Prince Caspian: Following, even if no one else will go
(Show Prince Caspian Clip, Lucy sees Aslan, or Lucy meets Aslan)
The KJV says, "be offended" instead of "fall away". The translation is trying to capture the spiritual implications of what it means to be ensnared by Satan. Jesus is about to be attacked physically and spiritually and the apostles will be caught in the trap.
Mark talks about it generally. He is focused on the truth that, not just Peter, but all Jesus’ followers will, in some way, be ensnared because of their connection to Him.
This was naturally a great source of discomfort for Peter and the others. They all aware denied that they would fall away because loyalty is so highly prized. Barclay says, "It is when a man is up against it that a man needs his friends the most, and that was exactly when Jesus’ friends left Him all alone and let Him down" (Barclay, Mark, 358).
The Apostles are an odd group. Today we question their intelligence because they seemed so dim when it came to their understanding of the things Jesus told them. Tomorrow we measure our own spiritual height beneath theirs, acknowledging that Jesus taught them personally and they are the first building stones of the Church.
In light of the truth that they are actually quite great men, we uncomfortably must ask, "If they fell away, and they walked with Jesus and knew him face-to-face, when will I fall away?"
Perhaps you already have.
• Perhaps you found yourself in a moral quandary and gave into what was easiest at the time
• Perhaps you found yourself in a group of unbelievers and, in your insecurity, walked with them instead of staying with Jesus
• Perhaps you found yourself in an emotionally dark place and wandered in the dark, without the personal strength to find your way back
That is the trap. Jesus does not offer us immediate security. He offers us ultimate safety. It takes an intentional effort to look beyond the bridge swaying beneath our feet to the anchors, cables and knots holding it in place at the ends. Our footing may shift, but our ground is solid.
You might remember that later, when Lucy was showing the others where she had seen Aslan, she stood right on a pit covered over by brush that gave way under her weight, as if she were being caught.
Only it was not a pit, it was a path. When she fell, it was into the best place she could find herself. If she had the courage to do this the first time around, they would have avoided a long diversion and delay. When she reached the bottom of the trap, it was a beautiful, safe passage that led them right where they needed to be.
We may not see it clearly, but we are ultimately safe. Following Jesus may not always seem like the wisest thing to do, but the trap is the best place to be.
Think of yourself as a precious, endangered species. There are few of you left, but you are ill, and the conservation community is bending enormous effort and resources to save you. In order to do that, they must give you medical treatment, a single pill, and to do that they need to catch you.
They design a box that shows you what you most want to find, but the moment you reach for it, the box falls down and you are captured.
You may be frantic, frightened, and caught off guard by the unexpected. But in reality, when you have received your pill, your survival expectations will double, maybe triple. You will be able to find your herd and continue your life, but with more vitality. You and others like you are safer and healthier because you were caught.
• You are precious: Jesus died to pay the price for you
• You are endangered: Satan walks about like a roaring lion hunting you to devour you
• You are ill: the sickness of sin eats away at your spirit like a cancer
Go into the trap with your eyes open. Jesus has told you that your faith is a trap and He is the bait. Following is not humanly safe. If you ignore this basic truth, you will fall away. Your dismay at being captured will frighten you and cause you to panic. The one thing that can give you the courage to stand when others tremble is the knowledge that you are walking into a trap and that the inside of the trap is the best place to be.
Lewis, the author of Prince Caspian understood this dynamic. He did not rejoice to find Jesus. He had been running from Him for his entire life. After a long search into what Christianity was and whether it could be trusted as truth, he said of himself:
The fox had been dislodged from Hegelian Wood and was now running in the open, ’with all the wo in the world,’ bedraggled and weary, hounds barely a field behind. And nearly everyone was now (one way or another) in the pack; Plato, Dante, MacDonald, Herbert, Barfield, Tolkien, Dyson, Joy itself. Everyone and everything had joined the other side. ... Amiable agnostics will talk cheerfully about ’man’s search for God.’ To me, as I then was, they might as well have talked about the mouse’s search for the cat. ... You must picture me alone in that room in Magdalen, night after night, feeling, whenever my mind lifted even for a second from my work, the steady, unrelenting approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet. (Lewis, Surprised, 225-227)
Following Jesus is a trap, but a trap into the freest, most joyful place in creation or eternity. We may have already given in to the first overtures of God, but then, Lewis had too, in his childhood. The crises of manhood bring hardships that a boy cannot imagine. Those new encounters present us with challenges that must be met.
• The Apostle Peter thought it was his courage and his personal strength that could help him
• Peter Pevense and the dwarf thought that it was their superior knowledge of the situation that could help them
We will trust many things.
• We will trust our courage
• our wisdom
• our assessment of the circumstances
• our friends
• our past experience
• our expertise and performance
But there is only one thing to trust, and that is Jesus. Fleeing toward the trap, the idea that our faith is our best refuge, confidence in something for which we have no evidence.
So, understanding others’ failing, and prepare yourself to keep from failing
Make up your mind in advance
Decide in your heart to follow Jesus into the trap no matter what. Make it your purpose to walk with him through a burning building, or in the path of a bullet if that is where He leads. Determine that you will not turn aside to the right or to the left. Be in your resolve as Peter was in his words. Be in your feet as Lucy was in her heart.
Do it with this in mind. Sometimes you may fail, but sometimes you will be the last one standing. Everyone else around you may lose faith and break ranks, but you must be faithful to what you know to be true about God and about His promises.
People will fail
If Jesus’ followers physically and immediately left Him, you can expect to get no better treatment. You will have friends who will lose faith. You will have family who fall away. You may even have a pastor or spiritual leader who fails in his walk. You take your lead from none of them. You take your lead only from Jesus. It is Him that you stand behind, at every turn and in every crisis. Look to the gospels to find His character and gravitate to that.
When the failings of other people shake us, we know that we are trusting them too much. When we say that Salvation is a "personal relationship with God" we mean it. That is not double-speak for go through your priest. According to the Bible, you are a priest.
When they were teaching me to march in the Navy, for awhile, till they learned that I have eye problems, go figure, they made me a guide. A guide is in the front corner of the ranks and marches straight so that everyone else can mark their place off him.
The guide is meant to fix his eyes on a distant point, in keeping with the commander’s destination, and move toward it without swerving. What he must not do is try to gauge his path off another person, because everyone around him is supposed to be gauging off him.
You are guides. You are meant to fix your eyes on Jesus, who gave you your faith and who will bring it to perfection in His time and way. If you look to anyone else as your primary destination you are missing your mark and you will not go straight. Follow Him, and account for others only in as much as they too are on the same path. If they wander away, you stay with your goal: Jesus.
Remember that your fear does not negate God’s presence or power
God is faithful. He is powerful. These are solid facts that cannot be overturned. If we fail to exercise faith in Him, His presence and power will be short circuited in our lives.
We sometimes mistake fear for a lack of faith. The two are not the same. Look at the difference.
• Fear: the emotional feeling that something bad is going to happen
• Faithlessness: The decision to disregard something, motivated by doubt that it will work
Exercising faith in the face of fear is courage, this does not block God’s power in your life. In fact, when people in the Bible were afraid and were confronted with God, He very often calmed their fear so they would move ahead.
Just as temptation is not sin, fear is not faithlessness. Both are the impulse to move in another direction, but decision and the power of God overcomes those impulses and allows you to do what God is calling you to do.
Some of you think there are things in this church that you should be involved in. That is great. Jump in. Get wet. Don’t allow fear to paralyze you. Know that if the job seems big, God is bigger. If you move ahead in spite of fear, that is the definition of courage. That is God building virtue into your spirit.
An exercise
Moving ahead, regardless of others, regardless of insecurity, regardless of second guessing is the essence of living courageously, confidently and independently. It is is the mark of a faithful follower of Jesus. So what does this faithfulness look like, practically? Look at this sentence:
A gentle answer turns away wrath,
but a harsh word stirs up anger. (Proverbs 15:1 TNIV)
Here Solomon unfolds for us one of God’s plans for peace and reconciliation between people. All of us face conflict in our homes, work places and among our acquaintances. This is even true between Christians. I know you realize this, but it doesn’t make the faithfulness any easier.
Next time you are faced with your own anger in response to another person’s unkindness you will follow this plan of faithfulness to God.
Decide your response now
I will not respond to anger and unkindness with gentleness, true gentleness. My response will be truthful but it will not belittle, degrade, humiliate, accuse, or abuse the other person. Instead my response will be one of love and kindness. If I must take a tongue lashing in spite of my love, I will know that is the way of Christ. In an effort to diffuse conflict, I will be honest but kind.
Allow me to be clear, that if the person’s verbal attack becomes physical, withdraw. Do not fight, withdraw. Allow God to deal with them.
The other person’s failings are irrelevant
One of the biggest mistakes we make in these situations is to compare our response to the action of the other person. This is wrong. We must compare our response to the standard set by God. We may think in our heart that the other person is being unreasonable and unfaithful to God. It does not matter. If we respond in kind, we are following them into their unfaithfulness. Knowing that we are walking into a trap that could lead us to emotional pain, we must follow Jesus into the trap that He has set. His example is our bait. He took the hatred of His enemies in order to fulfill the plan of God. We too must walk into the trap. Put away our swords, refuse to answer in kind, and allow the other person in the conflict the integrity of their own spirit. We will follow Jesus.
You may be afraid, do it anyway
Verbal conflict can result in hurt feelings or worse. We may feel belittled and humiliated. You may feel weak and victimized. The verbal attacks of another person can have that effect. You may have no confidence in that person’s self-control or good intentions. You may even be afraid that God will not come through.
However, your fear should not block the high road. If you are honest but gentle, you are claiming the high ground. Make pauses and prayer a part of facing your fear. Counting to 10 is great, if that isn’t enough, do it with Roman numerals. Make no statement without thinking. Follow no thought without prayer. Allow the stillness of thought and prayer to calm your spirit.
Once again, if all else fails, withdraw until everyone is calmer, but in the heat of the moment, be gentle.
You see, we like to think that spiritual warfare is all about miracles and casting out demons. Those are forms of the war. But the battles are fought in the every day dealings of life. Following God is not always about the big issues, it is more often about the small decisions we make all the time. It is about the daily grind. It is about the moment by moment awareness of His presence and command that changes our outlook and our behavior.
Every decision made to follow His path
Is a faithful step taken to follow Him
The longer you travel it, the lonelier road it will become. Sometimes you will not see another car for miles. You will feel like you are on Interstate 40 through the Mojave desert.
But in that stillness and uncrowded place is where we see God most clearly, contrasting to the emptiness around us.
Go there.
It is worth every step.
