The Fight

I'd rather walk with God than fight God
But I'd rather fight than walk away.

I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor, who will never leave you... I will not leave you as orphans- I will come to you...Those who obey my commandments are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them, and I will love them. And I will reveal myself to each one of them. From John 14:15-21

Despite the beauty of these words I have to admit that I have been wrestling with this text for a week now and I'm not sure that I've made much progress. However, I want to acknowledge the fight. Sometimes I fight with the bible. Sometimes it feels like I'm fighting with God.

Graeme Goldworthy comments that, "Whereas modern thinkers asked what the meaning of a text was, postmodern thinkers question whether a text has any meaning at all." I'm not sure where this places me but I want a text to mean something to me. I want some kind of revelation. My studies tell me that I should first consider what these words would have meant to the original hearers. What would Jesus' comments have meant to the disciples who had no idea of the radical changes the coming days and weeks would hold? At what points would they perhaps have remembered Jesus' words? When would it have meant something to them? My experience also tell me what this text has meant to other people (preachers, teachers, authors etc). But it is not enough for me to be content with whispers from men and women long dead nor with insights from a great blog on the subject.

So, this week I keep coming back to these words of Jesus. I'm still fighting with them.

Jesus says, "I will come to you. I will love you. I will reveal myself to you."

I say, "Then come. Jesus come. Come and show me your love. Show me the Father's love. For right now I am missing the people and the ways in which I have experienced your presence before. I'm thankful for the blogs, emails, phones etc that you give. But sometimes I crave the real, physical presence of people I love. So, Jesus, if you are saying that I can always experience you but that it might be in different ways (indeed- in increasing fullness and intimacy by your Spirit) then show me. Let these beautiful words resonate in my life because right now I don't feel it at all."

Perhaps this fighting- to believe the things I know are true and see God in my life- has been the reason that many other things have felt difficult this week too. Language study has been a huge effort. Sometimes it is a fight to sleep on hot nights. Several times this week I have fought the dawn and literally run circles- emerging with a red face and very sweaty limbs (not pretty!). I fight to find phrases to express how I feel and I fight the desire to write about something else altogether (such as the fact that it is mango season and I counted over 100 of them in our house yesterday...)

If anything, I am increasingly confident that God is big enough to handle my fighting. However, today I would rather just stop and wait. Perhaps tomorrow I will walk again. As I wait I will rest with these words from Psalm 4:6

Many people say, "Who will show us better times?" Let the smile of your face shine on us, Lord.