Nobody likes a bully. I had my fair share growing up, and would much prefer life without them. The problem is that there can be no life without bullies because we live in a fallen world in a fallen body among fallen, sinful people. On this side of eternity, there will always bullies. Unfortunately, we live in a very strange age where a certain segment of the population thinks life can be cleansed of its unpleasantness, often through some government program or other. There is even government program to stop bullying! So I learned from a piece at Intellectual Takeout with a decidedly different take on bullying: “We Need Bullies so We Can Be Heroes.” That got me to click, because as my kids will tell you, I’m big on the whole life is hard thing, of which I never get tired of reminding them. The piece speaks to the schizophrenic nature of our culture:
Culturally, we understand the role of adversity in growth. Adversity is like Miracle Gro for character. Adversity forms the plots of our most popular films, books, and TV shows. But as our culture works to stamp out “toxic masculinity,” it is also attempting to stamp out human nature itself. Both attempts are doomed to fail at accomplishing their stated goals, but they are likely to do unpredictable damage. If we are able somehow to eliminate bullying, how do we replace an often necessary rite of passage from weakness to strength?
I’m not sure I’d give our culture that much credit, although it’s common sense that adversity can develop character. Popular culture is indeed full of stories that inspire overcoming, but in real life it’s much more difficult. It’s almost funny how we know life is hard, but yet continually complain, out loud, but most often to ourselves, and to God, that it is. Complaining is the easiest thing in the world to do because there’s so much to complain about! But if we spend some time meditating on Genesis 3, and the story of our first ancestor’s fall, maybe we wouldn’t be so quick to complain:
17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat food from it
all the days of your life.
18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
19 By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.”
Painful toil, sweat of our brow, thorns and thistles, and to dust our end; not exactly “happily ever after.” All this is predicted, but we are so often surprised that life is obstacles, adversity, problems, challenges, frustrations, difficulties, one after the other . . . after the other . . . after the other. I’ll admit I don’t like it either, even as all these years I’ve preached to my children that crap happens, a lot.
As a follower of Jesus, however, my God and Savior, Creator and Sovereign ruler all things, I also preach hope. Everything that happens in our lives, including the bad stuff, is an opportunity to honor God with our trust. We have many verses in our Bible to anchor our hope in spite of what things may look like, not to mention the whole story of redemptive history that finds its fulfillment in Jesus of Nazareth. One of my favorite versus in the Old Testament is rooted in this fulfillment as revealed to us by the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans. When you read this, and surrounding verses:
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Then this verse, Isaiah 26:3, almost seems possible:
You will keep in perfect peace
him whose mind is steadfast,
because he trusts in you.
I say almost because I really have no idea what “perfect peace” is or feels like. I just know that when I don’t have it, I know I’m not trusting him! Which is pretty much all the time, and why I’m glad of repentance.
If anyone is worthy of our trust in the hard and difficult times, it is one who promises that all things work together for our good. Not most things, or almost every thing, but all things! The only way that we can even come close to approaching the peace Isaiah speaks of, is to understand that God’s promises are in Christ. Meaning they are first and foremost eternal, and not promises for our “best life now.” As we confront the “bullies” of our lives it is good to meditate on these words of Jesus, which have to be one of the great understatements in all of history:
In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
The Greek for trouble speaks to the internal consternation and pressure and frustration that results when “crap happens” in our lives, but the cross and the resurrection, and our promised reunion with him forever, will make it all worth it.
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