Climate and spiritual life - Chambers, Oswald
November 26, 1916, Zeitoun , Sunday morning Service
And he awoke, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, peace, be still. And the wind ceased and there was a great calm. Mark 4:39 (RV )
This verse is a picture of our own spiritual life; there are occasions, such as this war, when it looks as if god were asleep, as if all our prayers were of no use; there are breakers ahead and it looks like destruction. But when he awakes in us, he calms the storm and rebukes our unbelief.
The life of our lord exhibits the influence of character on climate. It is easy to make this absurd, but looked at from the attitude of the spirit of god you find there is an amazing connection between the storm and distresses and wild confusion of the earth just now and the waywardness and wrong of man; when the waywardness of man ceases and the sons of god are manifested, then the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of god.
The bible reveals that there is a close connection between character and climate. Ruskin is almost the only writer who recognises it, and in this respect he is akin to the great prophets. The reason for the con- nection is fundamental. According to the bible revelation, god created man a mixture of dust and deity, and when the redemption comes to its full scope, the whole earth is going to partake in it. Because mans body and his earthly setting have been affected by sin, we are apt to think that being made of the dust of the ground is his shame; the bible implies that it is his chief glory, because it is in that body that the son of god was manifested.
1. The way of god and the dawn
And in the morning, a great while before day, he rose up and went out, and departed into a desert place, and there prayed. (mark 1:35 rv)
Specific times and places and communion with god go together. It is by no haphazard chance that in every age men have risen early to pray. The first thing that marks decline in spiritual life is our relationship to the early morning. It is significant that before nations have been gripped by civilisation they always began their day early. (an American on visiting England after a lapse of years made this significant remark one thing that strikes me is the difference in the time people get up; twenty years ago everybody used to be astir early, but now i notice they rise much later. ) when we are in touch with the earnestness of things, we begin soon.
(a) the devotion of our lord
And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to god. And when it was day, he called unto him his disciples. (Luke 6:1213)
it is not a haphazard thing, but in the constitution of god, that there are certain times of the day when it not only seems easier, but it is easier, to meet god. If you have ever prayed in the dawn you will ask your- self why you were so foolish as not to do it always: it is difficult to get into communion with god in the midst of the hurlyburly of the day. George mac- donald said that if he did not open wide the door of his mind to god in the early morning he worked on the finite all the rest of the day stand on the finite, act upon the wrong. It is not sentiment but an implicit reality that the conditions of dawn and communion with god go together. When the day of god appears there will be no night, always dawn and day. There is nothing of the nature of strain in gods day, it is all free and beautiful and fine. And there shall be night no more (rv ).
(b) the difference of administration
Now late on the sabbath day, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary magdalene. . . . (Matthew 28:1 rv )
Mary Magdalene thought that this dawn would be like an ordinary one, but it was the dawn of the great- est day, not only for Mary Magdalene but for the whole world. Our lord told her that there would
Be a different administration till now you have known me as god manifest in the flesh, now it is to be a knowledge after the spirit; i will be in you, an indwelling presence. Penetration into truth comes when we choose the times god has chosen for us. All through the old testament the first is dedicated to god; whenever that was neglected the prophets rebuked the people (e. G. , Malachi 3:89). We all know when we are at our best intellectually, and if instead of giving that time to god we give it to our own development, we not only rob god, but rob our- selves of the possibility of his life thriving in us. We heard it said that we shall suffer if we do not pray; i question it. What will suffer if we do not pray is the life of god in us; but when we do pray and devote the dawns to god his nature in us develops, there is less self-realisation and more Christ-realisation.
(c) the direction of our lord
but when day was now breaking, Jesus stood on the beach. . . . And he said unto them, cast the net on the right side of the boat, and ye shall find. ( john 21:4, 6 RV )
We have special times and days when we expect god to do things, but he usually does them when we don’t expect it, e. G. , when we are coming back in the early morning from fishing, it is then that god gives us direction. It is not simply that it is easier to get direction in the early morning, it is a profound revelation that that is the time when direction comes.
2. The wilderness of temptation the devil and the divine
and Jesus, full of the holy spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the spirit in the wilderness during forty days, being tempted of the devil. (luke 4:12 rv )
When artists or poets of earlier days wanted to depict a particular type of man they painted or described in words the climatic and geographical setting agreeing with that type. For instance, if they wanted to portray a man in an angry temper, they put in the scenery of a thunderstorm. Dante does it in the inferno 14 and Milton in paradise lost.15 the outward is the symbol of the inner, according to the bible: there is a closer connection between them than we imagine. When our supreme temptation comes, the setting we are in, whether it is a city or the actual desert, brings us into contact with the foundation of things as god made them. According to genesis, the basis of physical material life is chaos, and the basis of personal moral life, wrath. If i live in harmony with god, chaos becomes cosmos to me, and the wrath of god becomes the love of god. If i get out of touch with god i get into hell, physically and morally; when i live in relationship to god by the inner witness of the spirit, heaven above is brighter blue, earth around a sweeter green. . . .
(a) the desertion of a disciple
and Satan entered into Judas who was called Iscariot, being of the number of the twelve. (Luke 22:3 RV )
There was the wilderness of temptation in the lives of the disciples; in one disciple the devil conquered absolutely and Judas became what Jesus called him, the son of perdition. The popular idea of temptation is that it is towards evil, meaning that we can see it to be evil by our common sense, but temptation is always a short cut to good, the mind is perplexed i wonder if this is the way of god? If i yield to the temptation the devil gets his way, as he did with Judas in the last extreme.
(b) the desperation of a disciple
and the lord turned, and looked upon peter. . . . And he went out, and wept bitterly. (Luke 22:6162 rv)
The devil tried to get peter where he got Judas, but he did not succeed; Satan did not enter into peter; peter got the length of denying Jesus, but in his wilderness of temptation he struck the divine, Judas struck the devil; consequently peter experienced a desperation producing tears, and those tears were the most amazing bitterness in his life. Peter with his impulsive heart would feel he could never for- give himself, he would have spent the rest of his days mourning, but Jesus had told him beforehand, and do thou, when once thou hast turned again, establish thy brethren (rv ).
(c) the defeat of the devil
then the devil leaveth him. (Matthew 4:11)
Jesus Christ met the devil in the wilderness and defeated him. When you go through a time of trial, a wilderness of temptation in heart or mind or spirit, you feel inclined to get away out into somewhere like the desert. The reason for that is not haphazard, but because in the primal constitution of god man is connected with the dust of the earth: he is related to the elemental condition of things all through. When the sons of god are manifested the desolate place will alter at once. The desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose.
3. The wall of god and the darkness on the deep
And it was now dark and Jesus had not yet come to them. And the sea was rising by reason of a great wind that blew. ( john 6:1718 rv)
This happens in our own lives we are on the deep, it is dark, and Jesus is not there. It is a description of every elemental experience, such as bereavement or heartbreak, or any of the big things that beset human life, there is real speechless terror and misgiving. You may have had communion with god in the dawn, you may have continued with Jesus in temptation, but this thing makes you feel helpless there is no way out. In times of deep sorrow it is not the people who tell you why you are suffering who are of any use; the people who help you are those who give expression to your state of mind, often they do not speak at all, they are like nature. Nature is never heartless to the one who is bereaved, but it takes a revelation to make us know this.
(a) at the request of Jesus
and he said unto them, let us go over unto the other side of the lake. And they launched forth. (Luke 8:22).
If you obey Jesus you will have a life of joy and delight. Well, it is not true. Jesus said to the discipleslet us go to the other side of the lake, and they were plunged into the biggest storm they had ever known. You say, if i had not obeyed Jesus i should not have got into this complication. Exactly. The problems in our walk with god are to be accounted for along this line, and the temptation is to say, god could never have told me to go there, if he had done so this would not have happened. We discover then whether we are going to trust gods integrity or listen to our own expressed scepticism. Scepticism of the tongue is only transitional; real scepticism is wrung out from the man who knows he did not get where he is on his own account i was not seeking my own, i came deliberately because i believe Jesus told me to, and now there is the dark- ness and the deep and the desolation.
(b) the revelation of Jesus
but Simon peter, when he saw it, fell down at Jesus knees, saying, depart from me; for i am a sinful man, o lord. (Luke 5:8 rv )
The revelation of Jesus comes in the way he walks on our deeps; he tells us to do something which in the light of our own discernment sounds ridiculous, but immediately we do it, we experience the judgement of Jesus. The judgement is not in what he says, it is himself. Depart from me, . . . O lord, said peter, but that was the last thing peter wanted him to do, it was the impulsive expression of his state of mind.
(c) at the rebuke of Jesus
and he arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, peace, be still. . . . And he said unto them, why are ye so fearful? How is it that ye have no faith? (mark 4:3940)
Our lord rebuked the disciples for fearing when apparently they had good reason for being alarmed. The problem is if Jesus christ is only the carpenter of Nazareth, then the disciples were foolish to put him at the tiller; but if he is the son of god, what are they alarmed about? If Jesus christ is god, where is my trust in him? If he is not god, why am i so foolish as to pretend to worship him? And they feared exceedingly, and said one to another, what manner of man is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him? (mark 4:41). Just where Jesus does not seem to be, when it looks as if the waves would over- whelm them, the son of god comes walking on the top of those very billows. As we go on in our spiri- tual life we get into similar conditions, they are not symbolic, but the actual conditions of our lives. God engineers us out of our sequestered places and brings us into elemental conditions, and we get a taste of what the world is like because of the disobedience of man. We realise then that our hold on god has been a civilised hold, we have not really believed in him at all. When we get out on to the deep and the darkness we realise what a wonderful thing the psalmist says therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed. . . . But it takes some confidence in god to say that when everything you trust in has gone.
4. The word of god and elemental
destruction (Matthew 7:2427)
Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, i will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not; for it was founded upon a rock. . . . (Matthew 7:24)
Our lord reveals that the elemental destructions cannot touch us, neither death nor hell, nor all the forces of man and the devil put together, can prevail against the word of god if once we build on that; but if we build on our own discernment, then when the elemental destructions come, not only do we go, but our foundations go too. Our foundations must be rooted in god, then when the upheavals come we do not need to be afraid.
(a) the cosmic power
of discernment (mark 13:2427)
And then shall they see the son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory. (mark 13:26)
The cosmic powers belong to god, and the great changes that will take place when he establishes his kingdom will reveal that the son of man and the cos- mic powers are identified, the meek . . . Shall inherit the earth, not the world; the world is not gods; the world is the name given to the system of things men have placed on gods earth, and the bible foretells the time when these shall pass away; they are going into the crucible just now. Poets talk about nature being the garment of god, and it will be true literally. We look for god in little ways, and he is there in all the terrific powers of nature. We shall discern him in the clouds, i. E. , the great elemental powers, when the heavens shall pass away . . . And the elements shall melt with fervent heat. And there will be new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.
(b) the conscious person and divinity
and he was transfigured before them. And his raiment became shining, exceeding white as snow. (mark 9:23)
Our lord emptied himself of his glory when he became incarnate, and here on the mount the glory which he had with the father before the world was suddenly burst through; the material part of him was shot through with glory, that is, god and matter became one. That is what would have happened to the human race if Adam had not sinned, there would have been no death, but transfiguration. The counterpart of the transfiguration is not the resurrection, but the ascension.
(c) the comprehensive presence and direction
go ye therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, . . . And lo, i am with you alway. (Matthew 28:1920 rv)
Jesus Christ teaches us to build our confidence in the abiding reality of himself in the midst of everything. If a man puts his confidence in the things which must go, imagine his incomprehensible perplexity when they do go. No wonder Jesus said mens hearts failing them for fear. These words describe the time we are in now. Our true life is not in the things which are passing, and if we build ourselves on god and his word, when they go, the marvel is that we are not scared. The thing to examine spiritually is, am i connected with Jesus christ personally? If i have only a form of belief or a creed, all that may go when the elemental trouble comes and i shall have nothing to cling to, but if i build my house on the words of Jesus and do them, then no matter what happens i shall find i am founded upon the rock.