Life is tough. Am I going to get any argument about that?
The philosopher Thomas Hobbes said that human life was
solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. Wow! Not the kind
of stuff we expect on Sunday morning. Supposed to be all,
“Praise the Lord”! But deep down, lots of people do feel that
life is tough -- solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.
Now most of us have tried to make something of our lives
anyway. We’ve tried to accomplish a few things. We’ve
gone to school and paid our dues, we’ve worked at our
professions and built our resumes. We think we might be on
the way. But have you noticed that whenever you try to
accomplish something, life gets even tougher? Have you
found out that when you push forward, something pushes
back at you all the harder? Just when it feels like you might
be getting ahead, something undercuts all you have done.
With your one step forward you take one or two or even
three steps backward. Isn’t that right?
Tough multiplies tenfold and nastiness comes in a
nanosecond. And yet, I am here this morning to proclaim
that when you get to that point – when you are fed up to here
– when you are consumed with how tough life is – that
is the moment when, through prayer, God will open a
window of opportunity. When the barriers are
insurmountable and it feels like you are a captive of
everything, God will open for you a window of
opportunity.
The apostle Paul, writing to the Corinthian church, is in the
mature phase of his life. He is able to look back over a
number of years of missionary service. He has
accomplished a few things along the way. But in this church
at Corinth he is up against a wall. He is facing something
that could blow away all that he has done. He is facing a
factious, contentious, argumentative crowd who have gotten
bent out of shape. They have spent their days worrying
about who gets to lead and whether tongue-speakers are
better Christians than others. Yet they have casually looked
the other way while one member was in a sexual dalliance
and other members gorged themselves at the church’s picnic
platters! Sound like any church you know about?
Paul had worked and worked with this crowd. At one point
he sent them a severe letter, a strong reprimand, but it had
done no good. Paul saw all his hard work going down the
tubes. But thanks be to God, Paul remembered that one day
he had discovered that through prayer, no matter how strong
the walls, God will open a window of opportunity.
Paul remembered that years before, right after the Lord
Jesus had confronted him on the Damascus Road, Paul had
found himself trapped in the city of Damascus. He had not
even gotten started on what the Lord wanted him to do with
his life, but here he was, trapped in a locked-down town, with
no way to get out. But – Paul remembers now when he is
dealing with these crazy Corinthians – Paul remembers that
at the very moment when things looked the worst, and the
barriers seemed impassable, at that very moment, his friends
put Paul into a basket, shoved him through a window in the
city wall, and he escaped. His extremity, bathed in prayer,
became God’s window of opportunity.
It has been well said that prayer may not always change
things, but in prayer God changes people, who in turn
change things. When life is truly tough, and the walls
seem to be closing in, through prayer God will open a
window of opportunity.
Do you feel trapped? Explore with me the ways we get
ourselves trapped. Find out with me how God will open a
window of opportunity for us.
I
Some of us feel trapped by the accumulation of
stresses. Things have piled up on us, one after another,
and we feel worn out, burdened down. It’s not only what we
have to deal with right now; it’s what we have been dealing
with, all along, and it feels like it’s still here, right on our
shoulders, all of it. Stress accumulates. Did you know that?
Have you ever taken one of those stress inventories that
asks you to report what has happened to you in the last
twelve months, and it gives a certain number of points to
each item, then you add them up to determine your stress
level? The stress inventory wants to know if in the last year
you changed jobs, a family member died, you had a health
problem, you made a major financial decision, you took a
course of study ... on and on. Every one of those things is a
stressor. The first time I took that kind of inventory a few
years ago, the year I became pastor here, I was off the
charts with stress and didn’t even know it! And as I speak
about this I see some of you who have accumulated enough
stress in the last few months to two lifetimes! Stress
accumulates, and it isn’t long before we feel trapped.
Sometimes that means we want to stop everything. We just
want to quit. A few years ago there was a Broadway play
with the prophetic title, “Stop the World; I Want to Get Off!”.
It’s not hard to feel that way. My mother, in her older years,
got fed up with housekeeping and cooking, and one day she
set down her laundry basket and announced, “I don’t want to
do this any more.” And, sure enough, she didn’t do any of it
anymore! I know the feeling; don’t you?
But now, folks, if you think you have accumulated stress, you
ain’t seen nothing yet! If you think lots of things have
happened to you, listen to Paul’s laundry list:
labors, ... imprisonments, ... floggings, and often near death. Five
times ... the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with
rods. ... stoning. Three times ... shipwrecked; ... adrift at sea; on
frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from bandits,
danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the
city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false
brothers and sisters, in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless
night, hungry and thirsty, often without food, cold and naked.
And we think we’ve got it tough?! Tell me if your list of
stressors beats that! I doubt it. You and I would have
surrendered long before that. But I don’t read anywhere that
Paul gave up. History does not tell us that Paul ran off to
chase golf balls in Florida! Paul kept on keeping on, even
with the mess in the church at Corinth. Why? And how?
Because he remembered that one day, years before, when
he thought he was trapped completely, God opened a
window of opportunity. Paul, committed to prayer, in
fellowship with the living Lord, knew that in his extremity was
God’s opportunity. Even in the accumulated stresses of life,
God will open a window of opportunity.
II
Some of us feel trapped by accumulated stresses, but
others of us feel caught in the web of our conflicting
feelings. We are immobilized by what we feel, deep in
ourselves. The trouble is that what we feel is sometimes so
conflicted that we cannot see a way out of the trap. In fact,
we help set the trap! But God, through prayer, I tell you, can
open a window of opportunity even when we are caught up in
our own conflicts.
Do you know what I mean when I speak of a self-fulfilling
prophecy? A self-fulfilling prophecy is a situation in which
what we feel about ourselves is so strong that we actually
bring about the very thing we are afraid of. For example, I’m
afraid of water. I really am. I tried swimming lessons at ten
years old, and I flunked floating. I am the original lead
balloon. I panic if my face goes under water. Well, because
I am already afraid of the water, if I go to the beach, what
happens? I panic and I start flailing wildly around, and put
myself into trouble! The water is dangerous to me because I
believe the water is dangerous. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Well, some of us trap ourselves by our own feelings, and
create the very thing we were afraid would happen. One
person is so afraid of failure, so tries to be so zealous, so
diligent, so compulsively correct that she creates the very
barrier she was afraid of in the first place. Another person is
afraid of success – yes, that can happen – afraid of
success, and so goes about his work thinking, “I can’t do
this. I’ll never make it”, and ends up with such a shambles
that in fact he guarantees that he will fail. We are caught in
our conflicted feelings and create the very thing we are afraid
of.
A number of years ago I heard a preacher speaking about
his ministry. He had moved from small church to larger
church to much larger church, and you would think that he
was getting something accomplished. And yet as he told the
story of his ministry, I saw him become more and more
agitated, more angry, and finally he blasted out, with
enormous hostility in his voice, “I’ve tried to show some
leadership and my deacons just get an attitude.” Wow! I
could see that if that pattern were not interrupted, this pastor
would bring about his own crash and burn! In his heart there
were nothing but enemies and nothing but barriers. He was
unconsciously working to assure his failure!
Paul gives us a glimpse into the feelings that had almost
engulfed him. It was not only that he had had to endure so
many hardships, but also that he had also felt so many
troubling things. He says,
... besides other things, I am under daily pressure because of my
anxiety for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who
is made to stumble, and I am not indignant?
Paul is telling us that he really cares about what he is doing;
he really feels what’s going on. It gets to him! All this mess,
and he is about to become a mess as well. He is about to
become a self-fulfilling prophecy. He is on his way to
becoming a victim of his own tangled web of feelings. But it
doesn’t happen. He does not crash and burn. Why not?
Because he remembers that day in Damascus, when,
through prayer, God opened a window of opportunity. He
remembers that he was a basket case, but our his extremity
God created an opportunity, through prayer.
III
Some of us feel trapped by our stresses; others of us feel
caught in our conflicted feelings. But I dare say even more
of us feel enmeshed in our shortcomings and sins. I
would guess that most of us have something in our lives that
keeps us from doing all we would like to do, and we would
love to change it, but it hasn’t happened. We are not what
we ought to be; and maybe we have not made peace with
that.
Hundreds of little boys out there on the playgrounds dream of
becoming the next Michael Jordan. But if nature placed a
weight on your head and you stopped growing at about five-
feet-six, it’s not going to happen. Forget about it.
Scores of young women dream of overtaking Venus and
Serena. Practicing power punches and poring over pattern
books for tennis dresses! But if by nature you are one of
these delicate little flowers who will never lift anything
heavier than a powderpuff, forget about it. It won’t happen.
Many of us feel trapped by our own shortcomings. Most of
us feel stopped by our sins. Some of us have done things
we cannot shake; it’s on the record, and nothing can change
that. Some of us have used substances that have altered
our body chemistry, and nothing will correct that. Some of us
have said things that have created such a rupture that
reconciliation seems impossible. How we wish we could
change the past! How we wish we could shove these faults
out of our lives!
This too Paul faced. This too Paul understood. After all, he
had presided over the deaths of Christians. But this too Paul
dealt with through prayer, and found in his life of prayer a
strength to overcome. Paul gave a great testimony:
... a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to
torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I
appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said
to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in
weakness.”
“Power is made perfect in weakness.” Even our sin is a
window of opportunity for God. Let us not give up. Let us
not give up on ourselves, and let us not give up on one
another. I do not want to give up on anybody, because God
has not given up on me. I want to understand and serve the
lonely, the frustrated, the broken, the hurting, because that’s
who I am too. One of our members, when she first came to
this church, was told that we didn’t want any hurting people
here. I do not know who said that, but I would guess it was
somebody hurting so badly that he was scared to death he
might get healed! We have to give ourselves permission to
be healed. We have to open up to God’s window of
opportunity. That’s what prayer does. It gives us permission
to be healed.
When, like Paul, I look back at my life, and think of the things
I wish I could have been rid of, and prayed to be rid of –
shyness, procrastination, tongue-tied speech – when, like
Paul, I look back and think of the things I prayed might be
removed, but they were not, I know that if there is in me
anything at all of value, it is not because I have achieved it.
It is because in prayer, God opened a window of opportunity,
and all I had to do was to give myself permission to climb out
of the window. His grace has been sufficient. His power is
made perfect in weakness.
Let us not give up on one another. All of us are basket
cases, but that means all of us are windows of opportunity
waiting to open. If God be for us, who can be against us?
A couple I know had been married for years, but never had
any children. They did everything. They consulted doctors,
they submitted to batteries of medical tests, and yes, they
prayed for a child. The doctors said there were genetic
problems, and it might be best if they gave up the notion of
having children. But they said “no”, they wanted a child and
were determined to press forward. At last the miracle came
and a child was on the way; but when that child was born,
she was a horror to behold. Her legs were twisted and
malformed. Her eyes did not track. And the hearing test
brought the awful news – she could not hear. This child for
whom they had prayed was profoundly impaired – completely
deaf, almost blind, with legs and arms that would never work
right, and with so many imperfections that everyone knew
this would be a very difficult life.
But this family was made of something special. This family
knew how to pray. And because of their prayer life, they
discovered in this challenge a window of opportunity. The
mother took a job in a center for disabled children, so that
she could be near her own child and could learn more about
the needs of children like this. It was not long before she
became an expert on special children; she was asked to be
advocate at the state level. Without the challenge of raising
her own impaired child, she would never even have found
the issue, but now, following her heart and listening to her
Lord, she became a voice for those who had no voice. For
her the wall had opened with a window of opportunity.
But then she and her husband saw that some of the children
at the center where she worked were essentially abandoned.
Their parents had found working with them too much, and
had signed over custody of these children to the state. My
friend began to see that not as a barrier, but as an
opportunity. She and her husband began adopting disabled
children. First one, then another, then another ... and by the
time I left the pastorate of their church, they had filled up a
whole pew with very special children! They had closed the
door on tragedy, for God had opened a window of
opportunity. Through prayer.
Prayer may not always change things. But prayer changes people, who
in turn change things.
So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the
power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with
weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for
the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.
