Influencers Weekly Devotional

Strong Calm Sanity by

Rocky Fleming

“When once we get intimate with Jesus we are never lonely, we never need sympathy, we can pour out all the time without being pathetic. The saint who is intimate with Jesus will never leave impressions of himself, but only the impression that Jesus is having unhindered way, because the last abyss of his nature has been satisfied by Jesus. The only impression left by such a life is that of the strong calm sanity that Our Lord gives to those who are intimate with Him.” Oswald Chambers – My Utmost for His Highest - January 7th entry

“The only impression left by such a life is that of … strong calm sanity ….” When I read those words, all I could say was, “Yes! That is how I’ve tried to describe the hidden strength that lies below the surface of someone who abides in Christ!” As a writer, I am given the challenge to engineer words to describe something I’m feeling, or visually see, or am being led by God to write. I like to take my time and carefully invest my thoughts and prayers into the particular words I choose. Even though I do this, there are times I can’t find words to describe some mysterious way God works, and it frustrates me. However, it excites me when I read something such as Chambers words, for they hit a mark that I could not. Way to go Ozzie! These words are profound to me in many ways. They describe something within a person the world can neither input nor extract. When we see it, we are left with an indelible impression of a work that only God could do in the person, and it sometimes defies description. In this day and time of hype and self-promotion by those who think it is the best way to grab attention, being able to see something in a person that is so pure that you just know it has to be the Living God authenticating him, leaves me without words. For instance: A few years ago a friend of mine was on a short-term mission trip and was serving people who live in and off the garbage city of Guatemala City. If you haven’t been to one of these places, you will find on the outskirts of several major third world cities around the world, you might not fully understand the culture or the challenges these people face. As far as the culture, the people who live and work in these places are regarded by the surrounding inhabitants as less than human … and called scavengers. They are seen as the lowest of the low as far as economic, education, health, and most other standards go. Even the poor people in the city look down on them. Most citizens in the city don’t want to see them or acknowledge them. Therefore, they are an inconvenience, and seen as a blight on the city. Got the picture? How would you like for you and your family to be seen as a blight on the city you live in, and know that you are seen that way? Kinda takes away a man’s self worth and esteem, wouldn’t you agree? From my own personal experience, I visited the garbage city of Cairo Egypt when I was there a few years ago. I went into the dirt floored, one room hovel where three generations lived … a grandmother, father, mother, and several children. I smelled a stench that permeated the “city”, and again, I could never describe it with words. I held children in my arms who had smiling faces, simply because someone outside their world would touch them. They innately knew that they repulsed most people outside their world. Because of this, there was something about them that tugged at my heart. Maybe it was because I was seeing a child who would likely never get out of the culture and the life he or she presently lived, and their shortened lives would be a hard drudge until they took their last breath? The life that lives in a garbage city is painful, limiting, and a fight for survival … everyday. How can anyone find something to smile about if you live there? Well, it depends on whether that “strong calm sanity” Chambers speaks of lives within the person. I saw it in Egypt with some of the Coptic Christians who lived in the garbage dump. My friend saw it in his new friend Juan, as he scraped out a living in the garbage city of Guatemala City, and demonstrated the strong calm sanity Chambers speaks of. After ministering to families in the garbage city and getting to know them, my friend saw something in the Christians who lived there that he rarely sees in Christians back in the States. This caused him to say to his new friend, “Juan, I don’t understand you people.” Juan answered back, “What do you not understand?” My friend explained, “I don’t know how you people can have so much joy and happiness, especially because you all are so needy. Juan replied, “Indeed you do not understand. You see we are not needy. We are only dependent. We are dependent on God … and He never lets us down. That is why we have the joy we have. We always have just enough, and He takes care of us always. Why wouldn’t we have joy?” Wow! Think of it. There must be something about this man’s perspective that we do not understand. How can any man live and raise a family who he loves in such a place as a garbage city without turning to crime to provide for them, or go insane with fear because he is so impossibly challenged everyday? There must be a mysterious strength, even a force within a man that would enable him to be able to live with such courageous and victorious faith in God, and even live with joy in spite of his challenges? There must be something within him to wake up each morning not knowing if he can bring food back to the leaking hut he lives in and feed his family … but still smile? Surely this man has all the same basic needs and desires that people outside of his conditions have? He wants what we want for our family. He wants for them safety and security. He wants for them an education so they can get out and stay out of the garbage he lives with each day. He wants to give his babies a toy, or a piece of candy, or anything to show them he loves them. He wants his wife not to grow old before her time because of the backbreaking work she endures. But she does anyway. He hates it when a child of his is birthed by his wife only a few feet above a dirt floor. But, there is no other option. He wants better for his family as any family man does. But, he will not find it where he lives, and the life he was born to. And yet he smiles. He has a heavenly smile that is as contrasting to his world as a diamond in a garbage heap is. He looks you in the eye and says convincingly that he might be the most blessed man in the world, and deep down you know he’s telling the truth, but you can’t understand why or how. When he speaks, you understand you are looking at someone who truly defies description. But, you also realize you are looking at someone who’s got walking with Jesus figured out. Chambers understood what is going on in a man like Juan. He described it best when he called it a “strong calm sanity” living in a man, when everything else around him is going nuts. Some of us who have lived in the luxury of having at least one good meal a day, a dry room and a warm bed each night might say that Juan is nuts to have joy while living in a place like a garbage city, and that he doesn’t have the strong, calm sanity mentioned. He’s simply crazy. In some ways I would agree. He would look crazy in some people’s eyes. I also think the things Jesus asks of His disciple might look like intellectual suicide for a lot of people as well. Why turn the other cheek, when someone deserves being struck in return? Why give away your riches to the poor to follow Christ, when being poor is so hard? Why pray for your enemy when he deserves your wrath? Why should we deny ourselves and take up a cross to follow Christ? After all, a cross got Jesus killed, and a guy has to look out for himself. Right? Yes, the cross represented death for Jesus, and it will for you and me. But being a true disciple of Christ requires that we die to ourselves and trust Him everyday, no matter if we are rich or poor. Dying to self is so very difficult, especially if you have a lot of things to keep you happy and comfortable. Juan understands this. I think I know why Juan thinks he is so blessed. I think he believes he is blessed by his poverty instead of being limited by it. I think he looks at many wealthy people who are so dependent on their wealth and pity’s them because they don’t have the poverty he has to make them aware of the idols that they depend on. By the way, according to his living standards, anyone reading this devotional is extremely wealthy. In many ways I feel that God’s family in America is like the Church in Laodicea. This is the warning sent by God to this church: “You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.” Revelations 3:17 -18 Most people in this country, including the Church, would describe Juan as “wretched, pitiful and poor,” while not realizing that this is how Christ sees them. Therefore, to understand God’s point of view, it would be good to ask how you think Jesus would describe Juan? I think Jesus would say, “There goes a man after My own heart. What he has in this life, and what I have stored up for him later cannot be understood by this world. But know this: I am well pleased with him.” That description is about Juan, and it would delight any man to hear this said about him by Jesus. But this next description concerns you personally. It is a very important question that you need to seek an answer for. “How would Jesus describe you?” Download file