THE DEVIL’S LAST STAND

“It is not when things are going well that we make our progress. It is not even when things are going wrong and yet we feel sure that we can handle them with prayer, that we advance. It is when, smitten by the temptation to discouragement or even despair, we yet stand for what we know is the Truth.” Forgive my language but an expletive is required. A wise man said to me years ago “there will be days when in pain, seemingly at wits end when you are going to look around and say WHAT THE F%&# GOD!” We have been working diligently, doing all that is indicated and yet life has gone sideways. Prayers seem to be falling on deaf ears and meditating has lost its savor. We begin to embrace negative analysis and wallow in morbid reflection. Everything is turning from light to dark. We begin to ask, “What’s the point?” We placed our trust in God and He has seemingly abandoned us at the worst possible moment. These times are always fed by a loss of perspective. We forget that we are eternal, that this is just one day in a very long existence, that we are living in eternity now. Dwelling on the false belief that this time nothing will change, that the dark will only become darker and we are adrift, alone and unloved. Perhaps even so far as to entertain doubts about even the existence of God and all the destructive thinking that this path leads to.

When that moment grips us, we redouble our efforts. How? By the simple recitation of possibly the most powerful prayer in the Bible: Be still and know that I am God. And wait. What an order. The times when the only action is non-action and allowing God to work are the hardest. When we find ourselves in the devil’s last ditch, having a WTFG moment we should rejoice in our good fortune. (It would be less than honest of me to say that I have the “rejoice” part down as of yet.) Today when I feel discouragement and despair creeping into my consciousness I do stop, sometimes quickly sometimes slowly, and repeat the prayer. And wait. Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord. (Psalm 27:14) and Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him (Job 13:15). Simple, but not easy.