Wake Up, Neo!

ESV 1 Thessalonians 5:4 But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief. 5 For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. 6 So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober. 7 For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night. 8 But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation. 9 For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,

ESV Romans 13:11 Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. 12 The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. 13 Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.


“A person had to get fed up with the ways of the world before he, before she, acquires an appetite for grace.” Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience In the Same Direction , p. 25

“’I’m doomed to live in Meschech, cursed with a home in Kedar! My whole life lived camping among quarreling neighbors.’ But we don’t have to live there any longer. Repentance, the first word in Christian immigration, sets us on the way to traveling in the light. It is a rejection that is also an acceptance, a leaving that develops into an arriving, a no to the world that is a yes to God.” Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience…, p. 33

1 John 2:15-17 Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of god lives forever.

The picture on the top represents the kingdoms of this world. The picture on the bottom represents the kingdom of our God. The picture on the top illustrates the futile attempts of the kingdoms of this world to bring peace between factions that have been warring for generations. It is a picture of the walls erected in Baghdad to keep the Sunnis from attacking the Shiites and vice versa. And we all are witnessing how well that is working.

The picture on the bottom represents the kingdom of our God. The man in the middle is an American medical missionary who works in Nigeria. His name is Dr. Tracy Goen. He went to a mission hospital that was about to close its doors. At first, he primarily ministered to the Yoruba people. They had been Christian for several generations and welcomed him warmly. But through some very unusual (some would say supernatural events) he began to work with a predominantly Muslim nomadic people called the Fulani. He endeared himself to this group of people by healing their sick and vaccinating their cattle (he was studying veterinary medicine at Texas A&M before he decided to become an MD). He did not charge them for the vaccinations. He gained such trust with the Fulani, that they made him one of their kings, with all of the rights and privileges that go with the office.

His deep relationship of trust and friendship with both Yorubas and Fulanis was developed through selfless service to both. Because of these relationships, Goen was able to bring an end to decades of killing between the two tribes. The Yorubas are subsistence farmers. The Fulani are cattlemen. Fulani cattle would often devour Yoruba farms and the Yoruba would retaliate by killing Fulani cattle. The Fulani would retaliate by killing Yorubas. Yorubas would retaliate by killing Fulani, resulting in generations of cyclical violence.

The doctor was able to bring both sides together to work out an equitable solution. The Yoruba were told to not kill a Fulani cow if it invaded his farm. Instead, they were to come to the Council and they would be compensated. The Fulani were told not to retaliate if one of their cattle were killed by the Yoruba. Instead, they were come to the council and they would be compensated. For the past three years the killing has stopped between the two tribes.

When Tracy Goen told his story at our church, he showed a picture of himself standing between the local leader of the Yorubas and one of the kings of the Fulani (that is not the picture above, although I have included it as a representation.). The contrast in the kingdoms was indelibly etched into my mind and soul.

Maybe Jesus really knew what He was talking about when He said the we should seek the benefit of our enemies with the same energy that we seek our own (Matt. 5:43-44).