"Whoever battles with monsters had better see that it does not turn him into a monster. And if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you."
Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil.
I was in a meeting recently where the discussion swayed from the issues of our lives to the concerns of Christian leaders on the national front. In one moment the focus turned from what is God saying to us to what is wrong with these national leaders who carry a celebrity status. Couched with the noble reason that we are called to be discerning on how Christian leaders conduct themselves in the Body of Christ, the discussion was but a poor attempt to draw quick and easy conclusions without sufficient prayerful contextualized responsible research. The result was that it almost left the people in the meeting drained when such meetings are meant to edify.
Playing the role of a standard-bearer is filled with its own temptations. It is difficult for fallible people like us to serve as the watchdogs of others – ensuring their purity, and their accuracy. What can subtly happen is that we can ourselves become what we despise and attack in others. When we are always searching for flaws and faults in others, we can subtly become critical and judgemental and self-righteous ourselves.
Unknown to ourselves, the reason we sometimes despise others is that we secretly fear we are seeing in them what we most hate about ourselves. Without moment-by-moment awareness of the cross of Christ, we crucify those we condemn in our own ritual of self-righteousness. And what is that but the opposite of the cross?
This week I enjoyed reading the opening paragraphs to the study of Judges from Tremper Longman and Ray Dillard’s An Introduction To The Old Testament, p 143:
What a collection of human beings in the book of Judges! Strange heroes they are—a reluctant farmer, a prophetess, a left-handed assassin, a bastard bandit, a sex-addicted Nazirite, among others. It is easy at a distance to point out the foibles and failures of the leading characters in this downwardly spiralling story.
But lest we get too proud, Paul reminds us, “That is what some of you were” (1 Corinthians 6:11). With similar mixtures of ignorance, frail obedience, and tangled motives, we, like them, were “washed, sanctified, and justified” by the grace of God. For all of their flaws, we are to learn from their faith. For it was in faith that Gideon, Barak, Jephthah, and Samson “conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised” (Hebrews 11:32-33).
In spite of their failures, their faith was not misplaced. They become a part of that great cloud of witnesses calling for us to persevere and to fix our eyes on Jesus (Hebrews 12:1-2)
Instead of pointing at their flaws and faults, we should instead pray this prayer:
Search me, O God, and know my heart!
Try me and know my thoughts!
And see if there be any grievous way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting! Psalm 139:23-24
It will keep our soul well!
