{"id":1878,"date":"2022-08-11T08:04:51","date_gmt":"2022-08-11T12:04:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=1878"},"modified":"2022-08-11T08:05:44","modified_gmt":"2022-08-11T12:05:44","slug":"worth-fighting-for","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/11\/worth-fighting-for\/","title":{"rendered":"Worth Fighting For"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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(c) New Line Cinema<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n


Throughout the month of August, we\u2019re taking a close look at 23 verses of the New Testament.  They comprise Ephesians chapter one, which paints one of the Bible\u2019s most comprehensive pictures of what it means for ordinary people to be \u201cin Christ.\u201d  <\/em>
 
How can we know God\u2019s will? 
 
That\u2019s one of life\u2019s most perplexing questions.  And one of the most important, too. 
 
Paul alludes to its centrality in verse nine: \u201cHe made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ.\u201d<\/strong><\/em>

\u201cGod\u2019s will\u201d has become a kind of catch-all term for at least four different ways of looking at reality.

First, theologians speak of God\u2019s Original Will.  <\/strong>That\u2019s a way of describing what God always wanted this world to be.<\/em>  According to God\u2019s original will, things like heartbreak, betrayal, genocide, and despair would never have been part of the human experience.  Ancient Hebrew poets and prophets proclaimed that this is now a fallen world \u2013 fractured in all respects because human beings have abused God\u2019s precious gift of freedom.  In other words, astonishingly, God\u2019s original will has been subverted by our <\/em>will. 
 
Therefore we must pay close attention, secondly, to God\u2019s Prescriptive Will<\/strong>, which is an expression of God\u2019s stated intentions for men and women who live in this fallen world.
 
God\u2019s prescriptive will is closely aligned to everyday issues of right and wrong.  For instance, is it God\u2019s will that I add phony academic honors to my resume, lie to my family about what I was doing last weekend, or steal cash from someone\u2019s wallet?  We can answer those questions with confidence:  No<\/em>.  The consequences of such behavior generate experiences of suffering which we can avoid by choosing to be honest.
 
Our third category is what theologians call God\u2019s Ultimate Will.  <\/strong>Followers of Jesus believe that certain things are going to happen, and there\u2019s no way they are not <\/em>going to happen.  It is God\u2019s ultimate will that justice shall be done.  Wrong shall be made right.  The first shall be last, and the last shall be first.  The world and all of its pain shall be healed. 
 
So what does Paul mean by the \u201cmystery of his will\u201d?  In Bible times, a \u201cmystery\u201d had nothing to do with Agatha Christie whodunits.  It\u2019s often equated with \u201can open secret\u201d \u2013 something that was hidden for generations, but which has now been brought into the light.  Paul appears to be saying that it was always God\u2019s intention to heal this broken world through Jesus.  That news has finally gone public, and it\u2019s just a matter of time before the whole world hears the message.
 
To put it another way:  God\u2019s original will has not been lost.  It will ultimately <\/em>be fulfilled.  And everything God originally designed for this world will be on display in the new heavens and new earth.
 
So where does that leave us in the meantime? 

Every day we live within the fourth reality, known as God\u2019s Permissive Will<\/strong>.  On our way to the world\u2019s deep healing, God permits <\/em>countless things that are clearly at odds with his stated will \u2013 whether original, prescriptive, or ultimate.  Why does God allow so much pain – especially the kind of suffering that seems to have nothing to do with the choices we make?  This is where our convictions concerning God\u2019s goodness and God\u2019s power may be severely tested. 
 
How can we ever say that sexual abuse, cataclysmic earthquakes, the death of a child, or mass shootings are \u201cGod\u2019s will\u201d?  How can God bear<\/em> such things?
 
Pat answers will never do. 
 
Therefore Christians point to history\u2019s most unexpected moment:  God did <\/em>bear such things.  On the cross.  The worst thing that could ever have happened to Jesus of Nazareth \u2013 the violence that ended his life \u2013 was simultaneously the best thing that could ever have happened to us.
 
In the midst of our own pain and suffering, there\u2019s always more than meets the eye.  God is at work.  Even when we can\u2019t imagine how. 
 
But if we keep our eyes on him \u2013 eyes that are sometimes filled with tears \u2013 we will one day make out the future that he has always prepared for us.
 
Such thoughts undergird The Lord of the Rings<\/em>, J.R.R. Tolkien\u2019s epic trilogy of good, evil, suffering, and redemption.  Tolkien was a faithful Catholic.  Biblical theology permeates his writing.  Some of the humblest creatures in his tale \u2013 hobbits \u2013 are called to perform the most difficult task.  Samwise Gamgee, or Sam, must accompany his friend Frodo to carry the Ring of Power to its demise in a churning volcano.
 
Along the way they endure incredible suffering.  It seems certain they will perish in the attempt to do what is right.
 
In The Two Towers<\/em>, the second of the three films based on Tolkien\u2019s books, Frodo has reached the end of his endurance: \u201cI can\u2019t do this, Sam.\u201d  Sam responds with the most moving statement in the entire Lord of the Rings <\/em>saga:
 
\u201cI know.  It\u2019s all wrong.  By rights we shouldn\u2019t even be here.  But we are.  It\u2019s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo.  The ones that really mattered.  Full of darkness and danger, they were.  And sometimes you didn\u2019t want to know the end.  Because how could the end be happy?  How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? 
 
\u201cBut in the end, it\u2019s only a passing thing, this shadow.  Even darkness must pass.  A new day will come.  And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer.  Those were the stories that stayed with you.  That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why.
 
\u201cBut I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand.  I know now.  Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn\u2019t.  They kept going.  Because they were holding on to something.\u201d  Frodo asks, \u201cWhat are we holding onto, Sam?\u201d  Sam responds, \u201cThat there\u2019s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo.  And it\u2019s worth fighting for.\u201d
 
Check out the stirring way<\/a> director Peter Jackson staged this conversation in the film.  
 
Apart from a Story that gives meaning to our existence \u2013 one that assures us that God\u2019s ultimate will is being done \u2013 our present circumstances can seem unbearable.
 
Scripture tells a Story \u2013 the greatest of all the great stories, as Sam might put it \u2013 in which the darkness will pass.  It will be only a passing thing.  A shadow.  And a new day will come.
 
Here\u2019s how the Story ends: \u201cThen I saw a new heaven and a new earth\u2026 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, \u2018Look!  God\u2019s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them.  They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.  He will wipe every tear from their eyes.  There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away\u2019\u201d (Revelation 21:1,3,4). 
 
Between now and the finale of God\u2019s incredible Story, what are we supposed to be doing?
 
Our call is to hold on, even when we have chances to turn back.
 
Because there\u2019s some good in this world. 
 
And it\u2019s worth fighting for.

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Throughout the month of August, we\u2019re taking a close look at 23 verses of the New Testament.  They comprise Ephesians chapter one, which paints one of the Bible\u2019s most comprehensive pictures of what it means for ordinary people to be \u201cin Christ.\u201d   How can we know God\u2019s will?  That\u2019s one of life\u2019s most perplexing questions.  And one of the most important, too.  Paul… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1879,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[480,112],"class_list":["post-1878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-ephesians","tag-suffering"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1878"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1878\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1881,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1878\/revisions\/1881"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1879"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}