PLUS

Judges 17:6 “In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes.”

II Chronicles 7:14 “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”

Lieutenant General Harold “Hal” Moore was a decorated and famous member of the United States Army. He was the first member of his West Point class to be promoted to 1-star, 2-star, and 3-star General.  The popular book and movie We Were Soldiers Once … And Young colorfully detailed his role as a Lieutenant Colonel and as the commanding officer of the 1^stBattalion, 7^thCalvary Regiment in the first major battle involving the American military during the Vietnam War.  This week-long battle, starting on November 14^th, 1965, saw innovations in warfare including the first-ever helicopter air assault, but its mixed outcome may have convinced the leadership of North Vietnam that they could ultimately defeat the Americans in a prolonged and bloody conflict.

In We Were Soldiers Once … And Young, Moore offers his overarching thoughts on American history and culture.  He boldly stated: “There were two great tragedies in the twentieth century.  One was the decline of morality in our country. The second was the war in Vietnam. It was an unnecessary war.”  What a telling and thought-provoking comparison on this Veteran’s Day weekend and 53^rdanniversary of the start of that conflict!

Over 58,000 American servicemen died in that “unnecessary war.”  Additionally, over 200,000 South Vietnamese soldiers died and over one million North Vietnamese military members perished.  Finally, over two million civilians died during the conflict.  Yet, according to Moore, the decline of morality in our country is equivalent to all of that.  Even if he is only partly correct in this powerful statement, then Christian Americans must awake and act.

PLEASE PRAY FOR AN IMMEDIATE AND REMARKABLE REVERSAL OF THE MORAL DECLINE OF AMERICA.  May our faithfulness, our prayerfulness, our humility, our repentance and our godly passion reverse the tragedy involved in the moral decline of our nation.

Proverbs 29:18 “Where there is no vision, the people perish:  but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.”

A few weeks ago, I spent a couple of hours in the pilot torture chamber known as the centrifuge – a large spinning machine that simulates the forces of maneuvering flight. After being out of the business of flying fighter aircraft for several years, going through the centrifuge was a prerequisite before hopping back in a high-performance aircraft.

The centrifuge is the tool used by the military to teach and refresh aircrew members on the necessary strain and breathing technique to withstand the high-G environment that draws blood away from your brain and causes it to pool in your lower body.  If you don’t properly execute this technique during heavy maneuvering, you can deprive your brain from necessary oxygen-rich blood causing you to pass out from a condition called G-lock.  If this happens in an airborne aircraft, you will likely perish, crashing before you regain your senses.

There is a precursor to the passed out condition of G-lock – you start to lose your vision.  It starts as a narrowing tunnel vision, and if not corrected, will lead to a complete loss of vision slightly before you go unconscious.  The loss of vision slightly precedes the loss of consciousness unless corrected.  The loss of vision is a sign that you are about to perish and you must recover immediately before it is too late.

In our lives as Christians, we need a vision to guide our lives.  We need vision to steer our families and our churches.  The loss of vision is a sign that we are about to perish – becoming irrelevant and useless to the cause of Christ.

PLEASE PRAY THAT AMERICAN CHRISTIANS WOULD BE GUIDED BY A GODLY VISION THAT SHAPES AND MOTIVATES OUR WAY. Whenever we recognize an impending loss of vision, we must recover immediately before it is too late.

Matthew 7:3-5 “And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?  Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?  Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.”

As described in the previous post (see https://prayatlunch.us/every-part-matters/), June 1980 saw a near nuclear catastrophe because of the failure of a small, simple, single 46-cent part in the American early warning missile detection system.  The billion dollar advanced capabilities of the United States were rendered useless and actually counterproductive because of this malfunctioning miniscule computer chip.  The tiniest of deviations corrupted the entire system.

We are very quick to lament the state of the world around us.  We rapidly recognize the flaws of others and dismiss those flaws in our own lives.  We see the subtly placed mote in the eyes of our neighbors and neglect the glaring beam that is grossly protruding from our own eye.  We forget that even if our own faults are mote-sized, they have a significant impact on our effectiveness.  We forget that the tiniest of deviations can corrupt the entire system.

Both the mote and the beam are harmful to the cause of Christ in America.  Our complacency about our own faults (even if they appear to be 46-cent faults), the hypocrisy in our skewed perspective and our judgmental attitude about the faults of others (even if they appear to be billion dollar faults) diminish the ability of our body to truly impact our world in the way intended by our Savior.

PLEASE PRAY FOR AMERICAN CHRISTIANS TO FIRST WORK ON RESOLVING OUR OWN FAULTS BEFORE ENGAGING IN THE FAULTS OF OTHERS.  May we never forget that deviations in our own lives (small or large) can corrupt the entire system.

I Corinthians 12:20-27 “But now are they many members, yet but one body.  And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee: nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you.  Nay, much more those members of the body, which seem to be more feeble, are necessary: And those members of the body, which we think to be less honourable, upon these we bestow more abundant honour; and our uncomely parts have more abundant comeliness.  For our comely parts have no need:  but God hath tempered the body together, having given more abundant honour to that part which lacked:  That there should be no schism in the body;  but that the members should have the same care one for another.  And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member be honoured, all the members rejoice with it. Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular.”

On June 3^rd, 1980, unbeknownst to the majority of humanity, the world faced a nuclear catastrophe that nearly ended humanity as we know it.  In the midst of especially high tensions with the Soviet Union, the military screens at NORAD detected 2 inbound Soviet missiles.  A few moments later, 220 missiles were detected, and that number increased to over 2,000 shortly thereafter.  As split second decisions were passed up the chain of command in how to respond, as nuclear alert crews were scrambling to their bombers, and as launch messages were being prepared for the missile fields and the submarine captains, the missiles on the screens disappeared without a trace and no missiles struck our nation.  The same scenario happened three days later.

Maintenance troubleshooting crews scrambled to determine the cause of the false alarm.  They quickly converged upon the culprit – the failure of a single, 46-cent computer chip.  When that chip failed, it transmitted a 2 instead of a 0.  In the computer code, that numerical value was translated into the number of inbound missiles, increasing in order of magnitude each time the signal was sent through the complicated early warning system. The engineers as the Pentagon recognized after that incident that every part mattered and nothing in the system could be discounted, minimalized, or marginalized.

If Christians in 21^stCentury America are to have the impact that God intends for us, then we need to embrace the idea that every part matters and nothing in the system can be discounted, minimized, or marginalized.  God has tempered our body together, and we are to never divide it asunder.  The schisms within our churches are footholds for Satan to exploit and for our secular society to mock.  We are to work together, suffer together, and rejoice together.  We are to embrace others around us.

PLEASE PRAY FOR CHRISTIANS IN AMERICA TO SUCCESSFULLY WORK TOGETHER AS THE BODY OF CHRIST.  Every part matters!

ADMIN NOTE:  The story above is from the book Raven Rock

Haggai 1:6 “Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.”

II Corinthians 10:12 “For we dare not make ourselves of the number, or compare ourselves with some that commend themselves:  but they measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise.”

Matthew 6:19-21 “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:  But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

We live in a society consumed by consumption.  We worship wealth and thirst after treasure.  We measure ourselves by our material output.  Yet, we never find the happiness that we think will come at the other end of the cash register or the checkout stand.  Our shopping bag leaks like a sieve as our wages seep out and are swept away.

American Christians often get caught up in this societal obsession.  We sometimes mimic the consumption addiction we see around us, forgetting that our earthly treasures are corrupted by moth and rust and our competition with others provides an unwise and unreliable standard.

Instead, we are to invest our lives in non-material items with eternal significance.  After all, laying up heavenly treasure provides a permanence to our efforts as compared to the fleeting folly of the race on the earthly treadmill.

PLEASE PRAY FOR AMERICAN CHRISTIANS TO AVOID THE EARTHLY AND AFFIX TO THE HEAVENLY.  May our hearts follow the permanent treasure of heavenly significance.