Greg Morse

Laugh Before Devils: Joy as Spiritual Warfare

Once I had a friend who dated this woman.

She was nice, as I recall her, smart and extremely studious. She had ambitions to be top of her class. Yet her drive to excel wound her up a bit tight, in my opinion. She had this wide, bright smile — when she allowed her face to relax. She lived braced for the next exam, which, for her, seemed a year-round sport. Comparing her work with mine, it’s almost as if we attended different universities — or as if she were secretly training for the CIA.

My friend dated this woman, and he assured me they enjoyed “fun” times together. But all I remember is their study dates, quick trips to the cafeteria between library marathons, and endless flashcards. They were a power couple, too busy for a normal life, destined to leave their mark on this world. Until they broke up. I don’t have all the details, but soon after the relationship ended, I heard him do what I hadn’t truly heard before: he laughed.

Sure, I had heard him chuckle before, but never laugh. That’s the difference between grinning and smiling, speaking and praying, singing and worshiping. And his laugh was music not easily forgotten. Colorful as Joseph’s coat, alive as a rainforest, the sound of his joy brightened his listeners. His laugh, unkenneled, became a trademark. The contagious sound erupted from far deeper than the chest.

My friend was happier. And to all appearances, that newfound bliss was due to ending the relationship with this woman. The whole situation serves as an illustration of why Satan is so relentlessly after your joy in God. Let’s connect those dots.

Killed Joys Point to Killjoys

The mathematics of my friend’s gladness seem obvious: friend minus girlfriend equals happiness.

Fairly or unfairly, her presence and his deepest laughter couldn’t coexist. As one disappeared, the other appeared — like Clark Kent and Superman. Such a sudden change in demeanor reflected unfavorably upon the relationship and, right or wrong, upon her influence on his life. With her gone, he loosened up enough to laugh his real laugh; the clouds parted.

Back to Satan. He knows all too well about this connection between our joy (or not) in relation to some person, and how onlookers perceive that person. If the other kills our joy, others will see them as a killjoy. And so, Satan seeks to make us look miserable in relation to God.

Our audible joy (or not) says something about our God. No matter how we assure them otherwise, unbelievers assume our Christian lives are little more than morning study dates in Scripture, making flashcards of rules to memorize, and sneaking brief guilty pleasures during the week between Sunday services. They need to see our delight in God, hear the newfound happiness in our voices. Do they? They often see us more serious than we used to be, but do they also see us happier? Do they suspect we were more satisfied in our previous lives, dead in sins and living for the world?

You see, spiritual warfare rages over who appears to make people most satisfied: God or Satan.
Thus, sounds of human gladness in God taunt Satan’s ears. Saints have understood their joy as a polemic: “You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound” (Psalm 4:7). This kind of combatant joy affronts Satan, especially when the boast comes from the man deprived of all worldly explanations for his happiness. Such a man provokes the darkness. He causes onlookers to wonder, gets them talking: What does he have that we don’t?

Satan’s Sermon

So count on it. If Satan cannot break you from God, he will attempt to make you look as miserable as possible while serving God. He means to preach about God through you, his manuscript. Your sighs and groans and complaints under the lordship of Christ begin his sermon:

Friends, relatives, neighbors, look at this man formerly free of religion now wasting away under its yoke. He was happy once, bright once, knew how to have a good time and carry a normal conversation to entertaining ends. But now the miserable creature has found God, receiving the wage of anxious toil. Further, he would attempt to evangelize you all into his same burdens and groans. He offers all that which he unhappily bears. Mark him well. Beware this uphill, narrow, and laughterless life of the Christian.

The point is not that we audibly laugh in every circumstance. There is “a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). The point is that we should be known for bursts of laughter and dancing, not endless weeping and weightiness. Our regular expressions of joy serve as an act of spiritual warfare against one who labors tirelessly to make us curse God to his face and grumble behind his back.

Here is the inconsistency that the enemy loves. God is my Father, you say — yet you’re always fretful. He is the Joy of my joy — yet you’re consistently gloomy. He is my all in all — yet even your children weary from your dissatisfaction. Christ is my Prince of Peace — yet you’re short-tempered. Jesus is my Good Shepherd who gives all by grace — yet you’re seldom grateful. Everyone can see it but us.

In other words, God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him — and God is greatly dishonored in us when we are consistently curmudgeonly and dissatisfied in him.

Laugh, Christian

Our duty, then, is to make it abundantly clear: Our best joys and laughter were had not before coming to Christ but after. We aim to make it plain that before the Spirit made us new, we did not know what real happiness was. But now that we have him, we have more than we could ask for, more than we deserve. We live in the desert, testifying that we have water the world knows not of.

Consider how this relates to the use of our mouths. One reason God hates the grumbling of his children is this relation between our satisfaction and his glory. “Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world” (Philippians 2:14–15).

Consider what disrespect this respectable sin of grumbling offers to God. It says we have no Father in heaven, no Friend on earth, no Shepherd able to provide for us. The sound of our anxieties indulged ignores the birds of the air and the splendor of the flowers, claiming that whoever cares for these has not been caring for us. Complaining tells the sad tale of the orphan. But our God has not left us orphans.

So laugh, Christian. Make a habit of smiling. Relax those face muscles and rejoice, for he has destined you not for wrath but for eternal life. Put to death those grumbles and petty complaints that consume those without our hope. Yes, weep with those who weep, and sing of God’s goodness to you, of his love for you, which towers over every creeping dissatisfaction of this life. Show a world desperate for answers, desperate for life, desperate for a cure that you have happily found all in him.

Why Your Life Isn’t Working

Are you happy? Are you satisfied?

You tour the zoo with your daughter and peer into the glass with the gorilla. You stare at the gorilla; he stares back. Are your lives all that different? He lives one outdoor-time to the next, one feeding to the next — what is a jungle? You live one entertainment to the next, one bite of sin to the next — what is true happiness? It’s as though you live outside of your joy’s natural habitat.

Yet you are a man and not an ape; you can consider your cage, the prison of your own choices. But when you stop to think about life, you sink — is this really it? Perhaps life was brighter when you were younger. Perhaps you and the future-you were once best friends, but now you talk with less and less pleasure. He doesn’t know what you’re searching for either, and you both are running out of guesses.

Are you happy? Are you satisfied? No? Then why continue to search in vain?

Why?

This is not my question but God’s:

Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,      and your labor for that which does not satisfy? (Isaiah 55:2)

God translates your sighs: You are spending money for what is not bread, laboring for what does not satisfy. You chew on gravel; you reap the wind. So much energy, so much time, so much dedication to what isn’t working. You are making bad purchases, eating the undigestible. The God of heaven and earth asks you: Why?

Why do you insist on digging the desert for water? Why enter into the cave for light? Why the mindless living, the endless scrolling, the watching until your eyes hurt — have these ever flooded your soul with happiness? What are you getting from this life you’ve chosen for yourself?

Your decisions leave behind dry lips, a thirst preparing you for God’s invitation:

Come, everyone who thirsts,     come to the waters;and he who has no money,     come, buy and eat!Come, buy wine and milk     without money and without price. (Isaiah 55:1)

Come, be satisfied. Come, be made happy. Come, God summons you. Simply come.

Wanted

The God of heaven hears your life of little whimpers and responds, Stop filling your mouth with sand; come to the waters. Stop intoxicating your heart with the world; come gladden it with my wine. Why labor for what leaves you hungrier? Will you not have real bread and water, wine and milk for free? Joy, life, substance, purpose — do these not interest you?

“Why will men not be happy?” we can almost hear one angel ask another. Why does the branch run from the tree, the egg from the nest, the fish from the water? You can answer from experience: you did not want this happiness if it is only found in God. Read the terms carefully:

Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good,     and delight yourselves in rich food.Incline your ear, and come to me;     hear, that your soul may live. . . .Seek the Lord while he may be found. (Isaiah 55:2–3, 6)

God can be your Uber driver and deliver the meal, but if it requires eating with him, well, you will see what you have in the back of the fridge. Pride speaks, Better king over your own unhappiness than a happy servant of your Creator. You will not “enter into the Master’s joy” because you cannot abide that word — “Master.” You will find another way back to Eden. You leave no cheap pleasure untried, and yet, a heaven stands open before you and you will not enter because the entrance is as low as a bow and as heavy as a cross.

In other words, We are sinners. God’s offer is not simply to the unsatisfied; it’s to the unrighteous.

Seek the Lord while he may be found;     call upon him while he is near;let the wicked forsake his way,     and the unrighteous man his thoughts;let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him,     and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. (Isaiah 55:6–7)

We do not just need better pleasures; we need abundant pardon. Justice, not just your heart, needs satisfaction. The gospel addresses not merely your discontent in happiness apart from God, but your disobedience in seeking happiness apart from God. The Lord Jesus does not just extend forever ecstasies; he stays final executions. We are creatures not just wanting but wanted.

Genius

What does your past (or present) life of fornication, lying, gossip, anger, or drunkenness have to do with your search for happiness? Everything. Alone, you have no right to this blessedness. Justice disallows sinners from the inheritance of the righteous. Should you who have sown hell reap heaven? Should God be mocked? How can God make you happy? His mercy, not his wrath, begs for explanation in the next verses.

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,     neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.For as the heavens are higher than the earth,     so are my ways higher than your ways     and my thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8–9)

Your thoughts of grace and mercy inch upon the forest floor; God’s thoughts of grace dwell far above the heads of the seraphim. His gospel ways of pity and pardon hang above us from crossbeams of rugged wood upon a hill. In other words, the gospel is not man’s genius but God’s. We had no clue how justice and mercy could kiss. Man couldn’t fathom a way for his own forgiveness; he couldn’t dream how to be adopted into God’s family. The happiness in God we never sought was given to us through a plan we couldn’t have imagined.

Joy

God’s plan features God’s Son. He would send his only Son to take on human flesh, live the perfect life you didn’t, die your death, and rise from your grave. He suffered the wrath you deserved so you could have the heaven Christ deserved.

God welcomed back a banished people through covenant, foretelling, “I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David” (Isaiah 55:3). And amid the promise, he turns to another and says,

Behold, you shall call a nation that you do not know,     and a nation that did not know you shall run to you,because of the Lord your God, and of the Holy One of Israel,     for he has glorified you. (Isaiah 55:5)

Hundreds of years later, one man rises to his feet to reissue God’s invitation to the thirsty:

On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’” (John 7:37–38)

Jesus invites all who will to come to him. He is the Lamb who was slain for the sins of the world. He is the man who, when lifted up by his Father, draws sinners to himself.

Whether you accept Christ’s happy terms of surrender, the promised bliss for God’s people will arrive. His word will not return to him empty (Isaiah 55:11). The consummation of this everlasting covenant will spill over creation. Mountains and hills shall sing for his saints; the forest and the trees applaud us. The curse of thorn and thistle shall be overturned, displaced by the fertile green of blessing (Isaiah 55:12). And the happiness of his people in a new heaven and a new earth will “make a name for the Lord” as an “everlasting sign that shall not be cut off” (Isaiah 55:13).

Do you thirst? Come to the waters. He promises to forgive you, satisfy you, adopt you as his own treasured possession. Leave behind the pornography, the living for your own name, your unsatisfying affair with the world, and let the Lord usher you into fullness of pleasures forevermore in his presence. Your joy, to his glory, forever.

Prepare to Speak on Sunday: The Ministry of Conversation

What if we recorded talk in the pews one Sunday morning? The sermon ends, the preacher descends, we sing in response, the benediction is given, voices break out, and the recording begins. As people speak to one another, what does one overhear?

Men talk of recent house projects, that afternoon’s football game, the weather, global news, politics, a sore knee, irritations at work, retirement. Women discuss kids, homeschooling, upcoming events, anxieties.

Ask an impartial judge: Is this a group of Christians? It might be hard to tell. Are we overhearing talk from a food court, a bus stop, or a church? Did these people just meet with the God of heaven and earth? The almighty Creator has just spoken to us through his preached word. Yet what if it has little to no consequence on our conversations directly afterward?

The contrast may be obvious with how happily we discuss other interests — for example, our entertainments. When you see a great movie or show, do you not make a point to discuss the plot twist at the end, the heartbreak of that character’s death, or the glory of this character’s redemption? Isn’t the experience somehow incomplete until you express what you think and feel and how deeply this or that moved you? Well, what about the sermon?

I am not giving a rule but questioning a culture. The problem is not that we talk about lunch or the game or earthly concerns, but that we lack deliberate conversation about the best things we just heard. Do we redeem the time? Would the recording detect much edifying, thoughtful, beautiful conversations about the soul and the Lord Jesus, or something closer to saltless, unspiritual, and rather idle conversation?

Consider how John Owen describes our blessed duty:

Believers, in their ordinary daily discourse, ought to be continually mentioning the Lord in helpful, profitable conversation, and not waste opportunities with foolish, light, frothy words that are out of place [especially on a Sunday]. (Duties of Christian Fellowship, 54)

A culture of frothy conversations seems to me the result of a more foundational assumption: that we really gather to hear the preacher speak, and not to further the grace in each other’s lives by our own speaking.

That All Were Prophets

What if we prayerfully arrived ready to speak words that “give grace to those who [need to] hear,” words the Spirit has equipped us to speak (Ephesians 4:29)? What if the culture of our churches were more potluck than single dish from the head chef?

I believe Paul has this in mind when he teaches the church that God gave us evangelists, shepherds, and teachers “to equip the saints for the work of ministry.” Note what ministry: “for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Ephesians 4:12–13). Pastors equip the saints not just to make disciples from the world out there, but to make mature disciples of each other in here. We are equipped by sermons, classes, and pastoral care not just to arrive the next week to receive again, but to use what we hear to speak into each other’s lives.

Thus, Paul continues,

Speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. (Ephesians 4:15–16)

How many members of the body are not working properly because they consider themselves mere consumers? While speaking is not the only way we build others up, it is the means Paul mentions here. The community that builds itself up in love is built not merely by the pastor with the microphone. Instead, that pastor equips us to take the truth of Christ and echo it into each other’s lives during the rest of Sunday and throughout the week.

Very practically, what should we say when the service ends?

1. Discuss the Sermon

As book clubs discuss books, saints should discuss sermons. Ask how God met them; be ready to share how God met you.

I remember being taught that when God’s word is faithfully preached, the responsibility to steward that word shifts from the preacher to the hearer. You now hold a duty to love, meditate upon, apply, share, and further speak the truth preached (including with those next to you).

Consider how we can influence each other — positively and negatively — by our worldward or Godward conversation.

God is convicting or uplifting or correcting a brother’s heart with the word — I interrupt to get his take on the Vikings game. Jesus teaches that Satan steals sermons from hearts; how often are we his unwitting accomplices? The seed was sinking into the soil; I blew it away. His spirit burned just now — I doused the flame. His heart was being pierced; I parried the blade.

“Just be a humble, simple lover of God and souls, and the good you can do is unspeakable.”

But imagine if I discerned his unspoken heaviness, asked the Lord if I should go speak to him, and, going over, said, “Brother, tell me how God met your soul this morning.” You can do so much good by joining the preacher in ministry, seeking to further impress the truth upon souls by simple conversations about Christ after the service. Here is an idea: take sermon notes for yourself first and then also for others. You don’t need to be another pastor. Just be a humble, simple lover of God and souls, and the good you can do is unspeakable.

2. Care for the Soul

Thomas Watson gave his assessment after listening in on Christian conversations:

It is the fault of Christians that they do not in company provoke themselves to good discourse. It is a sinful modesty; there is much visiting, but they do not give one another’s souls a visit. In worldly things their tongue is a ready writer, but in things of religion it is as if their tongue did cleave to the roof of their mouth. (Heaven Taken by Storm, 38)

Consider how we rewrite Hebrews 10:24–25 by our Sunday conduct: “Let the pastors alone consider how to stir us up to love and good works, and let us not neglect to meet together to receive their words, as is the habit of some, but be encouraged by the pastors, and all the more as the Day draws near.”

Now the actual passage: “Let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near” (Hebrews 10:24–25). We consider others, stir them up to love and good works. “Meeting together” is linked with “encouraging one another.”

So we ask questions about each other, we check in on each other’s souls, we stir each other up, and we “exhort one another every day, as long as it is called ‘today,’ that none of [us] may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin” (Hebrews 3:13). “Teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom,” we form each other’s souls (Colossians 3:16).

3. Pray for One Another

It is written, “My house shall be called a house of prayer.” (Matthew 21:13)

You may not possess many words of wisdom. You may not think well on your feet. You may get nervous and awkward and unsure of what to say in response to other’s questions. Here is one thing that eloquent and plain, wise and simple, young and old in Christ can do for one another: pray.

God’s house should be called a house of prayer. Intercession should fill the place before the service, during the service, and after. Ask others how they are doing. Ask how you can pray for them. And then bless yourself and them and the church by asking, “Can I pray for you right now?” “Right now” — two words that (when consistently added) can transform a stagnant culture.

Heaven’s Microphone

Some of the most shaping words spoken in the Christian assembly come not from the pulpit above but from the pew below. A church taught to make the most of the time together, to come to speak and not just to listen, to fill the building with holy conversation, experiences a foretaste of that country where we shall speak forever of all that God has done.

The pew is a powerful place. Marriages are saved there; sermons get engraved forever; souls pass from death to life. The pew or aisle or foyer is a grand place to “let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person” (Colossians 4:6).

The illustration I began with is not entirely hypothetical. Recording devices may never catch our conversations, but be sure that God does. He hears and remembers the holy speech of his people then and now:

Then those who feared the Lord spoke with one another. The Lord paid attention and heard them, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the Lord and esteemed his name. (Malachi 3:16)

When we who fear the Lord speak to one another this Sunday, what will the Lord overhear?

No Condemnation

“Holy, holy, holy” shook the courtroom as the Judge took his seat, a sight that I can only now liken to the sun ascending his throne at high noon. The proceeding commenced, and the prosecution began their case by calling one Spirit of the Age to bear his testimony on behalf of his business partner, World.

My evening reading that night was Romans 1–8. As the final page fell, sleep seized me, and I drifted into a dream.
I stood outside of a courtroom called Judgment Seat. August and austere, that courthouse appeared to me as the one great destination of all the earth. I entered willingly, though I later wondered if I had any choice.
Inside, demons and angels swarmed. “Judgment,” I overheard one angel say to another, “must begin at the house of God.” I took my seat in the courtroom, although some eyes rested upon me as though I did not truly belong.
Before I could spare the matter another thought, the doors flung open, and silence grabbed each creature by the tongue. Even the malevolent ones, those gods of the nations, were reduced to muffled sneers. The man entered enchained, head fallen, Amartōlos1 his name — though he shuddered to own it. He moved, so it seemed, like a man to his execution. He sat down in his seat — called Shame — with strange willingness, judging by the surprise of one angel behind me, who claimed that most sat down only after a great struggle.
“Holy, holy, holy” shook the courtroom as the Judge took his seat, a sight that I can only now liken to the sun ascending his throne at high noon. The proceeding commenced, and the prosecution began their case by calling one Spirit of the Age to bear his testimony on behalf of his business partner, World.
First Witness: Spirit of the Age
“Judge and jury and good spirits among us,” the spirit began, “I wonder if you have not realized already one who has no true place among the congregation of the righteous.”
At this, I swallowed so hard I thought I heard it echo.
“This man” — pointing at the man they nicknamed Tolos — “oh, how reluctantly do I bear my witness to his disgrace before you, Great and Holy One! I wonder, did you not say in your great book of law that this man ought not to love the world or the things in the world? Indeed, you did. I have it here: ‘Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world’ — and note this next part, good Judge and jury — ‘the love of the Father is not in him.’2 Or, if you’d rather, ‘You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.’3
“The precept is unmistakable, but did this poor villain transgress it? I submit as evidence the first two decades of his life — for the tree must be known by its fruit. Look with the eye of justice, not mercy — ‘Your eye shall not pity him’4 — and you will see ample proof in every word and deed. His whole life flows from one foul source. Unmistakably, he has served a willing slave to the lust of his eyes, the lust of his flesh, and the pride of life.5
“Consider how many varieties of sin lie before you now, sins cataloged by the apostle under divine inspiration: gossip, slander, hating of God, insolence, haughtiness, boasting, disobedience to parents, and even new inventions of evil.6 Look at the criminal — faithless, foolish, heartless, ruthless!7 What could be known about the Most High was plain to him — he knew well enough his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature — but the man neither honored God nor gave him any thanks.8 Instead, he exchanged the glory of the Most High for created things and went into partnership with me and my esteemed colleague here.9 He knew the truth but suppressed it in unrighteousness. Does the defendant deny any of these charges? Should he be true and God a liar?10 Is he not left ‘without excuse’?”11
The eyes of that other world focused on the man, who to them was no older than a boy. Without lifting his head, he stammered, “I have no defense, your Honor. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment.”12
Second: Accuser of the Brethren
At this, the proceedings might have ended, but the examination continued with a most adept prosecutor given the title Accuser of the Brethren.
“Excellent start, great Spirit. Now, I must state my relations to the defendant from the onset so as not to indulge unjust scales. The man before you is my son; from birth he has been mine, and I most fraternally his. We have the case clearly given in the eternal decrees: ‘Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning.’13 Or, a few verses further, the dividing line is drawn even plainer, the chasm more manifest — phanera, if I may quote the original. ‘By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.’14
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Escape from Doubting Castle: Counsel for Christians in Despair

Life within the prison of despair is a misery hard to explain. The darkness makes dumb, leaving groans too deep for words. Isolation becomes both a constant friend and a chief affliction. The other birds of the world chirp along merrily. Perhaps you used to sing among their branches, but now you wonder, What do these creatures know of the deep caverns of the world? How can they understand? They feed upon worms; you live with worms, if living it can still be named.

John Bunyan described such a state as mere breathing. When Bunyan personified despair in The Pilgrim’s Progress, he depicted it as a giant who battered his prisoners mercilessly. After the first round of beatings, Giant Despair visits his captives (Christian and Hopeful) and finds them “still alive, though barely alive at that. They could do little but breathe, because of their great hunger and thirst and due to the wounds they received when he beat them” (The Pilgrim’s Progress, 198). Inhale, exhale . . . inhale, exhale — and even this with pain.

And what is worse, some of those locked in the dark tower know they have themselves to blame. Christian had advised they take an easier meadow-path that paralleled the narrow and hard way. They got lost, caught in a storm, and then they were discovered trespassing on Giant Despair’s property. The pilgrims’ imprisonment was not due so much to tragedy as trespass; theirs was not simply grief but guilt. God seems distant; the two believers grow silent: “They also had little to say, for they knew they were at fault” (196). They’re caught in Doubting Castle. Their hearts condemned them; conscience grabbed a branch to club them; why wouldn’t God leave them there?

Have you ever been imprisoned here? Are you there now?

Escaping Doubting Castle

Whether you wandered from the way into a great sin or whether some calamity stole you from your peace, a voice may come to you and suggest the unthinkable. Giant Despair brings the sinister temptation:

So when morning came, he went to them in an unfriendly manner, as before. Knowing they were still very sore with the stripes that he had given them the day before, he told them that since they were never likely to leave that place, their only way out would be immediately to make an end of themselves — either with knife, noose, or poison. “For why,” said he, “should you choose to live, seeing it is accompanied with so much bitterness?” (197)

A lion hunts among the wounded. He loves the stray, the despairing, the disgraced. This temptation never made you pause before, perhaps — when life was happy, hope was bright, God was near. But now, the lights are out. Now, the wages of sin overwhelm you. Now, with Christian, you find yourself considering the counsel. If you wonder the same, I pray God gives you strong aid through Bunyan’s five lessons concerning Christian and Hopeful’s escape from Doubting Castle.

1. Expose the Temptation

If you struggle with suicidal thoughts, a first step is to expose them. Christian says to Hopeful,

Brother, what shall we do? The life that we now live is miserable. For my part, I do not know whether it is best to live like this or to die without further notice. My soul desires strangling rather than life, and the grave is more desirable for me than this dungeon. Shall we listen to the counsel of this giant? (198)

I have had conversations with Christians who confessed they were tempted to harm themselves. Isn’t this one of the best first steps out of such despair? Satan brings a lethal combination of temptation along with lies about his temptation. In this case, he tells those he tempts that they must be false Christians for even being tempted. He holds out the poisoned apple and smirks to see your hand twitch. Do true Christians really long to die? Can they actually be tempted toward suicide? Our soul’s enemy is not just “the father of lies,” but “a murderer from the beginning” (John 8:44).

No matter who you are, you are not the first to be “so utterly burdened beyond [your] strength that [you] despaired of life itself” (2 Corinthians 1:8). You are not the first to wonder, “Why is light given to him who is in misery, and life to the bitter in soul, who long for death, but it comes not, and dig for it more than for hidden treasures, who rejoice exceedingly and are glad when they find the grave?” (Job 3:20–22). Nor would you be the only one ever to pray for death, saying, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers” (1 Kings 19:4).

Bunyan’s first help for us is this: Expose the temptation. Follow Christian and go to a Hopeful, a trusted and mature believer or a faithful shepherd, and tell him how your Despair now counsels you.

2. Fear God’s Judgment

The second help comes with Hopeful’s response.

Indeed, our present condition is dreadful, and death would be far more welcome to me than to abide forever in this way. Even so, let us consider that the Lord of the country to which we are going has said, “You shall not murder.” If we are not to take the life of another man, then much more are we forbidden to take the giant’s counsel to kill ourselves. (198)

Beloved, to choose to destroy the life God has given you is not just a great tragedy but a heinous sin. With the euphemisms given for suicide today, we must not overlook that “God’s law, self-interest, and future judgment — all cry out against . . . the man who flees as a fugitive from life, and presents himself unbidden at the bar of God” (Commentary on John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress, 94).

Bunyan goes on in the original to teach that suicide is “to kill body and soul at once,” arguing his position from 1 John 3:15: “You know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.” While I do not believe that every person who commits suicide goes to hell, I do not doubt it in many cases. I believe some who have traveled this deplorable path will be in heaven, but dear brother or sister, never test the Lord in this matter. The high-handedness of this sin, the destruction it leaves behind, the precarious end before a sure judgment ought to make us tremble and restrain the hand of self-harm.

“Oh, the liberation of promises believed! How they send us forth beyond the prison walls to better days.”

O despairing soul, this is not the voice of your Father in heaven, “for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one” (James 1:13). This darkness playing upon your mind is not the wisdom from above — first pure, then peaceable, full of good fruit (James 3:17). No, demonic wisdom tempts you to such a dark act, and these spirits would lead you off the cliff if you would let them, as they did when they entered the herd of pigs. Life — abundant life — is what your Savior came to bring you. Do not commit an offense so great as self-murder against your Lord.

3. Remember Past Rescues

Prosperity preachers will not tell you this, because prosperity preachers do not preach the whole counsel of God, but Bunyan shows in his allegory how life can go from bad to worse, even for Christians. Giant Despair returns, incensed to find the pilgrims still alive, and vows to make them regret the day of their birth. At this, Christian faints in terror. After he regains consciousness, he again confesses his inclination to take Despair’s counsel. To which Hopeful, that brother born for the day of adversity, reminds him, “My brother, do you not remember how valiant you have been before now?” (200). Hopeful reminds him of all he has overcome and how many times he has played the man, God helping him. This remembrance is not so much about him but about his God with him, a recollection similar to the psalmist’s: “You have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy” (Psalm 63:7).

We face down our Giants of today and tomorrow as David did his: by remembering the God of past deliverances and every-morning mercies. “The Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine” (1 Samuel 17:37). The Lord that delivered in the past will deliver now. He lives above and beyond our lightless castles, ready to raid our cells with grace and help in time of need, just as he has done before.

4. Grasp Great Promises

What finally breaks Christian and Hopeful free from Doubting Castle? Not vague ideas or renewed resolves or wishing upon a distant star, but believing upon living promises.

What a fool am I to lie in a stinking dungeon when I may as well walk at liberty! I have a key in my pocket, called Promise, that I am sure will open any lock in Doubting Castle. (202)

Despair forgets the “precious and very great promises” of God and their Yes and Amen in Christ (2 Peter 1:4; 2 Corinthians 1:20). Forlorn, we feel the blows of sorrow, attend to the gashes of guilt, but fail to search the pocket where the promise lies waiting. What a fool we have been to remain in a stinking dungeon when Christ would have us walk at liberty. Recall keys that have worked mightily on many a door in Despair’s penitentiary.

Guilt’s door:

Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. (Isaiah 55:7)

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. (Romans 8:1)

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)

He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in steadfast love. (Micah 7:18)

Despondency’s door:

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. (Matthew 11:28)

Whoever comes to me I will never cast out. (John 6:37)

They who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint. (Isaiah 40:31)

This is the promise that he made to us — eternal life. (1 John 2:25)

Temptation’s door:

God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it. (1 Corinthians 10:13)

He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. (Philippians 1:6)

Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. (Isaiah 41:10)

Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. (James 4:7)

Oh, the liberation of promises believed! How they send us forth beyond the prison walls to better days — often before our situations even change. Robert Maguire captures the beauty of promise: “Promise sees the dawn from the midnight, anticipates the sunrise from the sunset, recognizes in the leafless trees and cheerless snows of winter the harbinger and earnest of the fruits and flowers and seasonable enjoyments of the summer-tide” (Commentary, 96).

O wintered soul, by faith in your great and compassionate God, who has not spared his beloved Son for you, send your heart ahead into coming spring by believing what he says is soon to come.

5. Crawl to Sunday

A final help Bunyan offers us comes by noticing the chronology.

Here, then, they lay from Wednesday morning till Saturday night, without one bit of bread, or drop of drink, or light or any to ask how they did. So they were in a dire situation, far from friends and acquaintances. (196)

Is it coincidental that Bunyan identifies the time frame as Wednesday morning till Saturday night? It is not. Sunday is the day of jubilee for the oppressed, the day to be reminded together of God’s certain promises with his redeemed people. “Is it not true that [Sun]day, by its holy rest and hallowed ministrations of the Word and prayer, breaks many a fetter, frees many a slave, dissolves the doubts of the week past, and delivers many a soul from the bondage of Despair?” (Commentary, 96). Can you not add your own testimony?

Giant Despair holds no authority in God’s house. The Lord of love lives here, the Lord of compassion, the Lord of life — the Lord in whose presence there is fullness of joy. He is the one who condemned sin in the flesh, crushed the skull of the dragon, and has sat down at his Father’s side — who is coming again for us. The Light of the world shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome him yet.

Despairing saint, Sunday is coming. Make it to his people, his shepherds, his ordinances. Crawl, if you must. Sunday, dear brother or sister, is the day of resurrection, the day of life — the Lord’s Day. A day to anticipate the arrival of the last promise he made to us: “Surely I am coming soon” (Revelation 22:20).

Lost in God’s Providence: How He Works Our Wanderings for Good

Saul stands as a controversial first king in Israel’s history.

At times, he fought valiantly against the Philistines and judged them on behalf of the Lord. At other times, we see a man selective in his obedience. Still at other times, we see him with a King Lear paranoia, hurling spears at David, raging at his daughter, and threatening to kill his own son. He had the Spirit, and he had the Spirit taken away; he had the kingdom, and he had it torn from him; he ascended to the throne and then was violently cast down.

King Saul was worthy of death and worthy of song honoring him at his death. When Saul and Jonathan fall together in battle, David, the victim of Saul’s demon, leads Israel in the dirge: “Your glory, O Israel, is slain on your high places! How the mighty have fallen!” (2 Samuel 1:19).

He is a conflicted character in the storied history — more like Boromir (we hope) than Smeagol. We can sympathize with him. He never asked to be king, after all; he hid from the crown behind the baggage. Though a head taller than everyone else in Israel, he seemed small in his own eyes. Most know the temptation to feel unequal to the task and tiny before others.

I want us to learn from his origin story. How did Saul, an unassuming Benjamite from the humblest clan of the least tribe, ascend to the throne once reserved for God himself? In this article, I want to remind you of the meticulous sovereignty of our gracious God, his care then and his care now, and his ordering of seemingly irrelevant details to further his great name and our great good. Saul stumbled onto the throne at the end of a long search for donkeys.

Scene One: Out with the Old

In 1 Samuel 8, Israel has just asked Samuel to find them a human king so they might be like the nations. Samuel is getting old; his sons are taking bribes; why not catch up to modern times and find a human king? Samuel tries to reason with them, yet Israel will not be moved, no matter the cost.

“Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you,” the Lord tells Samuel, “for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them” (1 Samuel 8:7). Samuel relents and sends the people home. Where is he to find this new king?

Scene Two: Lost Donkeys

The next verse introduces us to Saul’s father, Kish. A wealthy man of Benjamin, his son is the handsome giant of Israel: “From his shoulders upward [Saul] was taller than any of the people” (1 Samuel 9:1–2). But the first domino falls rather unexpectedly: “Now the donkeys of Kish, Saul’s father, were lost. So Kish said to Saul his son, ‘Take one of the young men with you, and arise, go and look for the donkeys’” (1 Samuel 9:3–4).

Saul and his servant pass through territory after territory but fail to find them. Saul wants to return: “Come, let us go back, lest my father cease to care about the donkeys and become anxious about us” (1 Samuel 9:5). But before they turn, an idea just happens to come to the servant’s mind: “Behold, there is a man of God in this city, and he is a man who is held in honor; all that he says comes true. So now let us go there. Perhaps he can tell us the way we should go” (1 Samuel 9:6). Saul asks what gift they might offer the man for his help. “Here, I have with me a quarter of a shekel of silver, and I will give it to the man of God to tell us our way” (8). Persuaded, Saul goes forth to meet the man who would make him king.

Now, here is what should amaze us. Rewind to the previous day:

Now the day before Saul came, the Lord had revealed to Samuel: “Tomorrow about this time I will send to you a man from the land of Benjamin, and you shall anoint him to be prince over my people Israel. He shall save my people from the hand of the Philistines. For I have seen my people, because their cry has come to me.” (1 Samuel 9:15–16)

Behold the God of meticulous, donkey-dispersing sovereignty. A God who brings forth a king from a nobody wandering after lost beasts of burden. A God who brings along just the right companion to bring him into his destiny. And a God, not just of meticulous sovereignty, but of meticulous mercy. Did you catch it? “I will send to you a man. . . . He shall save my people from the hand of the Philistines. For I have seen my people, because their cry has come to me.” This God has no equal. When rejected as king over the people, he nonetheless sees and hears their cries and brings his replacement to deliver them.

“Trusting God to govern our lives quiets many anxieties and affords much peace.”

At any point, the plan could have aborted; yet it couldn’t have, because at every point the Lord guided the plan. He told Samuel to expect Israel’s deliverer “tomorrow about this time” — and in stumbles the clueless Saul from stage left. When Samuel sees Saul, the Lord tells him, “Here is the man of whom I spoke to you! He it is who shall restrain my people” (1 Samuel 9:16–17).

Providence, Not Puppetry

Can’t we be reminded of God’s minute orchestration in Saul’s life and learn how to better read our own stories?

First, consider the nature of our God’s “sending” of Saul to his fate. From lost donkeys, to the right servant chosen, to the idea about going to Samuel for help — these were finely tuned secondary causes (or means) used by the First Cause to fulfill his will and achieve his ends. Westminster helps us understand the mysterious interplay: “Although, in relation to the foreknowledge and decree of God, the first cause, all things come to pass immutably and infallibly: yet, by the same providence, He ordereth them to fall out according to the nature of second causes, either necessarily, freely, or contingently” (5.2).

In other words, the Lord sent Saul to Samuel, not by taking over Saul’s mind and puppeteering him against his choices, but by creating the precise circumstances (secondary causes) to guide his will this way and that. As God guides the stream of a king’s heart, so he directs the steps of kings-to-be (Proverbs 21:1). So, over the same event, it can be spoken: Saul chose to obey his father and search for the donkeys and go to the man of God, and God sent him to Samuel. God placed the walking stones that he knew Saul would freely step upon to bring him to Samuel. I will send to you a man from the land of Benjamin.

Lost in the Fields

Saul remains a controversial first king in Israel’s history. I do not know whether those lost donkeys led him down a path that ended in eternal life. God will judge. But we do know that for his children, minute sovereignty is working for them, not against them, for their eternal good.

Apply this lesson to your own life, Christian. If we believe in this God of meticulous providence, we will put more confidence in him than in our meticulous planning. “The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps” (Proverbs 16:9). We do our little planning, but if we know this God, we will mostly pray that he will establish our steps and keep us open to his many surprises along the way.

Trusting God to govern our lives quiets many anxieties and affords much peace. Think of it: isn’t the unfolding of our lives wrapped in mystery? One small step this way and not that, one thoughtless act, one unexpected conversation, one small tilt in the rudder, and all is changed. One insignificant donkey hunt ends in a throne. If left to navigate ourselves, ours are perilous waters below and a sky of shifting stars — we would be lost before morning. How vital for us not to play Captain: Lord, establish my way!

And praise be to God that he hears our cries and will deliver us, even after we once rejected him as King. Lay hold of the promise: “For those who love God all things work together for good” (Romans 8:28). And he will not merely wave the wand at the end of time and renew our shipwreck, but he is working all things for good now — even that thing you never chose. He surrounds his children with inescapable good — even though his providence can be hard and confusing, and we foolish and sinful. His promise to us shall not break.

You cannot see now how a path of pain or fields of pointlessness lead to eternal good, but he does. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths” (Proverbs 3:5–6) — even when those straight paths follow wandering donkeys.

No Condemnation: A Dream Before God’s Judgment Seat

My evening reading that night was Romans 1–8. As the final page fell, sleep seized me, and I drifted into a dream.

I stood outside of a courtroom called Judgment Seat. August and austere, that courthouse appeared to me as the one great destination of all the earth. I entered willingly, though I later wondered if I had any choice.

Inside, demons and angels swarmed. “Judgment,” I overheard one angel say to another, “must begin at the house of God.” I took my seat in the courtroom, although some eyes rested upon me as though I did not truly belong.

Before I could spare the matter another thought, the doors flung open, and silence grabbed each creature by the tongue. Even the malevolent ones, those gods of the nations, were reduced to muffled sneers. The man entered enchained, head fallen, Amartōlos1 his name — though he shuddered to own it. He moved, so it seemed, like a man to his execution. He sat down in his seat — called Shame — with strange willingness, judging by the surprise of one angel behind me, who claimed that most sat down only after a great struggle.

“Holy, holy, holy” shook the courtroom as the Judge took his seat, a sight that I can only now liken to the sun ascending his throne at high noon. The proceeding commenced, and the prosecution began their case by calling one Spirit of the Age to bear his testimony on behalf of his business partner, World.

First Witness: Spirit of the Age

“Judge and jury and good spirits among us,” the spirit began, “I wonder if you have not realized already one who has no true place among the congregation of the righteous.”

At this, I swallowed so hard I thought I heard it echo.

“This man” — pointing at the man they nicknamed Tolos — “oh, how reluctantly do I bear my witness to his disgrace before you, Great and Holy One! I wonder, did you not say in your great book of law that this man ought not to love the world or the things in the world? Indeed, you did. I have it here: ‘Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world’ — and note this next part, good Judge and jury — ‘the love of the Father is not in him.’2 Or, if you’d rather, ‘You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.’3

“The precept is unmistakable, but did this poor villain transgress it? I submit as evidence the first two decades of his life — for the tree must be known by its fruit. Look with the eye of justice, not mercy — ‘Your eye shall not pity him’4 — and you will see ample proof in every word and deed. His whole life flows from one foul source. Unmistakably, he has served a willing slave to the lust of his eyes, the lust of his flesh, and the pride of life.5

“Consider how many varieties of sin lie before you now, sins cataloged by the apostle under divine inspiration: gossip, slander, hating of God, insolence, haughtiness, boasting, disobedience to parents, and even new inventions of evil.6 Look at the criminal — faithless, foolish, heartless, ruthless!7 What could be known about the Most High was plain to him — he knew well enough his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature — but the man neither honored God nor gave him any thanks.8 Instead, he exchanged the glory of the Most High for created things and went into partnership with me and my esteemed colleague here.9 He knew the truth but suppressed it in unrighteousness. Does the defendant deny any of these charges? Should he be true and God a liar?10 Is he not left ‘without excuse’?”11

The eyes of that other world focused on the man, who to them was no older than a boy. Without lifting his head, he stammered, “I have no defense, your Honor. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment.”12

Second: Accuser of the Brethren

At this, the proceedings might have ended, but the examination continued with a most adept prosecutor given the title Accuser of the Brethren.

“Excellent start, great Spirit. Now, I must state my relations to the defendant from the onset so as not to indulge unjust scales. The man before you is my son; from birth he has been mine, and I most fraternally his. We have the case clearly given in the eternal decrees: ‘Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning.’13 Or, a few verses further, the dividing line is drawn even plainer, the chasm more manifest — phanera, if I may quote the original. ‘By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.’14

“Now, though I do not mean to inconvenience the cosmos with family matters, note that he is not merely guilty, but in fact he is my son and no son of the Most High. He is mine and shall share in my inheritance, come what may. Did not the Most High swear that the woman’s offspring and mine shall have ‘enmity’?15 And while I will not dispute the fact here, let it be known that in identifying with me, in following my course and my way, in producing my works, he cannot but share my fate — as the great laws clearly teach. If some form of justice should prosecute me, then justice, by that same principle, must prosecute mine. Equal scales, I now ask of the court.

“If the dead dog desires to refute my claim over him or deny his service to me, then I shall forgo my gracious manner in this assembly and hail accusations violent — and most true — upon him, my own son. Jealousy for his soul, you see, would drive me to it. He already admitted to sinning not just against law, but against you, the Most High — and the villain now attempts, I fear, to do the same to me. If I be his father, where, dear assembly, is my honor?”16

At this the man stirred not. Only a groan was heard: “Oh, wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?”17

Third: Conscience

Finally — and this witness was, in my opinion, as damning as the last — the man’s conscience spoke forth a fiery testimony against him, as though he had only this opportunity to speak after many years. Oh, how lengthy and eloquent and exact this witness! He read aloud numberless trespasses, many of which he had been present for, giving his most ardent protest, only to be harshly dispensed with, laughed at, mocked, and finally silenced. These deep secrets of the soul were stripped bare for the rest of us to see — of such an exhaustive nature that the Great Accuser himself recorded new evidence with smiling satisfaction. Rather would I live in a sewer, with most loathsome rats chewing my flesh and disease gnawing at my bones, than ever subject myself to such a precise and detailed record of my sins.

Tolos’s Plea

Finally, the man himself responded.

“I never knew to hate myself as I do at this moment,” Tolos replied, scanning the evidence. “What a villain I have been. My great pleasures have but stored up wrath for myself.18 My throat is an open grave, full of curses and bitterness.19 I have chosen ruin and misery and lived without the fear of God, not deeming it worthwhile to acknowledge him in my thoughts. My mouth is stopped. I am accountable to God. I stand condemned — and this by my own testimony.20 I plead guilty, guilty, guilty on all counts. If you have only justice to give, my due is wrath and fury unending.21

“But this is why I have come.” He finally lifted his head. “I have come to be tried before my time because I have read more in your Book than of law and my sin. ‘Righteousness apart from law’ — ‘the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.’22 All seems a wide word to awaken my hope.

“I can be declared not guilty, legally innocent, and even positively righteous ‘by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.’23 When I, who am evil, give my children gifts, I do not expect them to pay me for it. An open hand is all I require. So, here is my hand — empty of its own merits, stained, tinctured with sin, culprit to countless crimes — yet open to receive mercy from nail-pierced hands. For as plainly as I’ve read the record of my crimes, I’ve read the record of my Savior’s merits. How he fulfilled every jot and tittle of the law. How he was sent ‘for sin’ to ‘condemn sin in the flesh’24 — condemning what stood to condemn me. Wretched man that I am, but wretched man was he made for me, ‘whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.’25 I do receive him!

“The book says — and I faint to believe it — that to all who believe, the verdict upon a whole life of carnal wickedness has been punished at the tree. There you proved that God is ‘just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.’26 My plea is the same as Abraham’s, who ‘believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.’27 This is the faith to justify and bequeath ‘peace with God.’28

“So, I bear witness against myself, yes, and plead most certainly and horribly guilty. But next, I draw the court’s full attention to the finished work of Jesus Christ on my behalf. By his blood, I am justified — and much more, he saves me from the wrath of God.29 I believe with my heart and am made righteous; I confess him and am promised salvation.30 I appeal not to the law of works — ‘for by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight.’31 I appeal to the law of faith, the law of the Spirit of life that sets me free from the law of sin and death.32 I hold, I can only hold, that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.33 I draw your attention to the gospel decree:

To the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness, just as David also speaks of the blessing [my blessing!] of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works:

‘Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven,     and whose sins are covered;blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin.’34

“So, I have come of my own accord before being summoned by death, believing, simply believing. I have pled guilty; I am worthy of eternal death. But you, O Judge, have promised life to those who come, and you promise them a spotless righteousness, my Savior’s righteousness. He shall deliver me from this seat of shame, for I am promised, ‘Whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.’35 He bore my sin, wore my wrath, ‘was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.’36 He is all my plea. If I be damned, come pry my arms from his feet, for there alone I cling.”

Verdict

A silence, a moment when even the gods are stilled, filled the courthouse. Then, a voice like the roar of many waters spoke from the throne words that shall be etched into my mind forever:

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”37

At this, the foundations of the courtroom rocked, shaken by howls quickly drowned in song. The small host of hellish spirits shrieked and shrank in fury while the mighty host burst into a new song to the Judge:

“Worthy are you to take the scroll     and to open its seals,for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God     from every tribe and language and people and nation,and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God,     and they shall reign on the earth.”38

And the Judge, looking rather annoyed by the blasphemous rage, cut short the cries of the fiends, exclaiming,

“Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? I am he who justifies. Who is to condemn? I am the one who died — more than that, who was raised — who sits at the right hand of power, who indeed is interceding for my people.”39

As the Judge closed the Book, I thought I glimpsed scars upon his hands and a name graven upon his palms: Amartōlos.

Christ Is King: A Warning to God’s Foes

If I were still an enemy of God, if I still dwelled in rebel camps outside his kingdom, if I still played the madman slinging stones at my Creator, this audible response to our amassed assault would empty my blood of courage. I would sooner hear the threats of the archangel, the blast of the trumpet, the opening of his gates, the rhythm of his war drums, the wheels of his chariots, than this. After our rage had been spent, our God presumed defeated, our terms of surrender sent, “He who sits in the heavens laughs” (Psalm 2:4).

What was true in David’s generation is true in every generation: the nations rage, the peoples plot in vain, the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and his Anointed (Psalm 2:1–2). Mankind does not just walk a broad way; we march along it. We bring the battering ram to the door; our soldiers spend quivers shooting over walls. You and I were born in their ranks, children of wrath by nature (Ephesians 2:3).

And the nations do not just oppose God; they “rage” at him. Their lives spit upon the ground at the mention of his name. Their hearts speak sedition: “Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us” (Psalm 2:3). And they gather, each man’s disgrace torching another’s — “the peoples plot in vain.” Heads of state sit stately, nodding their approval, strategizing — “the rulers take counsel together.” The body fevers mutiny. Samson’s foxes dart into the King’s fields with fire at their tails.

And after they unleash their hate and let slip the dogs of war, they thought the battle decided. They thought his strength broken, his cords snapped, the immortal dead. And then they hear it. Scorn and mirth that strip the forests bare and shake the earth to the foundations. His laughter, the noise to shatter the shield and stop the heart as the hunter realizes he is the hunted.

Sinister Soundtrack

Psalm 2:1–3 depicts how every age wars against God. Every generation of unbelief swarms and swaggers, taking counsel together to escape his rule. Fools pretend to deny him. Most pretend to ignore him. Nations defy his law. Our time flaunts its sexuality and kills its children. Every age seeks to break his reign, and every generation will hear his dreadful laughter.

But the specific fulfillment of this rising against God’s Anointed happened two thousand years ago. This was the D-Day of the world. The Master sent his own beloved Son to a people who had beaten his servants, as if saying, “they will respect my son” (Matthew 21:37). They did no such thing. They took him, cast him out of Jerusalem, and crucified him amid the garbage heap.

Consider the soundtrack of their unholy day, foretold in Psalm 22. Mankind scorns him; the people despise him (verse 6). All who see him mock him, hurl expletives at him, wag their heads at him (verse 7). They taunt, “He trusts in the Lord; let him deliver him; let him rescue him, for he delights in him!” (verse 8). Bulls surround him (verse 12). Lions roar at him (verse 13). His dry tongue sticks to his jaws as dogs bark and growl, as they pierce his hands and feet (verses 15–16). They gloat over him as soldiers cast lots for his garments (verses 17–18). They snarled over their prey, the ageless war decided, so they thought. Until a curious key change occurs (verses 21–31).

His enemies, no doubt, thought themselves very manly, exulting over the anguish of the Master’s Son. With violence they cast his cords from them; with what disdain they threw his shackles back at him. They must have assumed themselves mighty indeed to have subdued this lion like a lamb. They had failed so many times to trap him. Where now his whip, his woes, his questioning whether we have read the Scriptures? Where now his rebukes, his blasphemies, his boastings about his Father and being the Man coming on the clouds. Let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe him; let him now extend his hand to us, and we shall kiss his ring!

What musical sounds in their minds. The victory, they thought, was final. They slew him, slowly, as one might roast the Passover lamb. Oh, how the mighty have fallen — or rather, how that serpent had finally been lifted up. He who stood and beckoned the thirsty to himself now cries, “I thirst.” Is this God’s Anointed King? Well then, we have lifted him to his throne — we, his royal footstools (Psalm 110:1). If you are the Son of David truly, shake off this unproven and wooden armor, come down at these taunts, and sling the stone at Israel’s enemy.

Hunters Hunted

How quickly did their revelries end. But two days they enjoyed cigars. The Lord’s silence was their favorite song. On the third day, though, laughter. Laughter that kills courage. Laughter that bursts champagne bottles. Laughter that replies, “Your havoc only wakes my slumbering wrath.” They cannot discern how death lies dead at his feet, how the sins of his people lie still, alone in the tomb. A voice speaks, through a smile, “As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill” (Psalm 2:6).

The war room is mic’d with a megaphone — omnipotence cares not who overhears. He speaks to someone, but to whom? The riddle does not remain unsolved.

The Lord said to me, “You are my Son;     today I have begotten you.Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage,     and the ends of the earth your possession.You shall break them with a rod of iron     and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.” (Psalm 2:7–9)

And when was his sonship publicly declared? We might think only of his baptism, but overhear Paul’s revelation:

What God promised to the fathers, this he has fulfilled to us their children by raising Jesus, as also it is written in the second Psalm, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you.” (Acts 13:32–33)

But they killed him. Let him reintroduce himself: “I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades” (Revelation 1:17–18). The seed perished and was buried, corruptible, but raised incorruptible, indestructible. He lives. The one they fixed to the cross with iron nails has forged those nails into a rod of iron to dash the nations apart. All authority has been given to him. Who can stand in the day of his terror?

His empty tomb speaks a command to all, including kings and all in high places:

Serve the Lord with fear,     and rejoice with trembling.Kiss the Son,     lest he be angry, and you perish in the way,     for his wrath is quickly kindled.Blessed are all who take refuge in him. (Psalm 2:11–12)

Checkmate

Publish it in Gath, tell it in Los Angeles, speak it forth in Minneapolis, alert the Supreme Court, hail it in China, chant it in Honduras, light beacons in Brazil, declare it in Denmark, announce it in Afghanistan and Argentina: Christ is King. All authority is his; he offers amnesty to the humble who repent, and he will judge the nations and dash the unrepentant with his scepter.

Write it upon the gates of Jerusalem; post it for all to see: “Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified” (Acts 2:36). The Son reigns. “Now in putting everything in subjection to him, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him. But we see him . . .” (Hebrews 2:8–9). We see him by faith. We hear him in his word. We love him by his Spirit. And the time hastens for all to see him face to face — even those who will soon cry out to the rocks and mountains, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?” (Revelation 6:16–17).

Yet today is the day of his kindness, the day he offers terms of shalom. Surrender to his Son who freely gave his life, bore his Father’s almighty wrath and your curse willingly, that by faith in his finished work on the cross you may enjoy his peace and glory and life with him and the Father, forever. He does not ask — he demands you come be forgiven, welcomed, loved.

The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead. (Acts 17:30–31)

But this day of salvation is drawing late. John calls it “the last hour” (1 John 2:18). The time is arriving when he will say, “As for these enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slaughter them before me” (Luke 19:27).

Hail Him While You Can

O man, see the disaster of your rebellion. You have always been Satan’s pawn — “captured by him to do his will” (2 Timothy 2:26) — and never close to checkmate. Come to your senses and escape his snare. Your plots and plans have served his courses. Overhear how the early church prays Psalm 2:

“Why did the Gentiles rage,     and the peoples plot in vain?The kings of the earth set themselves,     and the rulers were gathered together,     against the Lord and against his Anointed” —

for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. (Acts 4:25–28)

Sinner, he laughs at your rebellion, and it is a harrowing laugh. He holds the nations in derision. He has equipped his Son with a rod. You stand outflanked, surrounded, defenseless. Only one safe space exists — not in his mother Mary, not in morality, not in Muhammed, not in your own positive vibes or self-defined spirituality — only in the Son, Jesus Christ, so violently put to death to bring the guilty dead to life. “Blessed are all who take refuge in him.” By faith, kiss this Son, lest he be angry with you, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled.

Are you still raging? Your insurrection causes him no loss of sleep. Your revolt gives him no worry. The loss is yours alone. Know that it will soon be sung to God, in praise, concerning all such rebellion: “The nations raged, but your wrath came” (Revelation 11:18). Celebrate his grace in this day of salvation, receive his kindness while you can, lest you glorify his justice and power in hell. All uprising is futile; sinner, come to Jesus, kiss his ring, bow to his love, and live.

The Prayer of a Hunted Man

Distress discloses who we really are. It wrings us, bleeds us, drags the soul to the surface to account for itself. I am the best me with a happy wife, obedient children, loyal friends, suitable bank account, and (as a pastor) humble sheep. But when the child screams inconsolably (again), when the wife is anxious, when friends and finances blow away, when sheep refuse to be shepherded, then who am I? Isn’t it easiest to “trust in the Lord with all your heart” when you don’t really feel any need to?

The devil thought so. In response to God’s celebrating Job, Satan sneers,

Does Job fear God for no reason? Have you not put a hedge around him and his house and all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face. (Job 1:9–11)

In other words, prosperity props up his righteousness. That twisted spirit is always incredulous about integrity. What happens next will reveal the spirit; the squeeze will spill the juice.

Predators and Pray

David was a man squeezed repeatedly throughout his life — and aren’t we thankful? His psalms pour forth as sweetest wine pressed in adversity. As we (unwillingly) explore affliction and wander through nights of uncertainty, everywhere we go we seem to find the inscription: Here stood David. Travel into the valley of death, into utter despair, into conflicts of soul and with Satan — there he waits to sing to our griefs, name our sorrows, and point us to the light of hope in God. His music comforted the tormented Saul and many Sauls since.

Psalm 27 is another psalm juiced from the winepress. The exact circumstances remain unclear; all we know is that vultures circle overhead; he is being hunted.

When evildoers assail me     to eat up my flesh,my adversaries and foes,     it is they who stumble and fall.

Though an army encamp against me,     my heart shall not fear;though war arise against me,     yet I will be confident. (Psalm 27:2–3)

He knows men wish to murder him. If he pens this on the run from King Saul, his adversaries are mighty indeed. If he writes this later as king, he knows men would step over his carcass to hold his crown. He imagines his opponents, vast and cannibalistic: “when evildoers assail me to eat up my flesh . . .” These men are beasts, omnivorous, arrayed, teeth bared and lurking.

What emerges from the inner man? A defiant faith in God. “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?” (Psalm 27:1). Here is the shepherd boy who stared down the predator of Gath and returned with the head of the foe. And with the foul stench of death’s breath upon his neck, he pens next his life verse. As the black dogs chase, what man comes forth from the depths? A worshiper.

One Thing I Ask

Feel how supernatural this is: as assassins lurk in the corridor, David’s distracting desire, his consuming passion, is to be away with his God. The hounds gather at the base of his tree, yet see him gazing up at higher branches, longing to be nearer the heavens.

One thing have I asked of the Lord,     that will I seek after:that I may dwell in the house of the Lord     all the days of my life,to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord     and to inquire in his temple. (Psalm 27:4)

When fear showed its crooked smile, he longed to gaze upon the beauty of his God. Here we find no atheist in the foxhole, nor even a mere monotheist, but a lover of God whose mind, even in this nightmare, daydreamed about seeing the King in his beauty. As Charles Spurgeon writes, “Under David’s painful circumstances we might have expected him to desire repose, safety, and a thousand other good things, but no, he has set his heart on the pearl, and leaves the rest.”

While his own life teeters in the balance, he teaches us what ours is about. As the Miner sifts him, the sand falls through; the one jewel remains. He longs “to enjoy the constant presence of God,” comments Derek Kidner:

Note the singleness of purpose (one thing) — the best answer to distracting fears (1–3) — and the priorities within that purpose: to behold and to inquire; a preoccupation with God’s Person and his will. It is the essence of worship; indeed of discipleship. (Psalms 1–72, 138)

To dwell with God all the days of his life, to see something — see Someone — “to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord” and to speak with him in his palace — this was everything to him. Life was not to rule, to slay giants, to marry and have children, to amass wealth, to eat, drink, or be merry — the continuance of these was not his one request. Worship was. As evil men swipe at the silver cord, he, like Mary after him, chooses the good portion that cannot be taken from him: to sit at the feet of his Lord.

Most of us will never have people try to kill us. But we can learn the priority of worship from the dark distresses of David. The object at the end of his soul’s longing was a glory to be gazed upon. Traveling back to David’s game of thrones — life hanging in the balance, his picture on the dartboard — we find a man not only after God’s own heart, but after God himself. On the caption to his own wanted poster, he scrawls, David, a man seeking the face of God, was here.

Summons Behind Our Seeking

I am convicted by the singularity of David’s request and marvel at the circumstances from which it arose. When offered one thing, Solomon asked for wisdom; David, like Moses, asked to see God’s face. What am I asking for? As I audit my life, what is the one thing I am seeking after? Is it to see my God’s majesty all the days of my life? Do my desires reach nearly that high?

My tepid heart warms to discover that this seeing that makes eternally happy is not just the man’s desire, but God’s desire for the man. David’s obsession to see God was in obedience to his command. David sings the secret later in the psalm:

You have said, “Seek my face.”My heart says to you,     “Your face, Lord, do I seek.”Hide not your face from me. (Psalm 27:8–9)

Our highest worship never climbs higher than a response. Behind our one request is always his command: “Seek my face.” Christianity is not about us scaling to the gods and invading their heaven, but about God descending to us and giving us his. Which means we do not persuade him to be seen; he persuades us to see. And at what price he makes his argument. When did Jesus intercede most ardently for David’s one request on our behalf? On the eve of his securing it at the cross: “Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world” (John 17:24).

Jesus Christ, David’s son and David’s desire, offers us more than a psalm or sympathy in our darkest moments. He gives himself. As we fumble in despair, he doesn’t just point us to God; he tabernacles among us as God.

“Christianity is not about us scaling to the gods and invading heaven, but about God descending to us and giving us heaven.”

And somehow, he too was hunted. Satan protested of him, “Does he fear God for no reason?” The armies of men arrested him by night, mocked him, flogged him, and crucified him. They did assail him to eat up his flesh. Strong bulls of Jerusalem surrounded him; they opened their mouths wide at him like a ravening lion (Psalm 22:12–13). And who was he then, crushed in the winepress of the Father’s wrath? “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34). Beneath the midnight of God’s wrath, in the valley of the second death, see inscribed upon a tree: The Son of God, the son of David, was here.

And he was there, Christian, so we could be where he is to behold his glory forever.

We Shall See Him

O saint, you will see him soon. How then shall we wait? Make David’s prayer your own so that when you see him you may have confidence before him and not shrink in shame at his coming (1 John 2:28). Imagine that coming. The sight of him will not only bless but beautify; you shall be like him, for you “shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). And we will see him as he is, no longer as he once was in his agony. Let the prince of preachers heat your heart:

We shall see him, not with a reed in his hand, but grasping a golden sceptre. We shall see him, not as mocked and spit upon and insulted, not bone of our bone, in all our agonies, afflictions, and distresses; but we shall see him exalted; no longer Christ the man of sorrows, the acquaintance of grief, but Christ the Man-God, radiant with splendour, effulgent with light, clothed with rainbows, girded with clouds, wrapped in lightnings, crowned with stars, the sun beneath his feet.

O Lord our God, heaven’s Radiance and our Desire, one thing we ask of you and one thing will we seek after: to dwell in your kingdom all the days of our lives, to gaze upon your beauty and to inquire of you in a world remade. When our hearts are now tried and crushed, may what comes out be a song that begs to see more, that pleads to see, finally and forever, your face, unveiled but not unrecognized — your face, a heaven of beauty and the beauty of heaven.

Strangers to Sin

Christian, you don’t belong in this world — how often do you consider that? Do you openly acknowledge it, and make plain through speech, that you seek a homeland (Hebrews 11:13–14)? And does the hope of home, the glory of home, the God who is your home, equip you to abstain from the passions of the flesh that wage war against your soul?

Then it came burning hot into my mind, whatever he said, and however he flattered, when he got me home to his house, he would sell me for a slave. (The Pilgrim’s Progress)
These words from Faithful still expose the sweet talk of the old self. We need the Holy Spirit to bring it hot to mind: whatever our lusts promise, however they compliment, when they get us home, they mean to throw us in a pit and sell us for a slave.
The apostle Peter rings the alarm: “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul” (1 Peter 2:11). For somebody to assault your body is treacherous enough, but here we find an assault on the soul — and that by our own mutinous passions. Peter pleads, Don’t embrace your soul’s murderer; don’t welcome your soul’s foe through the front gates. These are compelling entreaties for anyone who knows what a soul is. One assumes that discovering our flesh with soul-daggers up its sleeves would be enough to motivate any reasonable person to mandate pat downs at the gates. But then again, we are not always reasonable.
Weaponized Hope
The liquor of sin makes us drunk and stupid. Sin crouches at the door, and its desire is for us. How adamant its demands, how loud its knockings, how dear and costly and bloody the necessary resistance — “If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell” (Matthew 5:30).
With such a seductive tyrant, Peter sends another mighty reason to defend the gate, one easy to overlook: “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.” He does not appeal to us as farmers or carpenters or even as soldiers; he implores the church to kill sin based on our identity as pilgrims and outcasts. Refuse the world’s lusts as a people of the Spirit, a people not of this world, a people not yet home. Heaven’s joys will slay earth’s sins.
Has your heavenly hope ever reached its blade down to earth and stabbed your strongest temptations? Peter wants you to wield your heavenly citizenship; he wants your heavenly home and future to fill the skies with swords that everywhere reach down and behead the lusts of the flesh. “Christian,” Peter urges, “this world is not safe for you — its passions deceive, its pleasures enslave, its glories will perish. Our feet are not yet in Zion. The world and all its desires are passing away, sinking like a cannon-torn ship into the abyss. If you allow them, the appetites of the old you will fasten you to the deck.”
But Peter also reminds us that a paradise awaits the faithful: a place you half-expect is too good to be real, with a Person you only half-believe will sit you at his table and serve you after all you’ve done (Luke 12:37). But the grace of our Lord is not like man’s, and he has prepared a place, solely from his good pleasure, for us who receive the kingdom. And he sends his apostle with a message: “Beloved, as sojourners and exiles, ready any minute to be called away to feast at my table, make war against that which makes war against your future with me.”
Moses, an Illustration
Isn’t Moses a vibrant example for us? The author of Hebrews thought so.
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