while you were sleeping

2 Chronicles 32:20-21
Then Hezekiah the king and Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, prayed because of this and cried to heaven. And the LORD sent an angel, who cut off all the mighty warriors and commanders and officers in the camp of the king of Assyria…

I love, love, love how Anne Kennedy writes of this moment:

The Assyrians are the most powerful army in the world. Their weapons are strong, their soldiers resolute. They have come prepared to win. The people on the wall know they haven’t a hope.

But their king prays. Their king, in wisdom, cries out to God. And then, apparently, he goes to sleep. So everyone else must lie down and try to do likewise.

When they rise up, they strain their eyes over the mist burning off in the sweltering morning sun; they look out and see that not a single enemy soldier remains alive. Every single one is dead.

Anne Kennedy, Nailed It, Day 102

Our King is praying too. Whatever situation we face making us worry on the wall, know this: enthroned within the eternal kingdom King Jesus is praying for us. And all is well.

The night is long and dark and fearsome, but when the morning mist is burned away by the unshrouded glory of the Son, everywhere we look is evidence of victory. Carcasses litter the valley floor, and we are saved.

Today I was reading Mark’s account of the crucifixion. As the Savior hung on the cross, and the people jeered, there were better than 72,000 angels with hands on swords drawn and ready to strike at Messiah’s command.

Our story tells of one angel. Probably a biggie to be sure, nonetheless this one angel wiped out 185,000 Assyrians, clear-cutting them from the landscape! Just imagine what 72,000-plus could do. I shudder to think.

Whatever is weighing on you, fear not. Not a single Assyrian will get past your Father’s security detail. There’s at least one angel he’s dispatched whose carrying a work order with your name on it, and we know what one angel can do.

Spurgeon, as only Spurgeon can tell it:

To what dignity are the chosen elevated when the brilliant courtiers of heaven become their willing servitors! Into what communion are we raised since we have intercourse with spotless celestials!

How well are we defended since all the twenty-thousand chariots of God are armed for our deliverance! To whom do we owe all this?

Let the Lord Jesus Christ be forever endeared to us, for through Him we are made to sit in heavenly places far above principalities and powers. He it is whose camp is round about them that fear Him; He is the true Michael whose foot is upon the dragon. All hail, Jesus! thou Angel of Jehovah’s presence…

Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Morning Reading, Oct. 3

You are his dwelling place and the Lord of the angel-armies defends what is his. In another place related to this biblical scene, God says he will protect his city against the Assyrians in such a way the “feeblest will become like David” who feared no man, no challenge, no threat, no intimidation.

David, who had his Mighty Men acting as his human shield, going before and behind him, an omnidirectional wall of security, was no more protected than we are.

Finally, exhausted from prayer and cries for mercy and justice, the king and his prophet Isaiah felt they could go to bed. While they were sleeping, and the city with them, the death angel of the Lord passed over the Assyrians wherever they were camped, and made them history.

As bad as things might be for you tonight, if Assyrians are keeping you awake, know that he who is with you is greater than the forces organized against you, and tomorrow is a brand new day.

Selah, beloved.

bad news to make your day

Photo by Sandy Mitchell, Gatlinburg, TN

The old joke goes like this: a doctor called in his patient following some tests and told him, “I’ve got some good news and I’ve got some bad news; which do you want to hear first?“ His patient says, “Give me the good news first, doc.” Gravely, the doctor tells him, “You only have 24 hours to live.“ “Good grief, doc,” his patient replies. “That’s the good news? What’s the bad news?” The doctor leans in, lowers his glasses, and tells him, “I should have told you yesterday.”

<<<Jesus Juke alert>>>

Jesus, the Great Physician, leans in and tells the church: “I’ve got bad news. The world hates you. But here’s the good news: I have overcome the world.”

Yes, the world hates you. But you are eternally, extravagantly, wholly loved by God. Just know what you are up against when you go out your door today. And know who goes with you.

What prompted this post is the thought I had as I was waking up this morning: except for the restraining power of Christ, the world system would just as soon you not be part of it. The world wants you dead.

George Yancey, professor of sociology at North Texas University and prodigious Christian author, was asked on a recent podcast:

What are some of the things being said about Christians on the college campus today?

He replied,

  • “Churches and houses of religion should be designated as nuclear test zones.”
  • “Kill them all, let their god sort them out.”
  • “The only good Christian is a dead Christian.”
  • “A torturous death would be too good for them.”
  • “I’d be a bit giddy, certainly grateful, if everyone who saw himself or herself in that category were snatched permanently from our societal peripheries, whether by holocaust or rapture or plague.”
  • “I am only too well aware of their horrific attitudes and beliefs—and those are enough to make me see them as subhuman.”

Yancey has produced extensive surveys which have uncovered a rather alarming statistic: 32% of all Americans have an unfavorable opinion toward conservative Christians. That’s nearly 1 out of 3 people, my dudes.

Consider the street you live on or the apartment you live in. Every third residence is occupied by someone who doesn’t like you…for no other reason than your commitment to Christ.

Mind you, most wouldn’t think of acting on their dislike with violence, or repeat the things you read above (out loud), but the fact remains they see you as a germ in society and would rather you didn’t come near.

This is why belonging to a faith community is so imperative. One of the great blessings of gathering with other saints embodies the truth that you are not alone. You may be persona non grata at work or relegated to the uncool table in your high school, but there’s a place for you at the table of grace.

Yancey, again:

We must work together to protect each other from discrimination. We no longer live in a society generally supportive of Christians. We’re going to have to support each other. An important way to do that is to develop our Christian communities. For example, support of Christian-owned businesses may be vital to help minimize the economic costs of anti-Christian discrimination. Working together to socialize our children is vital for allowing us to pass down our faith in a post-Christian culture. We can’t count on support from the larger society.

The last book of the Bible is a book about Jesus. It’s not a book about Babylon or the Beast or the number of the Beast, or Armageddon, and it’s not even about us. These things are included, but the overarching plot is the Person of Jesus Christ.

As the world shows who it really is more and more, cling to Jesus. Trust in Jesus. Come out of Babylon and run to him. Meet with him daily. Walk in his steps. Gather with Jesus people. Listen to Jesus music. Look to Jesus.

May your life be a meditation on the prayer of Patrick in 5th c. Ireland:

Christ with me,

Christ before me,

Christ behind me,

Christ in me,

Christ beneath me,

Christ above me,

Christ on my right,

Christ on my left,

Christ when I lie down,

Christ when I sit down,

Christ when I arise,

Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me,

Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me,

Christ in every eye that sees me,

Christ in every ear that hears me.

Tomorrow morning, get up, get dressed, and go out your door knowing this: haters gonna hate but the One who is greater gonna get you home.

Selah, beloved.

two words that shape my faith

I’m not a Muslim because of two words. I have friends who follow the teachings of Mohammed regarding Allah, and I love them, but could never take their path.

These two words safeguard me from turning to agnosticism or atheism. I can’t fall away from the faith because of the way these two words are put together. I can admire some of the kinder gentler tenets and proverbs of various eastern religions but would rue the day before entrusting my eternal destiny to them.

Here they are, in all their glory. Sit before them and be amazed:

Jesus wept.

Call me an old softie, but I quite like a deity who feels what I feel. Isaiah promised a Messiah who “suffers when we suffer” (Isa 63:9). Paul didn’t say God merely pities us, he said the Father spills over with mercy and embraces us with smothering comfort (2 Cor 1:3).


Jesus is no remote deity, watching suffering from a safe distance. He is the God who inhabits our suffering.

– Rebecca McLaughlin


John, specifically, zeros in on the “I AM” episodes of Jesus in his gospel. When you see “I AM” in scripture your mind probably goes to burning bushes and almightiness, shoes-off zone, time’s-up for oppressive regimes, and the like. You envision an all-caps “LORD” not the lower case kind.

John’s gospel shows us the I AM-ness of the Almighty also allows space for himself to weep. Anger from deity we get, but sorrow? Tears?

Jesus is called “Man of Sorrows” in Isaiah and our Lord is not the least bit embarrassed by that designation. The powerful “I AM” is moved to tears and that moves me. As the Holy Spirit moved John along to pen the words to his gospel, he let the aged apostle know he wanted this most vulnerable part of Christ’s earthly ministry published for all the see.

“Jesus wept.”

First he snorted like a Roman warhorse, then he sniffled and sobbed. A lot of folk prefer their Messiah to be all thunder and lightning and calling down of fire. Others can only stomach a gentle and lowly Savior.

With Jesus you get both, but mostly the Jesus you get in the gospels is the One who enters into our pain.

There are two times in the gospels we find Jesus weeping. Here, and in Luke.

Jesus doesn’t just “feel your pain.” He also hates it. He hates what it does to you. He sees the long game, that every eye will be dried one day and there will be no more pain, but he also meets us in our most painful moments with mercy and justice in the here and now.

In “The Lion King” when Simba returns after a long time away and sees what Scar has done to the kingdom, plunging it into death and despair, there is an alarming look of righteous anger that clouds his countenance.

That’s what’s going on just before the dam inside Jesus of Nazareth breaks.

Weeping Jesus sees the enemy of this world wreaking havoc on his creation, disturbing the order. The same emotion Jesus felt when he saw the court of the Gentiles being barred and barricaded by hucksters, charlatans and snake oil salesmen, preventing the people from gathering to worship, is the emotion of this anger he felt outside Bethany. If he had had a whip in his hands he would’ve been swinging it at the enemy.

I’ll follow a God like that anywhere and all the way into eternity.

Selah, beloved.