DANE FOWLKES

“More than that, I now regard all things as liabilities compared to the far greater value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things – indeed, I regard them as dung! – that I may gain Christ.” Philippians 3:8

Shining is always costly. Light comes only at the cost of that which produces it. An unlit candle does no shining. Burning must come before shining. We cannot be of great use to others without cost to ourselves. Burning suggests suffering. We shrink from pain.

We are apt to feel that we are doing the greatest good in the world when we are strong, and able for active duty, and when the heart and hands are full of kindly service. When we are called aside and can only suffer; when we are sick; when we are consumed with pain; when all our activities have been dropped, we feel that we are no longer of use, that we are not doing anything. But, if we are patient and submissive, it is almost certain that we are a greater blessing to the world in our time of suffering and pain than we were in the days when we thought we were doing the most of our work. We are burning now, and shining because we are burning. . . . Many want the glory without the cross, the shining without the burning, but crucifixion comes before coronation.

“The glory of tomorrow is rooted in the drudgery of today.” (Streams in the Desert)

I began the day praying, “God, I want to know you,” followed hard after by the question, “How in the world will I know you today?” Had I been in some remote location on a spiritual retreat of some kind, I may have answered the question with thoughts from Bonhoeffer or Chambers or any of my other favorite authors who operate as spiritual mentors. But this was a normal week day, and my deep seated desire to know God soon gave way to mundane demands of the day—washing machine repair, taking out the trash, writing thank you cards to partners, database entries to make, reports to assemble, dishes to wash, beds to make, ad infinitum. Not exactly the setting one might expect as especially conducive for experiencing the divine.

Do not confuse the extraordinary moment for knowing God:

“One of the great snares of the Christian worker is to make a fetish of rare moments. When the Spirit of God gives you a time of inspiration and insight, you say—‘Now I will always be like this for God.’ No, you will not, God will take care you are not. . . . If you say you will only be at your best, you are an intolerable drag on God; you will never do anything unless God keeps you consciously inspired. If you make a god of your best moments, you will find that God will fade out of your life and never come back until you do the duty that lies nearest, and have learned not to make a fetish of your rare moments.” (Oswald Chambers)

Abraham Lincoln touts some pretty good theology when he states, “The Lord prefers common-looking people. That is why he made so many of them.” The same applies to common experience; our days and nights consist largely of repetition, tried and hackneyed cliches. How can I know the Father in the run-of-the-mill that demand the majority of my attention? Were we created for mountains or valleys? God either remains silent most of the time, or He speaks regularly and I simply fail to recognize His voice. What we fail to grasp at our own peril is that the humdrum is exactly where we meet God. Lower your gaze. Stop looking for Christ in the clouds and you will find Him waiting at the convenience store, next door, or in your own home. Prove useful when you are uninspired, and you will know God in a measure that exceeds expectation.

“And there was Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, sitting over against the sepulcher.” Matthew 27:61

How strangely stupid is grief. It neither learns nor knows nor wishes to learn or know. When the sorrowing sisters sat over against the door of God’s  sepulchre, did they see the two thousand years that have passed triumphing away? Did they see any thing but this: “Our Christ is gone!”

Your Christ and my Christ came from their loss; Myriad mourning hearts have had resurrection in the midst of their grief; and yet the sorrowing watchers looked at the seed-form of this result, and saw nothing. What they regarded as the end of life was the very preparation for coronation; for Christ was silent that He might live again in tenfold power.

They saw it not. They mourned, they wept, and went away, and came again, driven by their hearts to the sepulchre. Still it was a sepulchre, unprophetic, voiceless, lusterless. So with us. Every man sits over against the sepulchre in his garden, in the first instance, and says, “This woe is irremediable. I see no benefit in it. I will take no comfort in it.” And yet, right in our deepest and worst mishaps, often, our Christ is lying, waiting for resurrection. Where our death seems to be, there our Saviour is. Where the end of hope is, there is the brightest beginning of fruition. Where the darkness is thickest, there the bright beaming light that never is set is about to emerge. When the whole experience is consummated, then we find that a garden is not disfigured by a sepulchre. (Streams in the Desert)

The small community I call home excels in simplicity. Ours is not a meager existence, but one definitely scaled-down to essentials. We border a fair-sized city to the south and rapidly sprawling bedroom community to the north; “in-between” is a fair description of Bosqueville. We struggle on purpose to remain that way, and become collectively nervous when urban sprawl threatens to infect our delightfully remote way of life.

We avoid media overload for the most part; outdoor advertising billboards do not scar our rural landscape, but our two clapboard churches do have old-school message boards along Rock Creek Road they change manually from time-to-time. Neither the Baptists nor Methodists get into any hurry to update their messages, and I have heard myself more-than-once ask out-loud the value of the signs when driving by the same quip or quote for the umpteenth time. Both signs display their same messages from the day after Easter, but it is the two word admonition on the Baptist board that pokes my conscience each time I pass: “Practice Resurrection.”

In a very real sense, we are all either waiting for or practicing resurrection. To phrase it another way, we are either bystanders or agents of change. Neutral Christianity is a myth; Resurrection demands response. Some walk away in disbelief, while others run pell mell to the empty tomb and live out the remainder of their days infecting all they meet with the unearthly glow of transfiguration. For God’s sake and that of all those you know and will meet before you die, put on full display the glory of God. Practice resurrection.

“There hath not failed one word of all his good promise” 1 Kings 8:56

Some day we shall understand that God has a reason in every NO which He speaks through the slow movement of life. “Somehow God makes up to us.” How often, when His people are worrying and perplexing themselves about their prayers not being answered, is God answering them in a far richer way! Glimpses of this we see occasionally, but the full revelation of it remains for the future.

Oh for the faith that does not make haste, but waits patiently for the Lord, waits for the explanation that shall come in the end, at the revelation of Jesus Christ! When did God take anything from a man, without giving him manifold more in return? Suppose that the return had not been made immediately manifest, what then? Is today the limit of God’s working time? Has He no provinces beyond this little world? Does the door of the grave open upon nothing but infinite darkness and eternal silence?

Yet, even confining the judgment within the hour of this life, it is true that God never touches the heart with a trial without intending to bring upon it some grander gift, some tenderer benediction. He has attained to an eminent degree of Christian grace who knows how to wait. (Streams in the Desert)

“We all pray whether we think of it as praying or not. The odd silence we fall into when something very beautiful is happening, or something very good or very bad. The “Ah-h-h-h!” that sometimes floats up out of us as out of a Fourth of July crowd when the skyrocket bursts over the water. The stammer of pain at somebody else’s pain. The stammer of joy at somebody else’s joy. Whatever words or sounds we use for sighing with over our own lives. These are all prayers in their way. These are all spoken not just to ourselves, but to something even more familiar than ourselves and even more strange than the world.” (Frederick Buechner)

Prayer is much more alignment than it is activity. I pray best when the Spirit calibrates my heart to God’s heartbeat; the moment his interests begin to dictate my own. In this way, prayer consists largely of listening, granting space and thought to what the Father wants. Along the way, my prayer life becomes my life, and every thought translates into divine dialogue.

“Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside, of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb. And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush.” Exodus 3:1-2

The vision came in the midst of common toil, and that is where the Lord delights to give His revelations. He seeks a man who is on the ordinary road, and the Divine fire leaps out at his feet. The mystic ladder can rise from the market place to Heaven. It can connect the realm of drudgery with the realms of grace.

Some Christians think they must be always up to mounts of extraordinary joy and revelation; this is not after God’s method. Those spiritual visits to high places, and that wonderful intercourse with the unseen world, are not in the promises; the daily life of communion is. And it is enough. We shall have the exceptional revelation if it be right for us.

There were but three disciples allowed to see the transfiguration, and those three entered the gloom of Gethsemane. No one can stay on the mount of privilege. There are duties in the valley. Christ found His life-work, not in the glory, but in the valley and was there truly and fully the Messiah. The value of the vision and glory is but their gift of fitness for work and endurance.

“My Father God, help me to expect Thee on the ordinary road. I do not ask for sensational happenings. Commune with me through ordinary work and duty. Be my Companion when I take the common journey. Let the humble life be transfigured by Thy presence.” (Streams in the Desert)

“It is what it is.” I caught myself saying so the other day without thinking about my meaning or its wider implication. Quite honestly, I uttered it in a less-than-positive vein. Burdened by limitations within myself, frustration surfaced as a cliché, but, as is the case with most clichés, the trite and hackneyed expression was grounded in truth. Life is what it is, which makes it all the more critical that we see ourselves as we are—extraordinary harbingers of the divine, and every moment as it is—colored beautifully by grace. The practice of discerning grace in unexpected ways during the very non-surprising routines of life continues to dominate my thinking and captivate my imagination. Life changes suddenly for some, but for most of us, transformation comes slowly, imperceptibly. Alterations in patterns of living and the people experiencing them often go unnoticed until something causes us to pause and reflect. We can learn a lot about ourselves and our Maker if we know where to look. (From Ordinary Glory: Finding Grace in the Commonplace, by Dane Fowlkes)

“He knoweth the way that I take.” Job 23:10

Believer! What a glorious assurance! This way of thine—this, it may be, a crooked, mysterious, tangled way—this way of trial and tears. “He knoweth it.” The furnace seven times heated—He lighted it. There is an Almighty Guide knowing and directing our footsteps, whether it be to the bitter Marah pool, or to the joy and refreshment of Elim.

That way, dark to the Egyptians, has its pillar of cloud and fire for His own Israel. The furnace is hot; but not only can we trust the hand that kindles it, but we have the assurance that the fires are lighted not to consume, but to refine; and that when the refining process is completed (no sooner—no later) He brings His people forth as gold.

How it would take the sting from many a goading trial, to see what Job saw (in his hour of aggravated woe, when every earthly hope lay prostrate at his feet)—no hand but the Divine. He saw that hand behind the gleaming swords of the Sabeans—he saw it behind the lightning flash—he saw it giving wings to the careening tempest—he saw it in the awful silence of his rifled home.

“The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord!” Thus seeing God in everything, his faith reached its climax when this once powerful prince of the desert, seated on his bed of ashes, could say, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust him.” (Streams in the Desert)

I sat across the plastic folding table from a wiry, acne scarred eighth grader in a Green Bay Packers jacket. The reference to professional football looked out of place on the anything-but athletic teenager, and he sat in front of me at an awkward angle appearing uncomfortable and withdrawn. Fresh off a win in my first game of the Murray County Chess Open, I was confident to finish off the kid and walk away with first place. Playing white, I moved first. For the first ten or so moves he simply mirrored my own, convincing me he was just learning the game and unable to decide for himself where to place his pieces. My confidence grew.

Thirty minutes into the game it became apparent I had misjudged my young opponent’s ability. A few clever combinations averted my attack and put me on the defensive; I was forced to work hard to end in a draw when I should have won. I was clearly frustrated, but what annoyed most was the off-hand comment by the man I beat earlier, identifying exactly where I went wrong and the moves I should have made to win. On closer examination I had to admit he was correct, and it perturbed me to no end that he saw what I had failed to recognize. Perspective is everything.

The great challenge for every disciple is learning to trust first, and then to see. When we reverse the order, we lead frustrated lives lacking purpose and contentment. “Wherever the providence of God may dump us down, in a slum, in a shop, in the desert, we have to labour along the line of His direction. Never allow this thought—‘I am of no use where I am,’ because you certainly can be of no use where you are not! Wherever He has engineered your circumstances, pray” (Oswald Chambers). Find it in your heart to worship Christ in every circumstance, and He will help you understand in time His purposes in it all.

“And being absolutely certain that whatever promise He is bound by, He is able to make good.” Romans 4:20

We are told that Abraham could look at his own body and consider it as good as dead without being discouraged, because he was not looking at himself but at the Almighty One.

He did not stagger at the promise, but stood straight up unbending beneath his mighty load of blessing; and instead of growing weak he waxed strong in the faith, grew more robust, the more difficulties became apparent, glorifying God through His very sufficiency and being “fully persuaded” (as the Greek expresses it) “that he who had promised was,” not merely able, but as it literally means “abundantly able,” munificently able, able with an infinite surplus of resources, infinitely able “to perform.”

He is the God of boundless resources. The only limit is in us. Our asking, our thinking, our praying are too small; our expectations are too limited. He is trying to lift us up to a higher conception, and lure us on to a mightier expectation and appropriation. Oh, shall we put Him in derision?

There is no limit to what we may ask and expect of our glorious El-Shaddai; and there is but one measure here given for His blessing, and that is “according to the power that worketh in us.”  (Streams in the Desert)

Knowing how to end is one of my biggest challenges in writing. The ‘when’ of finishing usually works itself out; it’s the quality of closing that’s in question. The same may be said of human existence. These days I find myself face to face, face to back, and face to knee with my own physical decline and inevitable mortality. Just last week I was down on my knees laying some tile, complaining to my grandson Josh how I had shortened the lifespan of my knees by wasting my childhood pretending to be a horse. He promptly asked if I would be walking with a cane by the time he was his brother’s age (that will be in only five years), then added, “If you’re still alive.” There’s nothing like the brutal honesty of a child to set one to thinking. Frankly, I understand better now than ever why my mother said so often that she wanted Jesus to come again, so that she wouldn’t have to die. She was secure in her relationship with Christ, she simply preferred to bypass the finality of ending. I wish that she could have done so, and to be honest—so do I.

I can truthfully say it’s not the dying that bothers, it’s the fear of not fully living while I’m still alive. “We must be careful with our lives, for Christ’s sake, because it would seem that they are the only lives we are going to have in this puzzling and perilous world, and so they are very precious and what we do with them matters enormously”(F. Buechner). There’s not much I can do about the weakening of my knees or the chronic catch in my lower back, but I do have within reach the ability to write my own epitaph. What happened or didn’t happen yesterday pales in significance with what I do right now.  My life does count, and this very moment matters. The living of this day consumes, not remorse for the past or fear of failing to have tomorrow; the only way to know I’ll end well is by fully living for Christ right now.

“I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” (John 9:4-5, KJV)

“Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith Jehovah of hosts.” Zechariah 4:6

My way led up a hill, and right at the foot I saw a boy on a bicycle. He was pedalling up hill against the wind, and evidently found it a tremendously hard work. Just as he was working most strenuously and doing his best painfully, there came a trolley car going in the same direction—up the hill.

It was not going too fast for the boy to get behind it, and with one hand to lay hold of the bar at the back. Then you know what happened. He went up that hill like a bird. Then it flashed upon me:

“Why, I am like that boy on the bicycle in my weariness and weakness. I am pedalling up hill against all kinds of opposition, and am almost worn out with the task. But here at hand is a great available power, the strength of the Lord Jesus.

“I have only to get in touch with Him and to maintain communication with Him, though it may be only one little finger of faith, and that will be enough to make His power mine for the doing of this bit of service that just now seems too much for me.” And I was helped to dismiss my weariness and to realize this truth. (Streams in the Desert)

I cannot write as an authority on the future state of believers, but I am learning to recognize heaven here and now. Heaven, like grace, is present tense, and I write from personal experience that heaven on earth is living in close proximity to who and what one loves most. In that regards, I have found paradise; more accurately, paradise has found me. The most discerning, scintillating, jocular, and alluring woman I’ve ever known calls me “Darling”; precious grandchildren, daughters and sons-in-law call me “Papa,” intriguing neighbors and special others call me “friend.” I’m blessed with residential space to breathe without urban interference; plank fencing marks our boundaries rather than cement sidewalks, and caliche replaces asphalt. Prominent sounds in the distance are not those of urban sprawl; instead, Barred Owls beckon to one another, a Kingfisher rattles out near the pond, and the ever-present Phoebe wheezes on a nearby limb. And if that’s not enough to qualify as an earthly Elysium, I’m surrounded by books galore (Cicero said “A room without books is like a body without a soul”), enjoy fulfilling employment, retain the semblance of a brain, and, to top it all off, admit to darn good health for a man in his mid-50s.

I would never denigrate the thought and reality of our future state; I do, however, emphasize unapologetically the potential for embracing the Father on this side. I abide best in him, when I work at extolling his grace that benefits this breath and blesses this day. I accept the challenge of not living in the wake of what I once was. In place of always approaching sunset, I choose to rejoice over perpetual sunrise in this life and the next.

Then Peter began to say unto him, Lo, we have left all, and have followed thee. And Jesus answered and said, Verily I say unto you, There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake, and the gospel’s, But he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life. (Mark 10:28-30, KJV)

“Stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord.” Exodus 14:13

These words contain God’s command to the believer when he is reduced to great straits and brought into extraordinary difficulties. He cannot retreat; he cannot go forward; he is shut upon the right hand and on the left. What is he now to do? The Master’s word to him is “stand still.” It will be well for him if, at such times, he listens only to his Master’s word, for other and evil advisers come with their suggestions. Despair whispers, “Lie down and die; give it all up.” But God would have us put on a cheerful courage, and even in our worst times, rejoice in His love and faithfulness.

Cowardice says, “Retreat; go back to the worldling’s way of action; you cannot play the Christian’s part; it is too difficult. Relinquish your principles.” But, however much Satan may urge this course upon you, you cannot follow it, if you are a child of God. His Divine fiat has bid thee go from strength to strength, and so thou shalt, and neither death nor hell shall turn thee from thy course. What if for a while thou art called to stand still; yet this is but to renew thy strength for some greater advance in due time.

Precipitancy cries, “Do something; stir yourself; to stand still and wait is sheer idleness.” We must be doing something at once—we must do it, so we think—instead of looking to the Lord, who will not only do something, but will do everything.

Presumption boasts, “If the sea be before you, march into it, and expect a miracle.” But faith listens neither to Presumption, nor to Despair, nor to Cowardice, nor to Precipitancy, but it hears God say, “Stand still,” and immovable as a rock it stands. “Stand still”—keep the posture of an upright man, ready for action, expecting further orders, cheerfully and patiently awaiting the directing voice; and it will not be long ere God shall say to you, as distinctly as Moses said it to the people of Israel, “Go forward.’ (Streams in the Desert)

Biblical discipleship demands great courage. Spiritual valor allows us to stand when our impulse is to run, trust when tempted to abandon hope, and take heart when all evidence tells us to lay it down. Faith does not require an empty head and numb heart; quite the contrary, faith frees me to take every thought captive to the sovereignty of God, and leave unanswered questions to His response. We do as Watchman Knee writes—“Sit, walk, stand”—all with the dynamic aid of God’s Holy Presence. Waiting saints are not in suspended animation; we are runners with muscles poised in the starting blocks awaiting the starter’s gun.

“And he shall bring it to pass.” Ps. 37:5

I once thought that after I prayed that it was my duty to do everything that I could do to bring the answer to pass. He taught me a better way, and showed that my self-effort always hindered His working, and that when I prayed and definitely believed Him for anything, He wanted me to wait in the spirit of praise, and only do what He bade me. It seems so unsafe to just sit still, and do nothing but trust the Lord; and the temptation to take the battle into our own hands is often tremendous.

We all know how impossible it is to rescue a drowning man who tries to help his rescuer, and it is equally impossible for the Lord to fight our battles for us when we insist upon trying to fight them ourselves. It is not that He will not, but He cannot. Our interference hinders His working. (Streams in the Desert)

I customarily arrive early for appointments to avoid the risk of being late and to survey the lay of the land, so-to-speak. This occasion was no exception. A would-be guest had agreed to meet at a local coffee shop on a certain day and at a specific time; in fact, he chose the time and place. I stood just inside the doorway so that I wouldn’t miss him, checking my reflection in the window, and watching everyone in the world go by except the individual I was to meet. Our appointed time came and went, but still I waited. By the time he was fifteen minutes late I was restless and began pacing back and forth in front of the large windows facing the parking lot. My agitation must have been obvious because the manager walked over twice to ask if I needed something to drink or a place to sit until my guest arrived. I thanked him, declined the offer and continued to fret. Following two failed attempts to reach him by phone, I returned to my vehicle and exited the parking lot an hour later than I had arrived—frustrated and fuming.

There is a seismic difference between waiting for someone and waiting with someone. Waiting for someone breeds passive restlessness—agitation void of benefit. Waiting with someone encourages deepening intimacy and holds potential for myriad of creative and delightful engagement. You and I are never told to wait on God; on the contrary, life is full of opportunity to wait with Him. Waiting with God as we look to see Him act on our behalf is an invitation and opportunity to edge closer to the Creator and the purpose for which we were created. “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever” (Westminster Catechism). If you find yourself aggravated at God for any reason, check your heart. Most likely you are missing the point of waiting altogether.

“The hand of the Lord hath wrought this.” Job 12:9

In one of George MacDonald’s books occurs this fragment of conversation: “I wonder why God made me,” said Mrs. Faber bitterly. “I’m sure I don’t know what was the use of making me!”

“Perhaps not much yet,” said Dorothy, “but then He hasn’t done with you yet. He is making you now, and you are quarrelling with the process.”

If men would but believe that they are in process of creation, and consent to be made—let the Maker handle them as the potter the clay, yielding themselves in resplendent motion and submissive, hopeful action with the turning of His wheel—they would ere long find themselves able to welcome every pressure of that hand on them, even when it was felt in pain; and sometimes not only to believe but to recognize the Divine end in view, the bringing of a son unto glory. (Streams in the Desert)

I watched a cow standing in dense green alfalfa strain its neck through barbed wire to eat spindly weeds growing a few feet beyond the fence. Contrary to popular opinion, the grass is not greener beyond our reach. It may be natural to desire something other than what we are or possess, but such dissatisfaction as a rule proves destructive. Beware of any line of reasoning that begins with, “If only . . . “

Jesus weighs in on the dilemma when he emphatically states, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me” (Luke 9:23). During the years I taught undergraduate ministry students, I encountered what I consider to be a common misunderstanding of this essential component of discipleship. Perhaps by default, the frequent interpretation communicated to church-goers is that self-denial equates to self-rejection.  Somehow we confuse denying self with rejecting or at least avoiding self-understanding. The difference is colossal; self-awareness is paramount to obeying Christ’s command. Daily denying of self invokes an ongoing process of personal discovery, for only when I embrace the way God has fashioned me am I ready to relinquish all that I am to Christ.  How can I offer to Christ what I am unaware is mine to give? Such a scenario is more akin to hypnosis than surrender. It is ludicrous to think Sovereign God created me uniquely, only to require me to opt for a lesser version of myself. If you want to serve Christ in the way that only you can, develop as fully as possible every gift granted you. The more I acknowledge and embrace my God-granted uniqueness, the better able am I to surrender and use that uniqueness in serving Him and others.