O CALL ME “INRI” LED: Sometimes we have to “bite the bullet”...

When wounded soldiers were treated for battlefield injuries in the 1700s, it was a custom to give them something to bite on, to serve as a distraction and to help them keep their jaws clenched tightly shut during painful procedures. This didn’t stop the pain, but it did give the men something else to focus on and, with their jaws busy holding an object, they were unable to scream — at least, not very loudly. These men were often given a bullet to bite on for this purpose, which gave rise to the phrase “bite the bullet.”

By the late 1800s, the phrase began to be used as an idiom to signify doing something that needed to be done, no matter how unpleasant. The act does not need to be physically painful, but is generally something that causes discomfort in some way. It can refer to all kinds of things people must do, choices they must make or circumstances they must deal with. *

The man who had a heart after God’s own (1 Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22) once had sincerely confessed:

Psalm 119:71-72 (ESV)

It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes. The law of your mouth is better to me than thousands of gold and silver pieces.

and while being carried along by the Spirit (2 Peter 1:21) penned:

Psalm 23:4 (ESV)

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

Can our own hearts sincerely make these same claims with complete honesty? Or would we be found just as guilty as Ananias & Sapphira of lying to Holy Spirit if we dare to do so?

Do we trust that The Triune Creator, The Breath of Heaven, “will prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies and anoint our heads with oil overflowing our cups with His goodness and mercy?” (Psalm 23:5-6)

Or rather do we fear that Our Father won’t spare the rod and rather let us “eat the fruit of our way” as Wisdom herself avoids our presence and responds to our cries with silence as she mocks at our terror and laughs at our calamity in reprisal for having none of her counsel and despising all of her reproof, manifesting our hatred for knowledge and our disregard and disrespect for God? (Proverbs 1:20-31)

After all, due to longstanding unrepentant sinfulness, should The Almighty that has not spared the majority of Israelites in their desert trek to the Promised Land, and then subsequently did not spare ancient Israel from destruction by those nations even more sinful than her, spare us experiencing consequences from our own unrepentant sinfulness?

Should He permit and accept any one of His children to worship Him with their lips while their hearts remain far from Him? (Isaiah 29:13-14) Should the God who exposed and did not tolerate the hypocrisy of the religious elite in Christ’s day, somehow permit and accept the hypocrisy of today’s current self-professed Christians? (Luke 11:37-54)

If God should permit tragedy to enter into our life and to have the full force of life’s storms hit our homes unabated, should we really be shocked or surprised? After all, were we not taught by The Great Teacher Himself that storms will impact both those that are good and those that are evil? (Matthew 7:24-27)

What are we to say then about life’s “storms, trials, & tribulations”? Are these things to be ignored and avoided at all costs, and by any means necessary? Or possibly, should we humbly acknowledge them as part of the parcel of God’s good gifts that he has given to us; equal in every respect to the sun and rain that falls on the good and evil, the just and the unjust? (Matthew 5:45)

For more about blessings and curses please read Deuteronomy 27-30 & the following article: Blessings and Curses - Unfolding Biblical Eschatology

Is it wrong to pray sincerely for your heart’s desires and for being spared from life’s undesirable and unpleasant trials, tribulations, and pain?

No, Absolutely not!! Even Jesus fell face down on the ground and cried out in prayer to The Father in the Garden of Gethsemane, (Matthew 26:39, Mark 14 :35) pleading his sincere heartfelt request, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me;.” And we should follow Our Savior’s example remembering His life giving words of truth:

Matthew 10:24-25 (ESV)

“A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master. It is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher, and the servant like his master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household.

Luke 14:27-28 (ESV)

Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?

...and like He, we should not demand from Our Father what He knows is not best to bestow upon us. Rather we should follow Jesus’ example completely and like He pray, “Yet not what I will, but what you will.” (Matthew 26:39)

Shouldn’t we modern day Christians who have been blessed with the complete revelation of God found in the closed canon of Scripture have at least as much faith as the Old Testament believers of Daniel and his friends, who had only a partial glimpse found in the yet unfulfilled prophecies of their day? Cannot we refuse to cave before, and into, sin just as Daniel’s friends refused to cave into the King’s demands for worship, bowing before his idol? Cannot we manifest a similar attitude as they?

Daniel 3:16-18 (ESV)

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. If this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

If we in our humanity continually to fail to do so, shouldn’t we then express gratitude to Our Loving Father’s gift of discipline expressed through life’s storms, trials, &tribulations? Rather than focusing on the loss and pain found in our current circumstances, can we not rather look joyfully forward to sharing in His holiness and to one day possess and enjoy the resulting peaceful fruit of righteousness which God wants us to have and enjoy? (Hebrews 12:7-14)

The answer to the problem of our stubborn infidelity is the same as that of the Old Testament nation of Israel - it ultimately rests in God himself. “He will somehow enable his people ultimately to do what they cannot do in their strength, namely, to obey him out of the conviction and devotion of their own hearts.” (McConville, Grace in the End, 137) God’s promise to circumcise their hearts anticipates the promise of a new heart and new covenant found in the prophets (Jer. 31:31–34; Ezek. 36:22–28). In effect, God is telling Israel in Deuteronomy that she cannot in her own strength obey the very law that he is giving her. Because of Israel’s stubborn self-confidence, however, this is something that she will have to learn the hard way. (Blessings and Curses — The Unfolding of Biblical Eschatology, Keith Mathison Feb 27, 2012) Unfortunately, sometimes so will we.

If we should currently find ourselves either tempted to, struggling with, or fully engaged in worry over life’s circumstances, please harken your ear to a biblical encouragement that is recorded being given by the prophet Joel:

Joel 2:12-14 (ESV)

“Yet even now,” declares the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments.” Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster. Who knows whether he will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering for the Lord your God?

In summary, Godly living is not role playing. It is not a performance. If our Christianity is just a matter of doing our best to follow a list of do's and don'ts then we are nothing more than Christian Pharisees. Holiness begins in the heart. It is a matter of motives. What do I want? What are my goals? What are my desires? Fixing what's broke here requires real transformational change. This can only be done by and through the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit. He alters the desires of our heart. The Lord changes us from the inside out. (Hebrews 4:12-13, Philippians 2:13) Our prayer should therefore be:

Lord – Our Rock and Redeemer, Merciful, Gracious God, You who heal the broken hearted, give sight to the blind, and raise the dead to new life,

Lord we call upon you asking O Gracious God, that we your children would hear your Holy Voice, through the pages of your Word, as we humbly study it together. We give you thanks O Lord for your faithfulness that even when we’re faithless, You remain faithful. We thank you that You are unchanging and we ask O Lord for grace and mercy to currently abound in our hearts and minds. Please guide us in all truth. What we do not know, teach us. For the things we do know but do not live, empower us by your Spirit. Please cause your word to be illuminated to our hearts that we may live a life for your glory. Please provide us with proper motives, and establish righteous desires in us. Please help us set goals that stem from your Living Spirit and not from our old, dead, sinful natures that still actively wages war within us. Please make our words honest & true, economical & few, as well as wise and well chosen. Above all, grow in us a passion for your honor and praise, above our own desires for a more consistent happiness based on our current circumstances that provide us comfort, peace, and security. Please let us know that these rewards can only be eternally experienced in an appropriate saving relationship with You and that anything apart from this is only this world’s worthless pyrite which will ultimately one day be fully consumed and destroyed by your righteous judgmental fire. Therefore today please break our hearts for what breaks Yours and bring us whatever brings You glory!!

In Jesus name,

Amen

Closing with the words of Matthew Mead: [The mighty God, whose prerogative it is to teach to profit, whether by the tongue or the pen, by speaking or writing, bless this tract, that it may serve you as a cloud of rain to the dry ground, dropping fatness to your soul, that so your fleece being watered with the “dew of heaven,” you may “grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” In whom I am your friend and servant.]

Carmine DiLello

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