The Power of God
THE SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT
Last Sunday, the old testament lesson from Isaiah 58 gave us an example of unacceptable fasting and prayer that accomplishes absolutely nothing of the Kingdom... the only thing it produced was a rebuke from God, who then told them what an acceptable fast is. The acceptable fast is always evidenced by the external fruit of inward conversion: shedding tears of repentance over sins; increased desire for God and Him alone; caring sacrificially for the poor, the naked, the hungry, and the needy. This is an acceptable fast.
Today, King Solomon's prayer teaches that the world's external challenges and the inward failings from our weak and sinful natures are only overcome by God's power. The ark of the covenant has just been brought into the holiest part of the Temple. The glory cloud of God has filled His Temple. And, with all of Israel assembled before him, Solomon prays,
"If there be in the land famine if there be pestilence, blasting, mildew, locust, or if there be caterpillar if their enemy besieges them in the land of their cities; whatsoever plague, whatsoever sickness there be; What prayer and supplication soever be made by any man, or by all thy people Israel, which shall know every man the plague of his own heart, and spread forth his hands toward this house: Then hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place, and forgive, and do, and give to every man according to his ways, whose heart thou knowest; (for thou, even thou only, knowest the hearts of all the children of men;) That they may fear thee all the days that they live in the land which thou gavest unto our fathers" (1 Kings 8:37-40).
In humility, he beseeches The Lord God to wield divine power in times of calamity. To save them in times of plague, famine, whatever sickness there may be, and from the hand of their enemies. More importantly, he prays for God to wield his power within their hearts: to hear from heaven and forgive them for their sins. You see, Solomon is very clear about where true power resides not in men but in the right hand of Almighty God. As a child-king, he had once asked God to increase his wisdom, but now, he doesn't ask for more personal power. Rather, he wisely acknowledges where true power resides. His is an acceptable prayer because its intentions are for the right thing: for God to wield His power.
People desire power. And power is a force that needs an object: to have power, a person has to have it over something or someone. This is why power appeals so strongly to our base nature: to control things, people, circumstances and conform them into the reality of our own making: the more power, the more influence. The more influence, the more others conform to our desires. But I would like to propose an equally strong motivation for why we desire power. Yes, we desire power to control… but not necessarily to control others… what we are truly looking to control is ourselves. The desire for power is a desire for self-rule, for complete and unquestioned autonomy.
Think of the Garden of Eden. The serpent put forth a proposition to the woman that she simply could not resist (and neither could her husband), And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die; for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof [of the tree of knowledge], then you eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. You will be as gods, with all their knowledge and power. You will be a god unto yourself.
Scripture testifies to that fateful choice made by our first parents: Eve took the fruit thereof and did eat and also gave unto her husband with her, and he did eat. At a minimum, Adam and Eve desired equality with God; perhaps, they even desired to rule as God (humanity's history certainly presents a strong case!) The first 'power struggle' in recorded history. The result: autonomy… a deadly autonomy. They were separated from God. They were separated from each other, from the animals, and from the creation itself. The man alone. The woman alone. Naked in the world, vulnerable to the dangers of external threats, and inwardly suffering from guilt and shame.
We could almost sum up the human experience with these two words: power struggle. Fallen man is born at enmity with God and thwarts his rule; his anthem is that of the 19th-century poet, William Ernest Henley, who penned these famous words, "It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul." I am the captain of my soul. Unfortunately, these words can also become the anthem by which we try to live out the Christian life: autonomous, independent, a law unto ourselves.
This drift into autonomy, the movement away from God to self, is often accompanied by an acute case of delirium brought upon us by the chief of all vices: pride. Blinded by pride, we become convinced that our power is all-sufficient… sufficient to live in this fallen world and not merely live but thrive in obedience to God. Pride says we can love God with our whole selves, we can love others, walk in righteousness and holiness, we can fend off the assaults of the Devil, his temptations, and lies: we can do all this apart from the power and protection of God. We fool ourselves into thinking, "I can do this!"; rejecting the word of the Lord given to the prophet Zechariah, you will not succeed by might, nor by your power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts.
Beloved, here is the truth: we simply do not innately possess the power necessary to protect our bodies and souls from the ravages of temptation and sin. As we revel in self-reliance and autonomy (and I'm speaking of the Christian), we are as vulnerable as Eve and susceptible as Adam. The fool says in his heart, there is no God. He also is a fool who naively disregards our adversary's reality, the Devil, who desires to destroy us. In Martin Luther's words, we dwell in a fallen world, where the prince is an evil spirit and has the hearts of men in his power, doing what he will.
We simply do not have any power within ourselves to help ourselves. This is what we just admitted to God and to one another a few minutes ago in praying the Collect appointed for this 2nd Sunday in Lent. Turn with me there (191, BCP), ALMIGHTY God, who seest that we have no power of ourselves to help ourselves… Sobering. And to varying degrees, if we're honest, it's devastating! We have no power to help ourselves??? No. We do not. We have no power of our own to fend off the assaults of the Devil. We have no power to "keep ourselves unharmed both outwardly in our bodies and inwardly in our souls."
Left to our own strength, we will be overrun by any external adversities and will ultimately succumb to "evil thoughts that assault and hurt" the soul. In a one-on-one power struggle with the Devil… friends, we lose. And this is why we plead, by prayer and supplication, for God to exert his mighty power and defend us from all adversities which may happen to the body and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul.
We are utterly incapable of fending off the assaults of the world, the flesh, and the Devil and therefore desperately need God to see and protect us. Apart from the power and protection of Christ, we shall not prevail in the spiritual battle for the soul. Like the Canaanite woman from today's Gospel who desperately pleaded with Jesus, not to partake of the children's bread, but begged for the crumbs on the table, let us, with great humility, submit ourselves, our souls and bodies, under the mighty protection of Christ, who himself was tempted in the wilderness, and yet came out of His temptation without sin.
As today's epistle reminds us, "we have received how we ought to walk and to please God," and only He can help us overcome the evil one. Our hope is not in our own strength but in the power of Christ. Therefore, in the example of Solomon, let us pray for God to "keep us both outwardly in our bodies, and inwardly in our souls; that we may be defended from all adversities which may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul." Beloved, we have been given the faith and power to seek God's help. But we shall only overcome the world, the flesh, and the Devil by the mighty power of God. Amen+
