision on an important issue can lead to a lot of negative impact for our lives and those of our family, so obviously these things are not to be taken lightly.  When we rely on God for direction, we should pray for and expect nothing less than a clear answer.  This has nothing whatsoever to do with His faithfulness, but rather with our own propensity to go on feelings and other misleading criteria.  To see an example of how this works, we look at the story of Gideon in Judges 6:36-40.  In that account, Gideon was the de facto leader (judge) of all of Israel, and as his people moved toward their Promised Land, they faced a lot of obstacles - hostile tribes such as the Midianites in this case.  Gideon knew that based on his own wisdom he could not strategize successfully to battle the Midianites threatening his people's camp, so he did something interesting.  In order to get God's direction, Gideon took a wool fleece, and based on whether it was wet or dry, he would take it as God's direction to render his decision.  He wanted to be absolutely sure he was doing the right thing, so he did this test three times, and God did what he asked all three times.  The result was a successful battle and a momentous win for the people of Israel, and it got them closer to their destination. 

In my Pentecostal days, it was often a common practice to "put a fleece before the Lord" in order to discern the proper way to go about making a decision, something I still do today I might add.  Many times it works, and I have been able to do some remarkable things because I sought God's direction in that way.  I don't recommend that this be done in every circumstance, as it can degenerate into superstition, but it can and does prove to be an effective way to get a solution to a problem.  Another practice related to this that some do is the discipline of fasting.   Fasting is typically to be observed as an act of self-denial in order to draw close to God, and over the years I have learned it is never proper to fast for direction, as this amounts to essentially just a "hunger strike" to get what one wants from God, and it doesn't work that way.  Fasting is first and foremost an act of worship - you are denying self to give God more of a central place in your life.  If you fast for simple direction, it will not avail much as God is not the object of the discipline, but rather your need is.  That is why I would never suggest that anyone fast for direction - you fast as an act of adoration, not to get something.  Many Pentecostals have misunderstood that over the years, and it was only after understanding Lenten devotion better that I learned how to observe fasting and abstinence properly.  It is my hope that more of these people who have a misunderstanding about the discipline of fasting would see the light as well.

In summary, there are two things we understand about God's promise to give us direction:

1.  If we seek divine guidance, we need to ask that it be given to us in a clear way, to avoid the confusion with our own feelings.

2.  It is OK to do a tangible expression of seeking direction - such as a "fleece" - but never use the spiritual discipline of fasting and abstinence in that regard.

Now that I have explored these promises in detail, it is time to add some concluding thoughts.

Conclusion

There are many more things that could be said on this topic, and one area I wanted to touch on but forgot to do so is the practice of "pleading the blood of Jesus" as an act of asking for protection.  I have decided to do a separate study on that later, as honestly, it would take more detail to talk about that, but it is needed teaching for sure as many (including until recently myself) have misunderstood that.  However, as a precursor to that, let me just say this - the precious and sacred should never be reduced to mere talismans, for then they become the focal points of our faith rather than God Himself, and that is a form of witchcraft.  Again, I will deal more in-depth with that at another time though.

I hope this study, like other insights I have shared, will be a help to someone, as it is my prayer that what I write here will be used of God to touch others and make an impact.  If it does, you are always welcome to share it.  Until next time, thank you for allowing me to share my own insights with you, and hopefully will be back soon.