Part 9 (1/2)

Yet this morning's Bible study included this challenge: ”G.o.d has shown me that he doesn't think anyone is unclean or unfit” (v. 28 CEV).

Now what do you do?

One more. You are the superintendent of an orphanage. In dealing with the birth certificates, you come across a troubling word: illegitimate. As you research further, you learn that the word is a permanent label, never to be removed from the certificate.

This is what Edna Gladney discovered. And she couldn't bear the thought of it. If legitimate means to be legal, lawful, and valid, what does illegitimate mean? Can you imagine living with such a label?

Mrs. Gladney couldn't. It took her three years, but in 1936 she successfully lobbied the Texas legislature to remove the term from birth doc.u.ments.3 G.o.d calls us to change the way we look at people. Not to see them as Gentiles or Jews, insiders or outsiders, liberals or conservatives. Not to label. To label is to libel. ”We have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view” (2 Cor. 5:16 NLT).

Let's view people differently; let's view them as we do ourselves. Blemished, perhaps. Unfinished, for certain. Yet once rescued and restored, we may shed light, like the two stained-gla.s.s windows in my office.

My brother found them on a junkyard heap. Some church had discarded them. Dee, a handy carpenter, reclaimed them. He repainted the chipped wood, repaired the worn frame. He sealed some of the cracks in the colored gla.s.s. The windows aren't perfect. But if suspended where the sun can pa.s.s through, they cascade multicolored light into the room.

In our lifetimes you and I are going to come across some discarded people. Tossed out. Sometimes tossed out by a church. And we get to choose. Neglect or rescue? Label them or love them? We know Jesus' choice. Just look at what he did with us.

You [Jesus] are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals,

because you were slain,

and with your blood you purchased men for G.o.d from every tribe and language and people and nation.

(Rev. 5:9 NIV) Father, you have used all types of people for your holy purposes: prost.i.tutes, murderers, persecutors, liars, thieves, swindlers, the illiterate, the ignorant, the blind, the lame. Grant me the grace to treat everyone I meet as someone for whom Jesus died and rose again. Let there be no unwholesome or unholy distinctions in my eyes and no unworthy favoritism in my actions. Rather, make me into a vessel through whom Jesus s.h.i.+nes. In Christ's name I pray, amen.

CHAPTER 15.

Pray First; Pray Most

But while Peter was in prison,

the church prayed very earnestly for him.

-ACTS 12:5 (NLT)

King Herod suffered from a Hitler-level obsession with popularity. He murdered the apostle James to curry favor with the populace. The execution b.u.mped his approval rating, so he jailed Peter and resolved to behead him on the anniversary of Jesus' death. (Would you like a little salt with that wound?) He placed the apostle under the watchful eye of sixteen Navy Seal sorts and told them, with no tongue in cheek, ”He escapes, you die.” (Quality control, Herod style.) They bound Peter in chains and secured him three doors deep into the prison.

And what could the church do about it? The problem of an imprisoned Peter stood Goliath-tall over the humble community. They had no recourse: no clout, no political chips to cash. They had nothing but fear-drenched questions. ”Who's next? First James, then Peter. Is Herod going to purge the church leaders.h.i.+p?”

The church still faces her Goliaths. World hunger. Clergy scandal. Stingy Christians. Corrupt officials. Pea-brained and hard-hearted dictators. Peter in prison is just the first of a long list of challenges too big for the church.

So our Jerusalem ancestors left us a strategy. When the problem is bigger than we are-we pray! ”But while Peter was in prison, the church prayed very earnestly for him” (Acts 12:5 NLT).

They didn't picket the prison, pet.i.tion the government, protest the arrest, or prepare for Peter's funeral. They prayed. They prayed as if prayer was their only hope, for indeed it was. They prayed ”very earnestly for him.”

One of our Brazilian church leaders taught me something about earnest prayer. He met Christ during a yearlong stay in a drug-rehab center. His therapy included three one-hour sessions of prayer a day. Patients weren't required to pray, but they were required to attend the prayer meeting. Dozens of recovering drug addicts spent sixty uninterrupted minutes on their knees.

I expressed amazement and confessed that my prayers were short and formal. He invited (dared?) me to meet him for prayer. I did the next day. We knelt on the concrete floor of our small church auditorium and began to talk to G.o.d. Change that. I talked; he cried, wailed, begged, cajoled, and pleaded. He pounded his fists on the floor, shook a fist toward heaven, confessed, and reconfessed every sin. He recited every promise in the Bible as if G.o.d needed a reminder. He prayed like Moses.

When G.o.d determined to destroy the Israelites for their golden calf stunt, ”Moses begged the LORD his G.o.d and said, 'LORD, don't let your anger destroy your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with your great power and strength. Don't let the people of Egypt say, ”The LORD brought the Israelites out of Egypt for an evil purpose.” . . . Remember the men who served you-Abraham, Isaac, and Israel. You promised with an oath to them'” (Ex. 32:1113 NCV).

Moses on Mount Sinai is not calm and quiet, with folded hands and a serene expression. He's on his face one minute, in G.o.d's the next. He's on his knees, pointing his finger, lifting his hands. Shedding tears. Shredding his cloak. Wrestling like Jacob at Jabbok for the lives of his people.

And G.o.d heard him! ”So the LORD changed his mind and did not destroy the people as he had said he might” (v. 14 NCV).

Our pa.s.sionate prayers move the heart of G.o.d. ”The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much” (James 5:16). Prayer does not change G.o.d's nature; who he is will never be altered. Prayer does, however, impact the flow of history. G.o.d has wired his world for power, but he calls on us to flip the switch.

And the Jerusalem church did just that.

The church prayed very earnestly for him.

The night before Peter was to be placed on trial, he was asleep, fastened with two chains between two soldiers. Others stood guard at the prison gate. Suddenly, there was a bright light in the cell, and an angel of the Lord stood before Peter. The angel struck him on the side to awaken him and said, ”Quick! Get up!” And the chains fell off his wrists. Then the angel told him, ”Get dressed and put on your sandals.” And he did. ”Now put on your coat and follow me,” the angel ordered. (Acts 12:58 NLT) The apostle, who once wondered how Christ could sleep in a storm, now snoozes through his own.

Let's give this scene the chuckle it deserves. An angel descends from heaven onto earth. Only G.o.d knows how many demons he battled en route. He navigates the Jerusalem streets until he reaches Herod's prison. He pa.s.ses through three sets of iron doors and a squad of soldiers until he stands in front of Peter. Brightness explodes like a July sun in Death Valley. But Peter sleeps through the wake-up call. The old fisherman dreams of Galilean sea ba.s.s.

”Peter.”

No response.

”Peter!”

Zzzzz.

”Peter!!!”

Do angels elbow or wing people? Either way, shackles clang on the floor. The angel has to remind groggy Peter how to re-robe. First your sandals. Now your robe. Doors swing open in succession. And somewhere on the avenue to Mary's house, Peter realizes he isn't dreaming. The angel points him in the right direction and departs, muttering something about bringing a trumpet next time.