KNOCKED DOWN, NEVER KNOCKED OUT

In 2 Corinthians 4 Paul deals with the present difficulties he experienced by fulfilling his apostolic calling. He explains how those difficulties do not hinder the work of the gospel, and how they will be overshadowed by the future glory. As God commanded the light to shine on our world, so he has commanded light to shine on us and through us, a life giving light. This light is the "light of the gospel of the glory of Christ. Yet, this transcending glory of God is housed in meagre inadequate vessels; it operates in the rough and tumble of human existence with all its difficulties and limitations. Paul lists his experiences in the flesh - many a time down, but not out. There is his own weak self, "perplexed", and there are the circumstances of life pressing in on him. Yet he is not crushed, "not in despair". The inner substance of his faith maintains him. He is sure the Lord is with him and this gives him strength. Experience has confirmed for Paul the sustaining power of the indwelling Christ; "my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness", 2 Corinthians 12:9.

“Believe in Jesus and all your problems will be wiped away.” A statement like this is an example of success theology. It is based on the false notion that the Christian life is one of constant blessing; that God's intention for our life in this shadow land is joy and happiness. If we find our life a mess, full of trouble and distress, then either we are living in sin and need to confess it, or we are short on faith and need to renew. Ideas like these lead us into cloud cuckoo land. If we end up believing that we should be free from worry, distress, trouble, suffering, and bad times, then we have to pretend we are living the victory life when all about us is crashing down. When we start to think this way, reality becomes distorted.

A glance at the New Testament should leave us a little wary of a health, wealth and happiness theology. Of all people, Jesus was not a success, according to the expectations of his day. At the end of his earthly life he only had his mum, a few women disciples and John, to stand by him at his crucifixion. His ministry was a success in God's eyes only; from a worldly perspective it was a failure. Paul was in no less a situation. From God's perspective, Paul's arrival in Rome is glory indeed. Yet, from any other view, it was an insignificant achievement - he was a prisoner. His life reminds us of our own weakness, a weakness increased through faith in Christ, not decreased. Yet, it also reminds us of the wonder to be found in our limited lives. It reminds us of "treasure in jars of clay".

In 2 Corinthians 11:23-27, he catalogues his experiences: "overworked, scourged, imprisoned and many times face to face with death; five times the terrible 39 lashes, 3 times beaten with rods, once stoned and 3 times shipwrecked, and 24 hours adrift at sea. Constant danger on the road: danger from robbers, danger from rivers, danger from fellow countrymen and danger from foreigners: “I have toiled”, he said “and was used as a slave, I have gone without sleep, hungry and thirsty and suffered from cold and exposure."

The line that best describes Paul's life of adversity comes from the 4th chapter of 2 Corinthians. The J. B. Phillips translation reads: "We are handicapped on all sides, but we are never frustrated; we are puzzled but never in despair; we are persecuted, but we never have to stand it alone; we are knocked down, but we are never knocked out."

We have all been there! For most of us there is seldom a decisive battle in life where the war is won or lost in one engagement. There are many worrisome encounters which seem so trivial, days of deprivation and depression and long periods of discouragement when what we think to be the real battle seems so far away. The truth of the matter is that this is the real battle. In the ebb and flow of life, we finally get out into the deep water where what is happening to us not only lies beyond our strength to change and our knowledge to understand, it lies beyond all human strength and knowledge. Our only hope is that the great God of the universe knows as much and cares as much as Jesus said. There might be times in which we may doubt that. Paul says it well in 2 Corinthians 4:7, as he reflects on the tremendous reservoir of human power and potential: "It is clear," he said, "that the glorious power within must be from God. It is not our own." It is in that faith that we survive adversity creatively.

These verses are, to my mind, among the most encouraging in the Bible, speaking as they do of the consistency of God's loving care from the first day of creation and including this present moment. "The God who said 'Let light shine out of darkness,' is the same God who has shone in our hearts to give us the light of knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." Imagine that the exact same power that brought light to the cosmos at the beginning of time is now offering light to illumine you, is in fact, shining through you as sunlight streams through a window. It is very hard to hold on to dark notions in the face of such a shining thought.

Here is the truth: from dust we came, to dust we will return, and for the time we are on this earth, what we are is somewhat comparable to a piece of pottery. We are useful to be sure, but also subject to chipping and cracking and likely to contain imperfections. Earthen vessels have little reason to boast. The most appropriate attitude for them is humble gratitude for the privilege of serving a function in the eternal scheme of things. You and I are not likely to hear a message like this much of anywhere in our contemporary culture. This is exactly the opposite of the message our culture speaks. Humility is as out of fashion. Intolerance with imperfection is in.

Where did people get the idea that being human is about being perfect, and since when did that notion ever get wrapped up with Christianity? It is destructive to the human spirit and to the human community to believe that we have to be somebody we are not in order to be loved by God and accepted by one another. Mortals, by definition, are limited and imperfect. Only God is perfect in action and infinite in being.

What all of this says to me is that we are going to make it, you and I. There is a big difference between being under attack, which we will be, and being done in, which we will not be, thanks to the grace of God. What this says to me is that if we are true to ourselves and to God, we will likely have a life that has its share of trouble, but our lives and their troubles will not get the best of us. According to Paul, this resilient strength is made available to us by the mysterious power unleashed on the world by Jesus' death, in the pouring out of his blood and in the breaking of his body. "His risen life is being made visible in our mortal flesh." This is the mystery at the heart of the Christian religion, but it is the heart of the matter. Our conviction is that God is at work repairing the world through these means. It is the spiritual reality on which we stake our lives.

No matter how many gifts and abilities we have, our knowledge and insight are limited to our time and place in history. We are all, subject to selfish impulses, riddled with personal peculiarities, easily misled by delusions our own egos construct, as well as by the opinion of others. Some of us think erroneously that we are less worthy than we actually are, and others of us are convinced that we are the bee's knees. In reality, there is something good about the worst of us, and there is something wrong with all of us. I love the definition of a saint I once read. "A saint is someone whose life has not been sufficiently researched." There is not a single living human being who is in such great shape that he or she does not need the grace of Christ to make him or her whole.

Let us be reminded that there are gifts that are beyond words and that right here on earth. We are invited to participate in the "invisible drama" that is the life and death of Christ. The power behind that it all is God, who makes light to shine in the dark places and dares to place treasure in earthen vessels.