Heart of Gold

1 Thessalonians 5:11 NIV

Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.

Have You Been Searching For A Heart Of Gold?

As I was finishing my classes for my doctoral degree, I was scrambling to try and come up with an adequate topic for my dissertation.  There were countless possibilities but if I were to spend two years of my life dedicated to the project, I wanted it to be something that mattered; something that I could look back upon and feel like the work had an impact upon my field.  I knew that was a lofty aspiration, one I could probably never attain but nonetheless, it seemed worth pursuing.  While in a meeting with other staff members at work, I brought up my struggle to come up with a meaningful topic.  Several were suggested and then a friend of mine said I should do a study looking at the effect having a foster child had on the families where they were placed.  It sounded like such a great project and the research felt important to me.  What a benefit it would be to foster families if they had some idea what it would mean to them taking a foster child into their homes.  And yet I did not feel up to the challenge.  I did not have any experience with such types of research and did not know anyone at the seminary who had been involved in this kind of study and none of my doctoral advisors seemed qualified to help me with the statistical aspects of the research.  As I was about to cast the idea aside as impossible for me to pursue, one of my co-workers, who had spent several years doing research at a university, offered to help me.  She said she would meet with me and give me advice on my work.  Elaine kept her promise and the hours she spent advising me and helping me with my statistical analyses were invaluable to me and the success of my dissertation.  I have framed in my office the card she gave me congratulating me on earning my doctorate.  She was a perfect friend; one whose kindness I will never forget.

Years ago Neil Young wrote a song titled “Heart of Gold”.  In it he sung about his inability to find someone with a heart of gold despite his ongoing search that had lasted a lifetime.  It is not easy finding people like that; the truth is some never do. Many haven’t developed friendships that make them better people, never have had a real friend to count on when they are having a rough go of it.  There are those, even with countless acquaintances and work associates, who can’t think of anyone to look to for support.  The Apostle Paul near the end of his life made the heart-rending comment that when he faced a traumatic ordeal, he was all alone.  At my first defense, no one came to my support, but everyone deserted me. May it not be held against them. (2 Timothy 4:16 NIV)

Not everyone in the Bible though struggled to find a friend when one was needed.  David, when he was running for his life from the king of Israel had a friend who was passionately loyal to him.  Hiding in the desert with a cabal of warriors, David was exhausted psychologically, spiritually and maybe even physically.  His good friend though, who happened to be the son of the man trying to hunt down David and have him killed, suddenly appeared and lifted David’s spirits.  And Saul's son Jonathan went to David at Horesh and helped him find strength in God.  "Don't be afraid," he said. "My father Saul will not lay a hand on you. You will be king over Israel, and I will be second to you. Even my father Saul knows this." (1 Samuel 23:16-17 NIV)

One book of the Bible is named after a great friend.  Ruth, who herself was a widow and struggling with her own loss, refused to let her mother-in-law be alone in her time of sorrow.  Having lost her two sons and her husband, Naomi quite understandably fell into a depression.  Feeling abandoned by God, Naomi just wanted to return to her hometown of Bethlehem and mourn there.  Yet one of her daughters-in-law, Ruth, wouldn’t let go of her.  She insisted that they stay together and was willing to leave her own village and family members and friends to remain close to Naomi.  Her pledge is one of the loveliest declarations of friendship found in literature.  "Don't urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God.  Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me." (Ruth 1:16-17 NIV)

A friend of mine reminded me of a poignant scene in the movie, The Passion of the Christ.  As Jesus was carrying the Cross through Jerusalem, bloodied and bruised, He stumbled and fell to the ground.  Mary, His mother was standing nearby and saw Him collapse.  Just as this happened, her thoughts flashed back to a moment when as a child, Jesus fell and scraped His knee.  Mary rushed to Him and picked young Jesus up and comforted Him in her arms.  In a flash, Mary flung herself down before Jesus in the road, gazed into His weary eyes, and tenderly mouthed to Him, “I’m here!”

The Bible uses a vivid term to express a simple way we can make the world a better place to live.  It is the Greek word “parakaleo” and it is rendered “encourage” in many English translations of the New Testament.  It literally means, “to call alongside”.  In the Gospel of John, Jesus says that the Holy Spirit is the “Parakletos”, the noun form of the word “parakoleo”.  It means “the encourager”, “the one who picks you up and helps you keep going”.  Jesus, by describing the Holy Spirit this way says that God in you is a strengthener, a motivator, a friend who stands by you.  God’s people are commanded to be encouragers, uplifters, faithful friends who are loyal.  How can we be that sort of people though all the time?  Won’t we get drained if we keep pouring ourselves into others?  Not if we allow the Encourager God to replenish our internal supply of courage, mental toughness and joy!  As we move toward the end of time and it gets tougher and tougher for people to avoid depression, not be pulled to commit suicide, stay out of alcoholism and drug abuse, not melt under the heat of anxiety and worry, the Bible tells us that Christian people must be there for others.  Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing. (1 Thessalonians 5:11 NIV)  The Lord insists this must be a priority of ours every single day!  “But encourage one another daily…” (Hebrews 3: 13 NIV)

Who will you reassure today?  Who is on your list to comfort, to encourage?  No one wears a sign that reads, “I am depressed”.  “I am ready to quit.”  “I feel hopeless.”  “My life doesn’t matter.” There aren’t red lights on the foreheads of your family members or co-workers that flash when they are discouraged and broken.  You just have to assume that the Holy Spirit, who encourages you and wants you to encourage others, will put it in your mind those who need you to say something loving, something supportive, something uplifting.  Perhaps you will be the voice God uses to give courage to someone, to motivate someone, to breathe life into someone.  With Christ living in you and through you, I wonder who it might be that will remember you always as the one who was there when life got rough and it seemed hopeless, who became the voice of God for them.  Who might one day look at you as the inspiration that led to a new direction in life?  Who will point to you as the reason they found new life and hope when they were lost and without the love of Christ to give them strength?  Who needs you to say, “I’m here”?

Too Far Down the Road

Jonah 1:11 NIV

 The sea was getting rougher and rougher. So they asked him, "What should we do to you to make the sea calm down for us?"

Have You Gone Too Far?

Recently I had to take a rental car back after a trip to Los Angeles.  I needed to return it to the San Jose airport which is about a twenty minute drive from my home.  Before that though I discovered from my son that my wife’s car needed to be taken to the mechanic so after dropping it off, I headed to the airport.  No one in my family could drive my car because it is a manual transmission and it was in the church parking lot.  So it was up to my son to bring my wife to the airport to come get me.  For an hour I waited for them to arrive.  Growing frustrated, I called my wife to find out what had happened to them, only to discover that the hood of my son’s car had flown open while they were driving on the freeway and because they could not figure out how to reattach the hood, they were driving slowly back home, praying the hood would not bounce back up onto the windshield again while they were in traffic.  So what was I to do?  It was easy, I would just call one of my friends to come get me but I only had the numbers of three people in my phone who I thought I could ask.  One by one I called each of them and every time, the person I called did not take the call.  So now what was I supposed to do?  The normal answer would be, “Just solve the problem!”

What is your typical response to a difficult problem?  Do you just figure out what to do? Do you make the best of things and not worry about the outcome?  Are you a fretter?  Do you try to find an expert and get advice?  Do you just quit when you aren’t sure what to do?  How do you respond psychologically to the problems in life?  Are you most likely to take charge of the issue at hand or pretend as if nothing is wrong?  It is true that each situation is different and sometimes we react one way and other times another way.  Yet we must admit that we probably have a default setting when it comes to challenging situations; a way of approaching them that is our usual pattern.  What is going to be suggested today is that we can go too far in how we solve matters and when we do so we can be left psychologically exhausted.

What is meant by “psychologically exhausted”?  This is the state when we find it nearly impossible because of the lack of internal resources to cope emotionally in our preferred manner.  For example, rather than feeling relaxed and peaceful, you can’t hold back your anger, depression despair, anxiety and bitterness or even lust or moral limits.  Like someone who is so tired from driving that she cannot keep from falling asleep at the wheel, certain types of situations become too big for you to handle the way you wish you could or would.  You blow up at someone you really do love.  You develop a headache because of anxiety levels you have reached.  You lie or act in ways morally incompatibly with your values or you give in to an addiction you thought you were past or don’t show the sort of integrity you think you should or believe you ought to maintain.  There is a cause of psychological exhaustion that is actually quite simple.  We try to do God’s work and it is too much for us to handle.

Here is a way of illustrating this that you may have experienced personally or at least have known of happening.  A person who is not a skilled swimmer wades out into the ocean and suddenly a wave unexpectedly swells and sweeps that person off his feet and he is caught in the undertow.  Flailing wildly, the person tries desperately to get his head above the water so he can get his breath.  His heart is pounding, his mind is racing in desperation and his eyes are frantically searching for the surface.  If he does survive, he is left exhausted and even traumatized.  Spiritually it is like that for you when you are not careful.  If you take away from God the work He alone is supposed to be doing, you respond psychologically in similar ways to the panting and traumatized swimmer.  We see examples of this mistake often in scripture.

There is a strange detail in the account of Jesus’ crucifixion that although curious, rings true to human nature.  Christ was hung on a cross and on either side of him two criminals were also nailed to crosses.  Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed.  When they came to the place called the Skull, there they crucified him, along with the criminals — one on his right, the other on his left…One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: "Aren't you the Christ? Save yourself and us!" (Luke 23:32-33, 39 NIV)  Isn’t this odd?  One of the two men suffering the same fate as Jesus, convulsing in terrible agony used that time to curse and mock Jesus.  His psychological pain was also great and the way he managed it was by insulting Jesus.  What had Jesus done to hurt this man?  How had he earned the fellow’s wrath?  Of course our Lord hadn’t done anything to warrant the insults and rage.  This was the case of someone dealing with a circumstance much too big for him to handle.  The terrors of impending death, the grief of a life wasted, the regrets of pain he caused others to suffer was crashing down upon him and he was trying to cope with all this on his own.  Unwilling to turn to God to carry him through his pain, he was left, like a drowning man unable to swim, without the psychological capacity to handle what he was facing and so the psychological reaction was to become angry with someone who actually loved him.

We see something similar in the Old Testament.  Unable to have children but determined to figure out some way to provide a child for her husband, Sarah, without turning to God for help and counsel, convinced her husband to take her servant girl and try to father a child through her.  We know how well this went.  Abraham was successful and the slave Hagar eventually gave birth to his son.  It was not quite as easy as Sarah imagined seeing her servant pregnant with a child her husband fathered.  When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress.  Then Sarai said to Abram, "You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my servant in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the Lord judge between you and me."  "Your servant is in your hands," Abram said. "Do with her whatever you think best." Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her. (Genesis 16:4-6 NIV)  Clearly Sarah’s jealousy was egged on by Hagar but Sarah’s plan worked perfectly except that she was not equipped psychologically to live with the consequences of her actions.  Rather than turn to God for help regarding her seeming infertility, she figured out things on her own and the result was she became psychologically exhausted trying to do God’s work.

Jeremiah 2 gives us rich insight into the difficulties we face solving all our problems without God.  "My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.” (Jeremiah 2:13)  The two sins are clearly to God evil and deadly.  The people quit turning to God for help and then developed their own strategies for solving their problems.  We have come to think as they did that getting along on your own is somehow noble and courageous.  But it is just the opposite.  It is foolish and ruinous.  On your own, all you have are the psychological skills you have acquired in life.  Some have quite a few and can manage well for a while without God.  Some have been so damaged by the hardships they have faced that they have almost nothing in them to keep their anger and depression and bitterness and jealousy at bay. Why do we see suicide and drug abuse and violence and crippling depression?  Without God carrying you through the troubles of life, you may or may not have the psychological strength to protect you and keep you at peace so you turn to your own brokenness to see you through.  There is however another option to independent living.

Consider the fascinating case study of Daniel who as a believer in God, prayed three times a day.  When a law was instituted that demanded no one would be allowed to pray to anyone other than the king for the next thirty days, Daniel coolly opened up the shutters covering his windows and quite publically continued praying to the Lord.  When he was caught and brought before the king, even though the king, who was desperate to try and save him from his own law, fretted in despair, Daniel seemingly did not have a care in the world and without comment bravely faced his sentence of being thrown into a pit with ravenous lions.  When the king heard this, he was greatly distressed; he was determined to rescue Daniel and made every effort until sundown to save him.  Then the men went as a group to the king and said to him, "Remember, O king, that according to the law of the Medes and Persians no decree or edict that the king issues can be changed."  So the king gave the order, and they brought Daniel and threw him into the lions' den. The king said to Daniel, "May your God, whom you serve continually, rescue you!" (Daniel 6:14-16 NIV)  Where did Daniel get his courage and peace to see him through his trials?  He went directly to God.

Jesus’ famous promise to give his people peace is almost universally misunderstood in one important detail.  Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. (John 14:27 NIV)  Jesus is not offering to give you a reason to have peace.  He is pledging that the peace He possesses Himself will be inserted into you when you accept it from Him. Regardless of what you have learned or not learned in life, of however many self-help books you have read or not read and however much confidence or despair is in you, God’s peace will take over and put calmness in your heart.  Christ did not die on the cross in order to give you strategies for having peace in your life.   That would leave you with the same failure rates of all other men or women who have tried to work out their problems on their own.  He died so that you might have his own personality working inside you regardless of what you face each and every day.  Stop trying to figure everything out on your own.  Let God work out things in you so that whatever challenges you face can be worked out through you.

Suicide—Intervention

1 Kings 16:18 NIV

When Zimri saw that the city was taken, he went into the citadel of the royal palace and set the palace on fire around him. So he died,

How Can You Help The Suicidal?

The after the election I was teaching in a middle school class and as the students filed into the room a number of them were complaining about the results and several were saying that they were going to move to other countries.  Perhaps they were planning on going with Barbra Streisand or Miley Cyrus.  A few of them, who had never before had met me but knew I was their substitute teacher for the day, asked me who go my vote.  They were too young to worry about whether or not it was proper to ask me and I thought it was funny to be pressed for an answer.  I just laughed and turned away but as I thought more about the moment, I should have told them that I voted for hope, I voted for optimism, I voted for life.  I did not vote because I was afraid of the worst, I voted because I believed that my vote would help our country and even our world.  I did not vote for dread or for gloom or for fear.  I voted for promise.  Not everyone feels that such things exist or can even come their way.  There are many who have no hope and believe there is no good in life…not today…not tomorrow…and not ever.

There is so much hopelessness in our country, it is astounding.  Last year suicide was the tenth leading cause of death in the U.S.  Nearly 43,000 Americans killed themselves last year and what is even more painful to realize, there are twenty-five attempted suicides for every person who actually commits suicide.  Another way to put it: there are 117 suicides every day in the U.S. and nearly 13 suicides for every 100,000 people.  Men are 3.5 times more likely to commit suicide than women and older people are much more likely to kill themselves than are young people.

What do we do about the massive numbers of people who feel hopeless and broken by life?  How should we respond when we realize a friend or neighbor or co-worker feels too miserable to continue living?  At the risk of giving simplistic answers to complicated and terrifying questions, it would be good for us at least to examine the only example we find in the Bible of someone on the verge of suicide who changes his mind at the last second.  Tucked away in the book of Acts is a most enlightening account of how two missionaries responded to the despair of someone who was ready to kill himself.

As Paul and Silas sang and worshipped in their jail cell in the Macedonian city of Philippi, an earthquake shook the jail and miraculously the prison doors flew open and the chains on each of the prisoners fell off them.  The jailor woke up immediately and saw the prison doors wide open and knowing what would come of him if the prisoners had all escaped on his watch pulled out his sword to kill himself.  Such hopelessness is a key component to suicide.  This jailor was much like millions of others who have looked at what they face and decided they could not bear living any longer.  It does not matter how true the assessment is; they may be completely wrong about how bad it is.  What matters is that the person ready to commit suicide thinks all is hopeless.  Paul the Apostle, one of the prisoners in the jail immediately cried out to the jailer, "Don't harm yourself! (Acts 16:28 NIV)  Literally, he shouts to the jailer, “May you not commit evil.”  When dealing with someone suicidal, it takes a clear and unequivocal voice from a person who cares; this is wrong what you are thinking of doing.  There can be no wavering on this.  If you want to stop a suicide, you must forcefully insist that it is evil, that it is wrong to kill yourself.  Do not leave even a crack open to the possibility that suicide is an answer to the problems faced.  Paul shouted because he did not want there to be any doubt in the jailor’s mind that killing himself was evil.  Of course the jailer could have still fallen on the sword but it would not be because he thought Paul approved.  If you want to help someone who is suicidal, you must insist that killing yourself is not an option and always wrong.

In the instant when Paul intervened he said something else that is critical to preventing suicides.  He cried out, “We are all here!" (Acts 16:28 NIV)  There was in this immediate reaction a burst of reassurance that it was not as bad as the jailer thought.  This is always the way to help someone who has lost all hope and wants to end life.  There is in every instance, more to consider, a reason for holding out and not committing suicide.  Yes it may be bad, it may in fact be terrible what is faced but regardless of how bleak it may seem now, there is someone who needs you someone whose life will suffer if you are not there.  It may not be as easy as it was for Paul who simply had to remind the jailer that none of the prisoners had fled the prison.  Sometimes you might have to pull from a deep pocket to find some reason for hope but you can count on the Holy Spirit to help you.  Perhaps it is the family that is still there who loves you or the possibility of recovery or the encouragement that others can gain from the courage you show.  There is always a reason to live because in every situation one’s life matters and great good will come of it if given a chance.

Immediately the jailer responded to the hope Paul offered and he asked what he needed to do to be saved.  The jailer called for lights, rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and Silas.  He then brought them out and asked, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" (Acts 16:29-30 NIV)  Without hesitating, the two prisoners told him, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved — you and your household." (Acts 16:31 NIV)  Too many Christians think of the Gospel as a message or a new approach to life.  It is far more than that.  It is the power of God to change a life completely.  To believe in the Lord Jesus is the entry way in which the Lord comes into the personality and rebuilds it.  The sin that has wrecked so much within begins to be taken from it so that memories and damaged emotions and broken dreams can be worked out by God and replaced with hope and promise and a fresh start.  The root cause of every suicide is Sin, whether it is brought on by the sin we have committed or the sin that has been committed against us or the physical damage caused by sin.  It is always the Sin that must first be addressed when the immediate threat of suicide is pushed back.  By joining with Jesus Christ in faith, there is no limit to how much healing God can do in the broken and aching personality.

When Paul told the jailer that he and his family would be saved if they believed in the Lord Jesus, it was not a quick fix panacea but rather what each person in his home needed to be made right.  The blood of Jesus Christ is a healing balm that goes deep into the heart of those who receive it and it works into every place of hurt and sorrow and fear and despair and makes life come fully alive at each point.  Paul did not call for the jailer to become Christian; he called for him to be saved.  What every person considering suicide needs is not a new religion but a new life that brings salvation.  The Cross of Christ puts peace and hope and even love into the human heart.   To put it another way, it makes the humanity of the person right.  We know this is the case with the jailer because of what happened next.  He never would have reacted as he did if the Cross of Christ had not worked its way in him and made him new in observable and hidden ways.

When our Lord takes hold of the one who is broken and hopeless, a miraculous transformation occurs that manifests itself in a dramatic way.  We see it demonstrated by the jailer.  Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all the others in his house.  At that hour of the night the jailer took them and washed their wounds; then immediately he and all his family were baptized.  The jailer brought them into his house and set a meal before them; he was filled with joy because he had come to believe in God — he and his whole family. (Acts 16:32-34 NIV)  Suicide is the cocooning of the soul so that it becomes withdrawn and self-absorbed and with nothing to lean upon but its own sorrow and brokenness its only way out is death.  All it can find within is sin and the damage caused by sin and in despair it finds nothing but self-annihilation as a solution to its pain.  When healing begins to take place, the soul looks outward and finds a whole world to love and embrace.  The jailer in this case saw Paul and Silas and the wounds they had and so he washed them and bandaged them and even that wasn’t enough to fill his longing to love and bring comfort and so he brought them to his house and made dinner for them.  Eventually, if the despair of a suicidal heart is to be taken away, the movement must shift to an outward extension brought on by love.  The jailer was drawn to the pain his new friends had and did what he could to take away their pain.  This was not a small deed he performed; it was almost supernatural in scope.  No jailer who wants to survive a Roman inquiry and court would take prisoners home and feed them.  Yet his love now could not be bound by the risk he felt expressing it because he no longer was absorbed with his own problems but now free to love the world God had given him

There are two verses worth memorizing and claiming as promises for all those who are broken by despair.  The first is Matthew 11: 28. "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (NIV)  Never forget that Christ really does bring rest and comfort to those who come to Him.  The second is Psalm 33: 20.  We wait in hope for the Lord; he is our help and our shield. (NIV)  We do not come to those who are hopeless and wanting to destroy themselves with empty hands and feeble alternatives.  We come with a Savior who is strong and able to save.  We come with hope that is not just trite verbiage but real hope that makes life good and filled with joy.  We come with God, our help and shield...the help and shield of every single hurting person we know. 

Suicide

1 Samuel 31:5 NIV

When the armor-bearer saw that Saul was dead, he too fell on his sword and died with him.

Have You Been Impacted By Suicide?

While I was working on my doctorate in marriage and family counseling, I decided to volunteer for a suicide prevention hotline.  After going through the practical training on working with callers, I was given my shift.  Four hours, once a week calls to the hotline were forwarded to our apartment and I waited for the phone to ring.  Sometimes I would go nearly an hour without getting a call and other times I spent the entire four hours on the phone.  Many times the callers were on the verge of killing themselves and I was all that stood in the way of them ending their lives.  Sometimes it was a teenager that called, other calls were from seniors.  Many were from alcoholics who were intoxicated and felt hopeless and broken.  Calls could last a few minutes and others hours. Often I had to first try to convince the caller to put down the gun or dump the pills in the toilet.  It was exhausting and unfortunately I did not get to find out what happened after the callers got off the phone with me.  One of the most frequent questions asked of me was, “If I kill myself, will I go to hell?”  Sometimes I would pray with the callers, other times I prayed silently as we talked.  It was the most stressful moments I ever had encountered; these shifts I took for the suicide prevention hotline and I heard many terrible and heart-breaking stories.  What struck me was how much pain and sorrow there was in people’s lives and I often wondered if someone in the supermarket or on the street as I walked downtown or even in the church where I was a member was thinking about committing suicide because life seemed too unbearable.

Perhaps you have been devastated by the suicide of a friend or relative and had a tough time trying to make sense of it.  Is suicide an acceptable option for someone suffering greatly?  Are there times when suicide is the right thing to do?  Perhaps you have heard someone comment that those with terminal illnesses or elderly ought to end their lives.  Do you know someone who is thinking about “ending it all”?  What would you say to that person?  Have you ever considered suicide?  Why is it that some people take their lives rather than face their problems and try to get past them?  What does the Bible have to say about suicide?  Does God have anything to say about suicide in the Scriptures?

There are seven suicides recorded in Scripture.  The most famous of course is that of Judas Iscariot.  But there are others also that must be considered if we are to have a Biblical view of suicide.  The first recorded suicide in the Bible is that of Abimelech who asked a servant of his to kill him when he received a deadly blow as he and his army attacked a town.  Abimelech went to the tower and stormed it. But as he approached the entrance to the tower to set it on fire, a woman dropped an upper millstone on his head and cracked his skull.  Hurriedly he called to his armor-bearer, "Draw your sword and kill me, so that they can't say, 'A woman killed him.'" So his servant ran him through, and he died. (Judges 9:52-54 NIV)  Technically this was an assisted suicide but the result was the same.  Pride and the determination that he could not survive the injury led to his decision.  Was he right to demand that his servant kill him?  Was the armor bearer right to run Abimelech through with the sword?

A similar situation is described in 1 Samuel 31.  King Saul led his army into battle against the Philistines and was wounded.  Three of his sons were killed in the fighting and his army was decimated.  Saul called to his armor bearer and demanded the servant kill him but this time the request was rejected.  Saul said to his armor-bearer, "Draw your sword and run me through, or these uncircumcised fellows will come and run me through and abuse me."  But his armor-bearer was terrified and would not do it; so Saul took his own sword and fell on it. (1 Samuel 31:4 NIV)  This did not kill Saul apparently but along came an Amalekite who later confessed to finishing the job.  When the armor-bearer saw what happened, he took his own life.  We see it here and have found this to be true again and again.  Suicide breeds suicide!

In 2 Samuel 17: 23, the advisor to Absalom who was leading a rebellion against his father, King David decided to kill himself when Absalom did not take his advice and strike out immediately and attack David’s army.  We cannot say exactly why Ahithophel hanged himself; maybe it was the humiliation he felt in not being Absalom’s most valued counselor, maybe it was his sense that the rebellion would now fail.  Whatever the case, it can be certain that his loss was deeply felt by Absalom at least and we assume his family too.  Pride…despair…hopelessness.  These are common threads found in the fabric of nearly every suicide.  Likewise, Zimri who also led a rebellion against his king killed himself when it became clear his cause was lost.  When Zimri saw that the city was taken, he went into the citadel of the royal palace and set the palace on fire around him. So he died, (1 Kings 16:18 NIV)

A second suicide is recorded in the book of Judges and it could be argued, and perhaps rightly argued that this in fact was not a suicide but rather a valiant act of war.  Samson had been captured by the Philistines when he stupidly let out the secret of his great strength to a Philistine lover.  Betrayed by the object of his lust, Samson’s eyes were gouged and with his strength gone after the Philistines cut off his hair, Samson was chained and thrown in prison. When the Philistines celebrated a national festival in their temple, Samson was brought out to entertain the crowd.  It all unraveled for the Philistines though when the Lord restored Samson’s strength.  Now the temple was crowded with men and women; all the rulers of the Philistines were there, and on the roof were about three thousand men and women watching Samson perform.  Then Samson prayed to the Lord, "O Sovereign Lord, remember me. O God, please strengthen me just once more, and let me with one blow get revenge on the Philistines for my two eyes."  Then Samson reached toward the two central pillars on which the temple stood. Bracing himself against them, his right hand on the one and his left hand on the other, Samson said, "Let me die with the Philistines!" Then he pushed with all his might, and down came the temple on the rulers and all the people in it. Thus he killed many more when he died than while he lived. (Judges 16:27-30 NIV)

Now if this was a suicide, then you could argue that God assisted Samson in it but it seems reasonable that this was in fact an act of war that would be no different than a fighter pilot attacking an enemy ship realizing full well he wouldn’t survive.  Yet the knowledge that many lives on his side might be saved if he followed through with the attack made this not a throwing away of his own life but the “laying down of his life” for his friends.  By taking down the temple, Samson killed the leaders of the Philistines and ended for a while the war between the Israelites and the Philistines.  Judges indicates that this was in fact a great victory for the Israelites, wrecking for a while the Philistine leadership and military strength which God seems to have helped Samson achieve.

Now we must turn to the last clear example of suicide found in Scripture, that of Judas Iscariot.  Only here and with the attempted suicide of King Saul is there given any sort of indication what the spiritual state of the person killing himself was.  With Saul, we are told that many years earlier, the Spirit of God left him and was replaced by an evil spirit that tormented Saul. Now the Spirit of the Lord had departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him. (1 Samuel 16:14 NIV)  Something similar is described with Judas Iscariot.  After Judas went to the Jewish leaders and offered to betray Jesus, he was with the Lord and the other disciples eating when Jesus offered Judas a piece of bread and instantly Judas was taken over by Satan.  As soon as Judas took the bread, Satan entered into him. (John 13:27 NIV)

In both cases, with Judas and Saul, there is described an evil invasion of the personality that is supernatural.  Both ended up taking their lives or at least trying to do so.  This sort of occurrence is not mentioned in any other of the suicides recounted in Scripture.  Of course not much at all is said about the mental state of any of the other men who killed themselves.  We can only guess at what was occurring internally with them.  What we do know is that the two most important suicides spoken of in Scripture involved people who were dominated by evil spirits.  Jesus says of the devil that he is a murderer.  You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. (John 8:44 NIV)  Christ also said of Satan that he comes as a thief who destroys.  The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. (John 10:10 NIV)

Before we take up this topic again next week and develop a Christian response to suicide, we must note carefully what the author of Hebrews insists.  The devil is the one who is in charge of death…Satan is in fact the death master planner.  He concocts plans for death, develops schemes to bring about death and pushes death on humanity. Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death — that is, the devil— (Hebrews 2:14 NIV) The only times we know anything about the internal state of those who committed suicide or tried to do so as documented in Scripture, Satan or demonic forces had hold of them.  If the devil is the one who drives people into death, then we must conclude that Satan is the one pushing people to suicide.  There is not a single instance in Scripture where you find a person of God committing suicide.  Even Job and Jeremiah, despite being miserable and wishing God would end their lives, never attempted suicide or tried to do so.  Despite the poor theology often developed by many writers in of the Middle Ages, they were right about this.  Suicide is self-inflicted murder and it must be assumed that Satan is behind it.  To aid in a suicide is to join the devil in his plans and to commit suicide is to make oneself his instrument.  Any careful assessment of suicide must take into consideration the fate of both the devil and death.  And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever…Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death.  (Revelation 20:10,14 NIV)

Holy, Holy, Holy

Is there any religion in the world that so completely recognizes the need of mankind more than Christianity?  If all that was necessary for a good life was a better list of self-help suggestions or moral platitudes, then we would be fit for any challenge before us.  The world would be nobler and more reasonable than at any time in history for there has never been a time that such a proliferation of advice has been available.  Suicide should have long been eliminated along with drunkenness and violence.  Yet we are not better off than before...perhaps not worse off but that is certainly debatable.  It is a modern absurdity that religion can help us without a radical transformation of our soul.  Give any system of thought a societal landing spot and it will do nothing to make the people there better.  Cannibalism did not spring up in a vacuum; it originated in a religious subsystem that could not redeem the people who lived its tenets to its logical conclusion.  The treasured and time-honored practices of wife-burning, child sacrifice, abandonment of elders and prostitution all sprang out of religious cultural mores.  We are ignorant of the facts if we think we can make ourselves better people by getting something taught more effectively.  Religious atheism brought us the wonders of genocide and death camps.  The problem facing all mankind is the deadly plague of sinfulness that permeates every level of each society on earth.  One can read the Proverbs day and night, meditate all one wants upon the Decalogue and nothing good will come of it but a more subtle and pervasive sinfulness petrified by pride.  We need a savior completely .   The most common mistake we make is to assume we can gain Christ and then figure out everything else .  Your soul is not fixed by you in any way; only Christ entering you through the Cross can make you actually right...perfectly right.  As more of you becomes engaged with Jesus crucified, more of you becomes pure and holy.  Say "no" to Jesus Christ even for an instant and the wreckage of sin stiffens its neck and won't let you pass any further.  Your temper will stay, your lust will stay, your despairing fretting will stay, your arrogant self-righteousness will stay, your argumentative piety will stay, your cursing heart will stay.  The unbeliever generally can care less if he changes a whit...He is too comfortable to move off his twilight roosting.  But the Christian, who has tasted the sweetness of real holiness will never be able to rest contentedly with his sin self still established.  The only way to be done with it, and it will be eliminated fully, is to give the crucified Savior His way in each part of your doings, to make His life the life you live day in and day out.  Let your body be the Holy of Holies for Christ the King to rule...never say "no" to Him as He works out of you habits sin has worked into you.  Never trust yourself but never doubt the power of God working through you and in you.

May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.    Galatians 6:14-15 NIV