SURVIVING THE FIRE: Part 3

BURNT STONES

“…Will they revive the stones from the heaps of rubbish---stones that are burned?” Nehemiah 4: 2.

“…The strength of the laborers is failing, and there is so much rubbish (rubble) that we are not able to build the wall.”   Nehemiah 4:10.

Standing in the Rubble

Burnt stones lie as a broken-down monument to some past tragedy and testify to a loss of vision and lack of hope for the future. The "burnt stone" syndrome happens when a person  embraces wrong or sinful responses to difficulties, adversities, conflict, or mistreatment. These wrong responses, left uncorrected, hinder the grace of God, choke out the fruit of the Holy Spirit, and produce spiritual desolation. When a person gets the wind knocked out of him, his primary concern becomes self-protection rather than service.  Standing amid the broken fragments of collapsed walls, he loses heart and hope. How can I give of myself again after all my past investments have gone up in smoke?  How can I build again? Why should I build again? Who can I trust? These are questions asked by those who have been disabled by the fires of life.  To lose all that we have invested in, to be hurt by those from whom we least expected it, to be dismayed in the grief of our failures will strain our faith to the limit. When the past is seen only in terms of hurt and regret, the present is experienced as pain and emptiness left by the void, and the future is viewed as a dark place devoid of vision and purpose. When the past is a disaster or disappointment the future is faced with apprehension and fear. In such a state, it is very difficult to reach forward. With hair singed and garments blackened with soot from yesterday’s fire we tend to navigate our future looking in the “rear-view mirror” and stumbling over the rubble about us. Our discernment, understanding, and vision can be distorted by the lingering smoke filling the air around us.

Nehemiah described the ruined city of Jerusalem as being in great distress and reproach, with its walls broken down and its gates burned with fire. Glorious dreams and great expectations of its prophetic destiny had seemed to go up in smoke and scatter to the wind. Although the temple had been rebuilt by Zerubbabel and Ezra, the walls and gates of the city were still nothing more than shattered ruins and heaps of rubble with stones burned, torn down, broken, and scattered. This picture of desolation is a fitting description of those who have been derailed and sidelined from the mainstream of God's plan for their lives. They sit desolate and spiritually disabled, "burnt stones" lying in the rubble of what they once thought could never be moved or shaken.        

Like the city Nehemiah came to rebuild, the temple is there, but the walls are down. Spiritually disabled and without vision, so many "burnt stones" lying in rubble, out of place, and dysfunctional. They have enough pulse to claim life but not enough life to enable usefulness in God's service.  They have resigned themselves to spiritual "nursing homes." Their primary goal is to survive and make it to heaven. Some, even more sadly, have quit altogether and from their prisons of disobedience find themselves questioning God and keeping a “safe distance” from the people of God lest they be hurt again.

Some become bitter and openly hostile to the things of God. Others, like the humble but stubborn donkey, are passive-aggressive as they “lick their wounds,” quietly refusing to obey the Lord as they sit paralyzed in the rubble of past disappointments, failure, conflicts, or hurt.        

An Excerpt from My Daily Journal

We must have a godly response to people and the problems of life in order to proceed with purity of heart, clarity of discernment, and purity of message. Years ago when facing a time of stress and potential conflict, I asked the Lord for grace and wisdom in how to deal with those whose actions and attitudes were hurtful to me. Below is an excerpt from my journal at that time. It is a prayer I sincerely presented to the Lord.

“I pray, Lord Jesus, that I engage YOU properly in order to come through this situation …in faith…in love…in purity…and that I please the Lord in word, action, and heart. I pray that I come through it with a pure word.

I do not want to proceed with a ‘chip on my shoulder,’ cynical, bitter, in self-pity, and thus risk this coloring and tainting my message and life henceforth.

I want to engage the Lord in such a way as to minister and speak with attitudes and words of grace and purity that are such that ‘none fall to the ground.’ (1 Sam 3)

Let my message not be tainted, but let it be refined as silver is refined in the fire.

Let me know how to be full of grace and truth in facing this and all other situations I may encounter.”            

God’s Redemptive Power

Isaiah prophetically called our age the year of God's favor. This means that God is working redemptively to turn all things to good for those who yield to Him in obedience and faith. He sends the fire to purify. He allows trials in order to perfect, establish, and strengthen. He applies the rod of discipline to train and to produce holiness. Even judgment itself, which generally represents punishment upon the wicked, is often God’s intense effort to effect repentance and draw the wayward back to Him. God deals with people in His love and wisdom, and intends for them to come through all things in better shape spiritually than when they started. It is man’s negative responses, however, that hinder the plan and cause him to end up burned rather than refined. But God’s real desire is to cause all things to work together for our good and toward his wonderful plan for our lives.

Like the three Hebrew men, we can come through the fire without smelling like it.

“Then Nebuchadnezzar went near the mouth of the burning fiery furnance and spoke, saying, ‘Shadrach, Meshack, and Abed-Nego, servants of the Most High God, come out, and come here.’ …Then they came from the midst of the fire...And they saw these men on whose bodies the fire had no power; the hair of their head was not singed nor were their garments affected and the smell of fire was not on them.”  Daniel 3: 26-27

The verse quoted at the beginning of this article was the scornful question asked by Israel’s adversary Sanballat, “Do these people think they can revive these burnt stones and build from this rubbish?”  The answer, of course, is “Yes, these stones can be raised up.” The Apostle Peter says it well. “You are coming to the Lord as living stones being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”  1 Peter 2: 4-5.

This post describes the problem without giving any detailed list of solutions. However, there are many practical “down to earth” Biblical principles that enable us to avoid becoming burnt stones. These same principles also help us to rebuild when we find ourselves standing in the rubble. In future articles, I would like to discuss how we can face life redemptively and come through the fire without “smelling like smoke.” We can see the redemptive power of God as we walk with Jesus in faith, obedience, and forgiveness. We do not have to be spiritually disabled and derailed.