Worm’s Eye View

 Worm’s Eye View

I learned in art class about perspective, and the difference between the worm’s eye view vs. the eagle’s eye view. The picture will look much different depending on the chosen perspective.

I’ve been reading a collection of sermons written by Christopher Love of England in the 1600’s. He died in his 30’s, so you can see that I am willing to take counsel from younger men, so long as they are dead. The title of the sermon series (and the book) is The Dejected Soul’s Cure. Its a real pick-me-upper.

But the book is honest and wise, and the author, like Spurgeon two hundred years later, is given to word pictures.

The question being examined is why a person who desires to live a holy life focuses more quickly on his faults than his goodnesses. He views his life more from the perspective of a worm’s eye view than that of the eagle. I would guess that a certain number of you would know what I am talking about. Sin is a constant and obvious problem to those who wish to be holy. Certainly we know that pattern of holiness displayed in descriptions of God’s character and as played out in the life of Christ. But we are also convicted about how far we fall short.

Love says that “God’s people see their sins like Mountains, and their graces like mole-hills.” That is not how God sees us, but it is how we tend to see ourselves. There is no sin so mountainous that God will not forgive, and His grace is sufficient for a complete covering. If Noah’s waters covered the mountains, God’s grace can cover our worst sins (according to our own estimation, which is faulty).

But the battle is hard. Love says “my lusts burn like a flame, but my graces like a glowing coal.” It is a view born in a moment, and we cannot see that God can quickly douse a wildfire, and that He will also nurse along a glowing coal.
There are people in the world capable of writing a great list of all their successes, and have little memory to jot down but a failure or two. Not so with many who pursue godliness. “Grace is as the gleaning of the Vintage; sin is as the full harvest.” You know the difference, don’t you? The gleanings are the few stalks left around the edges and corners of the field. The full harvest is greater by far. That is how it seems for those who live with a hunger for God, and also have a keen sensitivity with regard to sin in their own hearts.

Sunday at our Lord’s Table service we will sing the hymn “Grace Greater than our Sin.” Verse two sings “Sin and despair, like the sea waves cold, Threaten the soul with infinite loss;
Grace that is greater, yes, grace untold, Points to the refuge, the mighty cross.” While the serious but dejected soul says “my sins (seem) at full tide, but my graces (seem) at a low ebb,” the Gospel argues against the dejected soul, telling him that “where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." It is not that you are so much better than you thought yourself to be. No, you were probably quite right about yourself. It is rather that your Savior is so much greater than you have imagined. Verse 3 of “Grace Greater” sings “Dark is the stain that we cannot hide; What can we do to wash it away? Look! There is flowing a crimson tide, Brighter than snow you may be today.”

Great Cry and Little Wool

Great Cry and Little Wool

It won’t surprise you, if you have read recently, that I am dipping from the well once again of C.H. Spurgeon and his John Ploughman’s Pictures. The artwork at the beginning of the present chapter shows a man shearing his animal in order to collect wool. The problem is that he is shearing, not a sheep, but a pig. That explains our title, in that the pig gives “great cry” but “little wool”.

The first application is to our pursuit of pleasure. Listen to the critique: “There is noise enough - laughter and shouting and boasting; but where is the comfort which can warm the heart and give peace to the spirit? Generally there’s plenty of smoke and very little fire in what is called pleasure.” If our entertainment makes us miserable, perhaps we are seeking to gather wool from a pig.

But then one could speak of the entertainment that takes place at church. Is this also an end in itself? Of course, there are different types of churches, and thus different types of entertainment. For some, it might be the band. For others, the preacher or homily. For others, the people with whom they rub shoulders and exchange conversation. It might be the experience of the grand cathedral, or even the joy of watching the children. Each and all of these most likely have less to do with entertainment described in our chapter as “all fizz and bang and done for.” You carry the experience with you as you exit the doors and resume normal life. I pray that it is deeper, touching not only the senses but also the soul. And for the churches seeking to draw crowds as though they were a stadium or coliseum, you may just get what you deserve: great cry and little wool.

Of course, there are other applications as well. Have you ever heard a person laugh loudly, not because of happiness but because they merely wanted people to believe that they were happy? Wouldn’t it be better just to find the true source of happiness and enjoy it rather than pretending? Or perhaps worse, the person who grumbles and complains about the miseries of their life, and, lo and behold, we find their life is not all that bad. Why not focus on what is good instead of bad? Why not be thankful for the blessings? The persons who plays the martyr may soon find a response from others that secretly hopes your martyrdom finds success. Great cry and little wool. It is present in politics and marketing and the workplace and in our own souls.

The Sheep has been sheared and He has given His wool. We don’t have to shear it ourselves. What we must do is to embrace the proper Resource, not a pig, but the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, and find in Him what is good and true and beautiful.

Don’t Cut Off your Nose to Spite your Face

Don’t Cut Off your Nose to Spite your Face

 
Spurgeon, in the voice of John Ploughman, says ”Anger is a short madness. The less we do when we go mad the better for everybody, and the less we go mad the better for ourselves. He is far gone who hurts himself to wreak his vengeance on others. The old saying is, ‘Don’t cut off your head because it aches,’ and other says, ‘Set not your house on fire to spite the moon.’"

This little chapter on Anger in “John Ploughman’s Pictures” says it better than I can, so here are some more quotes:

• “Do nothing when you are out of temper, and then you will have the less to undo.”
• “Let a hasty man’s passion be a warning to you; if he scalds you, take heed that you do not let your own pot boil over.”
• “He who cannot curb his temper carries gunpowder in his bosom, and he is neither safe for himself nor his neighbors.”
• “When passion comes in at the door, what little sense there is indoors flies out of the window.”
• “Anger does a man more hurt than that which made him angry. It opens his mouth, and shuts his eyes, and fires his heart, and drowns his sense, and makes his wisdom folly.”

From whence does anger come? Those who are angry are quick to blame others. “You make me so mad!” But that is not the truth, is it? Anger is our response to the situation, but anger is not a necessary response. A person could just as soon respond with patience, or a desire to see whether one’s own self has contributed to the problem, or with an attitude that you would like to help the person who is in the wrong. Anger does none of those things.

So again, from whence does anger come? Do you remember that Jesus Himself already answered that question? 

Mark 7:20 And He was saying, “That which proceeds out of the man, that is what defiles the man. 21 “For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, 22 deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness. 23 “All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man.” 

You might argue that you do not see “anger” in this 13-fold list, though I might find it in the entries “evil thoughts” and “murders” (since, when one is angry, we often think that we would be better off if the other person were absent). But let’s compare this list, “which proceeds out of the man,” to the “works of the flesh” in Galatians 5:

 Gal. 5:19 Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, 21 envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

 Spurgeon says, “A hot-tempered man would be all the better for a new heart, and right spirit.” That fits the Matthew text well. To accord with the second text, we might say that the angry person needs the Lord. Why? Because merely trying harder not to be angry will never work. We cannot change our own hearts, and we cannot conjure up the Spirit. They are both given by Christ to those who have given up on self-salvation and come to Him for the only real help available.

The Value of a Mirror

 The Value of a Mirror

I have spoken recently of figures of speech, and the Bible is full of them. James talks about a man looking in a mirror, but as soon as he walks away, “he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was” (Jas 1:24). Spurgeon in his John Ploughman’s Pictures tells a similar story. He describes showing a mirror to a blind man so that he can see the soot on his face, which is, of course, fruitless. But he goes on to say, "the man without eyes has the advantage for he is in the dark and he knows it."

We found last Sunday that the man born blind in John 9 could actually see some things much more clearly than those who were fully sighted. He could see that there was something different about Jesus, that He was a prophet and a man come from God. He could see in Jesus an authenticity that led him to belief in Jesus as the Son of Man, something that others simply could not or were not willing to see. Spurgeon goes on to tell of other forces that lead sighted people to blindness.

One such condition is simple unreasonableness or willfulness. Some would call it being mule-headed and stubborn. There is an arrogance to it as well. Spurgeon concludes, “We pity the poor blind; we cannot do so much as that for those who shut their eyes against the light.” I have wondered about Jesus’ figure of speech in the Sermon on the Mount about not casting pearls before swine. I think it might fit here.

“Prejudice shuts up many eyes in total darkness.” Pre-judging means that a person has already made up their mind. Arguments will likely do no good. Spurgeon gives the curious illustration: “when he has said a thing he sticks to it like a cobbler’s wax.” I have to confess that I’m not sure the role of wax in shoe repair, at least back in the 1800’s. More clear is: “one man can lead a horse to the water, but a hundred cannot make him drink.” Or, “he is as stubborn as he is stupid, and to get a new thought into his head you would need to bore a hole into his skull with a centre-bit.” (You can get away saying those things when you quote someone who is dead.)

So what is my excuse of your excuse for failing to heed the mirror of the Word you have heard, the truth you have seen, and yet have not responded with appropriate action? We wouldn’t think of going about with soot on our faces, but then we may go about with soot in our hearts, knowing full well that Jesus said that out of the heart come all kinds of evil things. We wouldn’t fail to respond to warning signs from the car that we are driving, but we ignore the warning signs given by the Spirit and the lack of comfort and assurance with God that go with it. In fact, we can become almost used to it. And so, we pray for one another, as Spurgeon does, in these verses:

A dark and blinded thing is man Yet full of fancied light!
   But all his penetration can Produce no Gospel light.
Though heavenly truth may blaze abroad, He cannot see at all;
   Though Gospel leaders show the road, He still gropes for the wall.
O Lord, Thy holy power display, For Thou the help must find:
   Pour in the light of Gospel day; Illuminate the mind.
Behold! How unconcerned they dwell, Though reft of sight they be;
   They fancy they can see right well, And need no help from Thee.
Speak, and they’ll mourn their blinded eyes, And cry to Thee for light;
   O Lord, do not our prayer despise, But give these blind men light.