[Sanballat] flew into a rage and mocked the Jews… Then I prayed, "Hear us, O our God, for we are being mocked…" (Nehemiah 4:1, 4, NLT)
About 14 or 15 years ago, I participated in a critique group with six aspiring writers who met in my home. The only Christian in the group, I definitely wasn’t living for the Lord back then. But some spark of His light must have peeked through the basket I’d put over myself and my beliefs, because they still knew I was a Christian. If one of my characters said a curse word (limited and mild), one of those gals would pull out a little notebook and supposedly scribble, "Robin used a bad word." I was sometimes referred to as "Miss Goody Two Shoes."
It wasn’t until a few years later, restored to right relationship with my Savior, that I understood the unseen spiritual warfare that was going on when those women made fun of me, my beliefs, my moral choices, even my word choices. Though I thought it was just good-natured teasing, the truth is I was being mocked. Yet there was much more at work beneath the surface than teasing or mocking, things none of us were conscious of. A spiritual battle in the heavenly realm.
A backslidden or lukewarm Christian who is not in prayer, who is not serving the Lord, who is not reading the Bible, who is not growing in faith is no problem to the devil. After all, he has already lost that soul. He can’t drag a believer into hell, but he can hope to keep them ineffective. When he sees a Christian beginning to get fired up for Christ (as was happening in me though I didn’t recognize it yet), Satan doesn’t like it because when said Christian gets fired up and begins to pray and live for God, he or she will make a difference for the kingdom. Guaranteed. You cannot love God and not have it spill over onto other people.
Nehemiah and the workers rebuilding the wall were mocked, but Nehemiah didn’t respond to the mockers in kind. He didn’t shout back nor did he become discouraged. He talked to God instead, and then he and the others finished building the wall. God prevailed.
Just as He prevails today. I take great comfort in that knowledge.
In the grip of His grace,
Robin
I experience jabs here and there. Yesterday a coworked laughingly pointed out that next year will be the date 06/06/06, and wondered what I thought of that–she wanted to see what kind of silly ideas I may have head.
I laughed and didn’t say too much. I can’t get offended that easily. Still, these kind of mild jabs happen all the time, so perhaps I am almost too used to it.
They seem harmless, but perhaps they are more than that.
The paragraph about the backslidden or lukewarm Christian vs. the Christian who is fired up for Christ reminds me of my own life.
I used to be a lukewarm Christian. Then I was basically dragged away from church entirely for a few years. But God intervened via the move of significant other and via a friend so I began to get fired up and pray and live for God. From then on, no amount of mocking could drag me away from Him anymore.