Keystone Heights, FL 2008: Getting knocked around by a question or challenge should be commonplace in a real ministry. Responses and explanations must either stack up or must be completely reconsidered and reevaluated.

From Trent Ling:

Recently, a brother in the ministry challenged a couple of other brothers about their eyes not being so good.  Though I was not addressed, I considered the challenge as if it were given for me.

“The eye is the lamp of the body.  If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light.  But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness.  If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!”  Matthew 6:22-23.

First, the best-case scenario never gets much better than:  “My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent.”  1 Corinthians 4:4.  As such is the case with me, I cannot simply dispense with my brother’s challenge.  The Lord will judge me and render his verdicts for or against me, even while I walk the earth.  I must be on the lookout to see if God agrees with my challenging brother, and whether God perhaps has prompted my brother’s overture from the beginning.

Second, I do work very hard.  But, do I work smartly?  Rightly?  Fruitfully?  Hmmm.  These questions present excellent, exacting, and more difficult questions.  At a minimum, this gives me much pause.

Third, the facts are mixed.  Yes, I have been delivered from the sins of my youth–pride, lust, and cowardice, for example.  But unmistakably, I remain in an all-out tussle with God on the issue of sustainability that is now on the verge of entering its eighth year.  Though such can certainly be traced out as a Biblical imperative and a good sign, who really knows for sure?  Though God remarkably passes over my Achilles, does such stem from favor or mercy?

Fourth, concerning my eyes themselves, I withhold zero confessions.  From the beginning of my spiritual days I have always poured out my unseemly deal.  Thus, my eyes themselves should be good and well lit.  On one hand, I suppose that I would insist that my brother throw me a bone and help me out specifically as to what he sees.  On the other hand, I would diligently search out the Scriptures as to whether walking in the light necessarily keeps eyes in lamp-like shape.

I will forever remain susceptible and weak.  Hallelujah!  I will always run myself through the best examination that I can muster.  And I will always keep an ear out for challenge and assistance in getting through this wonderful faith that has taken me to inexplicable heights over 22 years.  None of this makes me innocent.  It simply points out that no matter what anybody says, I presume they must be onto something because I am far from the arrival station.

Thanks, brother, for this stroll down living-the-Bible Lane!

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