Greenleaf

 “May Your kingdom come, may Your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven” (Matthew 6:10).

In a short story entitled “Greenleaf” Flannery O’Connor writes of a prim and proper, southern lady, Mrs. Mays, her ignorant handyman, Mr. Greenleaf, and his “oddball” wife, Mrs. Greenleaf.

 

Mrs. Greenleaf, described as a “large and loose” person, was the kind of woman Mrs. Mays despised. Especially infuriating was Mrs. Greenleaf’s preoccupation with “prayer healing”: “Every day she cut all the morbid stories out of the newspaper—the accounts of women who have been raped and criminals who had escaped and children who had been burned, and of train wrecks and plane crashes and the divorces of movie stars.”

 

Then she would take these fragments into the woods behind the house, fall on the ground at the foot of a tree and weep over them. “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus,” she would cry. Then she would dig a hole in the ground and bury every scrap of misery under the tree.

 

I think of the weary tales I read each day of wrongdoing and wretchedness: The tragic confusion in Afghanistan and on the Southern Border; the rising death toll from the Delta variant; the widespread brutality and violence in the city; the factional and fractured churches; the stories of broken promises and broken homes; the pictures of sad–faced little children and other victims of hunger, cruelty and neglect. The reports overwhelm ne. What can I do in my little sphere of influence to bring salvation to the world? 

 

The best I can do for the whole world is the best I can do for my own small part of it. I cannot save the world—that’s a job for God—but I can have compassion on my neighbor and alleviate his suffering insofar as I can.

 

As for the rest of the world, I can see and hear the misery that lies at the heart of it, and I can bury it at the foot of the “tree,” where the worst of life’s sorrow and suffering fell upon Jesus.

 

And I can leave it there—for His healing.

 

David Roper

8.28.21

When the Lights Go Out

 “I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and meekness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Ephesians 4:1-3).

If I were the devil and wanted to subvert God’s plan to save the world to what end would I direct my efforts? I would subvert the agents, of course, thorough whom God plans to save it.

 

That’s why we have such a hard time in the most unexpected place—within the church herself. And that’s why we must make “every effort” (a very strong Greek verb) to keep that peace by which the church is bound together—an effort that calls for great humility, meekness, patience, endurance and love. There’s no other way, for it is a failure of these virtues that causes a church to fall. 

 

Satan’s finest scheme is to get a church to go bad from within so God himself must judge her and remove her “lamp stand” (Revelation 2:3). The buildings may stand, the people may gather, the praise band may play, the preacher may preach, but the light will have gone out of that church and she will be of no use in this world.

 

(I was reminded, however, as I wrote that sentence, of a bank officer I knew, who, upon approving the building plans of one church, said, “Well, if the church goes under we can always turn the building into a dog clinic.”)

 

God forbid that we should be ignorant of Satan’s devices!

 

David Roper

8.19.21

Acedia

“The arrow that flies by day…” (Psalm 91:5)

 

One of the so-called Seven Deadly Sins is acedia (a-said-ia), said to be a state of apathy, boredom and dissatisfaction with one’s lot. Early Christian monks referred to acedia as “the arrow that flies by day” because the temptation often struck in the afternoon, when fatigue—we would blame it on our bio-rhythm—made them susceptible to restlessness. It drove them out of their rooms to wander aimlessly, to seek other companions or conditions, rather than enjoy God in the “sweetness of their cells.”

 

One fourth century Christian, Evagrius, wrote that when acedia “has taken possession of some unhappy soul, it produces dislike of the place, disgust with the cell, and disdain and contempt of the brethren who dwell with him or at a little distance, as if they were careless or unspiritual… He often groans because he can do no good while he stays there, and complains and sighs because he can bear no spiritual fruit so long as he is joined to that society; and he complains that he is cut off from spiritual gain, and is of no use in this place, as if he were one who, though he could govern others and be useful to a great number of people, yet was edifying none, nor profiting anyone by his teaching and doctrine. He cries up distant monasteries and those which are a long way off, and describes such places as more profitable and better suited for salvation; and besides this he paints the intercourse with the brethren there as sweet and full of spiritual life.”[1]

 

Can it be that my restlessness in this wearisome pandemic is nothing more than acedia in another guise?

 

The word, “acedia” is not found in scripture. It’s a theological construct. Some, therefore, may doubt that it falls into the category of sin, or temptation to sin. But, it occurs to me, my present restlessness  and dissatisfaction may be nothing less than the sin of covetousness: a craving for something other than God has given me. [2]

 

Boredom and restlessness are endemic in me; I’m a rolling stone. But I must see my impatience for what it is and do what is required of me this day simply because God has asked me to do it. I must do it in the situation in which he has placed me, not yielding to my restless passion for that elusive “something more.” thinking that I am "cut off from spiritual gain, and of no use in this place.” I must tend “my lamp quietly for God without wondering how much longer it has got to go on.”[3]

 

It may be that someday God will remove these strictures and enlarge my sphere of influence. In the meantime I must be calm, patient, willing to do anything, willing to do nothing, to sit and wait, to enjoy God in the “sweetness of my cell.” Here in this place I must stay. Here I must be content until he guides me to some other place—on earth, or in heaven. 

“In this the long unrest is soothed and stilled; Our hearts are filled!”

 

David Roper

8.14.21

[1] The Institutions

[2] Cf., 1 Corinthians10:1-14 and Numbers 11:4-9

[3] From The Fruits of the Spirit by Evelyn Underhill 

Satisfied

Arise, O LORD. Deliver me...

from men of the world whose portion is in this life.

You fill their chambers with treasure;

they are satisfied with children,

And they leave their abundance to their infants.

 

As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness;

when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness.

 

—Psalm 17:13-15

 

David considers “the men of the world whose portion is in this life. God fills their coffers with treasure! He gives them all they desire!And more.

 

The man or woman who has no time for God during their lifetime is given their portion in this life. But in the end they leave their treasure to others and enter eternity without God, an existence in which there is no love, no laughter, no beauty, no truth, no goodness—nothing to make life worthwhile. 

 

Here's an answer to the old question, "Why do the ungodly prosper?" To have everything in life but God is judgment enough. 

 

“But as or me," David writes, "(When I die) I shall behold Your (God's) face in righteousness. When I awake (from death), I shall be satisfied with your likeness," a promise to which John's assurance is a resounding echo: "Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when He appears we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as he is" (1 John 3:2). As God’s children we shall share our Father’s likeness and his love forever.

 

Augustine imagined this proposition: Suppose God promised that He would give you everything you ever wanted in this life—beauty, wealth, power, prominence, love, marriage, children and a measure of satisfaction with it all. "But,” He said, "You will never see My face again." Would you take Him up on His offer?

 

David Roper

8.13.21

The Maker of Trees

 

Poems are made by fools like me

But only God can make a tree —Joyce Kilmer

He shall be like a tree,

Planted by rivers of water,

Bringing forth his fruit in his season.—Psalm 1:3

 

In these quiet years I'm watching a tree grow, a river birch I planted forty years ago in our back yard. It was a sapling then. 

 

I haven't done much for it in recent years, but it keeps on growing. It stands now in mature verdure, amidst ferns and flowers, rugged, serene, beautiful in every season of the year. 

 

So it is with those we’ve nurtured.

Occasionally, I hear from “saplings" I’ve not seen for awhile, and discover to my great delight that they’re still walking in truth. It’s a gentle reminder that I may plant and water, but only God can make a tree. 

 

German theologian Helmut Thielike wrote, “The man who doesn’t know how to let go, who is a stranger to quiet confident joy in him who carries out his plans without us (or in spite of us)... that man will become but a miserable creature in his old age. Can the reason why many aging people are melancholy and fearful be that for decades they have never been able to ‘let go and let God’" (The Waiting Father).

 

And so, though I can't care for my saplings these days I can sit still and watch them grow.  There is no greater joy (3 John 1:4).

 

David Roper

8.4.21

Things That Are Not Seen

“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy” (Shakespeare, Hamlet). 

“Elijah said to Elisha, ‘Ask what I shall do for you, before I am taken from you.” And Elisha said, “Please let there be a double portion of your spirit on me.” And he said, “You have asked a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it shall be so for you, but if you do not see me, it shall not be so’” (2 Kings 2:9,10).

 

Elisha, Elijah’s protégé, asked for a “double portion” of Elijah’s spirit—a disposition, attitude and outlook that would enable him to carry on the work of national reformation that Elijah had begun.

 

“You have asked a hard thing,” Elijah said, “yet if you see me when I am taken from you, it (the double portion) shall be yours.”

 

Suddenly, a chariot of fire and horses of fire "swung low” and swept Elijah up to heaven in a whirlwind. “Elisha cried out, ‘My father! My father! (I see) the chariots and horsemen of Israel!’” (2:12).

 

F. B. Meyer wrote, “No mere mortal eye could have beheld that fiery cortège. To senses dulled by materialism, the space occupied by the flaming seraphim would have seemed devoid of any special interest, and bare as the rest of the surrounding scenery.”

 

Elisha saw “things that are not seen”—a most important perspective for us—"for the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are not seen are eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:18).

 

For this reason, we long to tell our friends and neighbors the good news of Jesus and the eternal good that he brought to earth, for we have seen a realm of reality that secular men and women do not, indeed, cannot see. (To be sure, there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in their philosophies.) They see the transient good of this world and arrange their theories accordingly. We fix our eyes on the eternal good of a world that is to be.

 

David Roper

8.2.21