A Different Perspective Official Podcast

Poverty is a terrible thing. Physical poverty. Emotional poverty. Spiritual poverty. It eats away at you. Well, what if I told you that God wants to make you rich. No, no – I don't mean a big house, and expensive car and a personal jet. They're just trinkets. No … God has something much better planned for you.
As we look around at people that walk past us on the street, what we often see are blank faces with very little emotion, faces that hide what's really going on inside – joy, pain, boldness, fear, wealth, poverty – we just don't know, do you?
Now I used to think I knew what poverty was. And then in January 2005, I found myself standing in the middle of a squalored little village, just a few hours drive outside Hyderabad in India. It was all I could do not to weep over the depth of the poverty that screamed at all of my senses.
Sometimes a lack of money, financial poverty, strikes. It can strike the wealthy and the not so wealthy, in the developed world and the developing world.
So where's God? Today, I'd like to share with you the story of 'Harry', a young man from Zimbabwe and his friend Joseph from South Africa. It's a story of God's blessing amidst poverty.
The story begins in the middle of June 2005 at a conference in the UK at Stock-on-Trent. It was the conference of the United Christian Broadcasters, which I attended. There were Christian TV and radio stations from right around the world at this conference. In particular, I wanted to connect with the CEO of a ministry called 'Media Village' in South Africa. These are people who train young folk in television and radio and they seem to be doing some really cool stuff. But she was so busy, she was speaking at most of the conference, we just couldn't seem to connect.
The last morning of the conference at breakfast, my wife and I sat down at the table in the dining room and this young, very well dressed African man in his late 20s, by the name of Joseph sat down at our table. We got chatting and it turned out that he was the head of the radio school at the Media Village. As we talked, somehow we just seemed to click and we got excited. And we said, "Let's do something when we get back to Australia and South Africa respectively".
So over the next few months our relationship developed. Joseph was promoting our radio programs, this program and the other programs that we produce, to stations right around Africa. It's a great ministry partnership that's developing. But on the 22nd of December 2005, Joseph sent a broadcast email out to a number of people, (me included), telling us that there were nine students who had just completed a three-month course on how to produce radio programs.
They'd all done so successfully, but so many of these students were very poor. And without paying their fees, just as with any other institution, they couldn't get their graduation certificate. It's the bit of paper that said well, this is what they have done. It's the reality. They're very poor people and we were talking about US$4000 about AU$5000 for all the students. Most of them had paid some of their fees but you know there was some really poor people there. And in particular, I'd like to share with you now Harry's story. Have a listen to this because when I read Harry's story in Joseph's email, I tell you, it really got to me. He writes this:
Dear Friend,
It's been a privilege attending the school of radio broadcasting 2005, here at the Media Village in Africa and I just wanted to express my appreciation. I hope this letter finds you in good shape emotionally, and physically, and mostly spiritually. It's been a challenge being at this school, considering that when I came, I was really greatly financially disadvantaged. It took me a huge step of faith to leave Zimbabwe with only the money to get to Johannesburg and I just didn't have enough money to get to Cape Town, (which is twice the distance from Zimbabwe to Johannesburg).
God took care of me by His grace and I made it to the Media Village. I was still short with my finances because I was supposed to pay half the fees but I didn't have the money and so a friend blessed me with some money but still it wasn't enough. But praise God because they allowed me to start the school. Because of the production costs, they still needed me to pay the first half. I went through some troubles but thank God He provided the first half but I was still left with the second half of the fees, which I still owe today. But God's grace is still on me because last night I graduated and despite of me coming late, I was awarded the 'Most Improved Student Award' which was such an honour.
I still have problems in hand because in January I need to start my internship and I haven't paid my whole fees, so they won't allow me to start. They have given me until Friday to pay the money, or else I will vacate the premises because I can't afford to do that. I still need the money and greatly appreciate your prayers. Have a blessed Christmas! In His service, Harry
So we received this email just a couple of days before Christmas. And I tell you, you listen to this man and he left his home with not enough money to get to where God was calling him to go, and he went anyway, and he just believed, and somehow he scraped through. But at the end of the day, he didn't have the money to continue. Enormous faith!
And so we were able to respond really quickly, we talked to our US parent 'Back to the Bible' who had some money in a scholarship fund. And we found some money locally, and we got half way to paying for the fees for these nine students that were outstanding.
So I sent and email off saying, 'Look, here's half the amount, that's all we could scratch together, I'll pray that you'll get the rest'. And so I sent that email off, and I was trying to write radio programs but somehow God wouldn't let me settle. And I just felt God saying, 'Put this before your brothers in Canada' because of course 'Back to the Bible' the Ministry that we serve is a global Ministry.
And so I've flown it by our Canadian Director, a good friend of mine. Five minutes later my PC rings, because we talk across the internet and PC's, and it was Bob, our Canadian Director and his second in charge, Byron. We were chit chatting and they said, 'We'd love to help. We'd love to pay the whole of the remaining amount'.
I thought, 'Wow! Here we are, the last working day before Christmas. This is Harry's last day before he has to pull the plug on his dream of being trained in Christian radio and go home back to Zimbabwe where it's very difficult to be a Christian. And God goes from Africa, to Australia, to the US, to Canada, and all the way back again, just for Harry and these eight other students.'
For me, I felt like a bystander in the middle of something God was doing. I mean Harry, in the world's eyes, is just some young black kid from Zimbabwe who needs money. But in Gods eyes, Harry, is a great man of faith. Harry stepped out in faith and he took the risk. And listen to me, God never ever forsakes the Harry's of this world, never! I shudder to think what God has got planned for Harry in the next few years. How many lives He will save across Africa through Harry?
Let me ask you something … are you poor? Are you needy? Do you know someone who is?
When we are poor, when we don't have enough money to make ends meet, when we are struggling financially, as people often are, you know it's almost worse in a wealthy society like Australia, or New Zealand, or the UK, or the US because they're supposed to be the land of opportunity. They're supposed to be the place where you can be well off. When we are struggling financially, and we look and we turn, and we say, 'Father, Father God, I need you. I need your help', He will never ever forsake us, never. It's God's promise, 'You put your faith in me, you look for me, you seek for me, you want me and I will never leave you destitute'.
It's so easy when we are struggling financially, when we're in a precarious position, to think, 'God could never come through on this. God would never do this for me'. If you are ever in that position, can I ask you to remember Harry? Can I ask you to remember what God did for that young man who had the guts to follow after the call that the Holy Spirit had put in his heart?
God is an awesome God. God will travel around the world ten times to get you the money that you need, if you're struggling. God will never leave us destitute. We need never be afraid of being poor.
And maybe if you know somebody who is struggling financially, maybe it's time where God is calling you to be the instrument of God's grace in that person's life. Just a simple thing like helping someone make a car payment can say more about who God is and how much He loves a person than all sermons under the sun.
I would encourage you to have the faith to believe. I would encourage you to remember Harry's story in your heart. And have the faith to believe that God can provide for you, and that God will provide for you.

Ever felt sick on the inside. Sometimes it's physical. Other times it's emotional. Sometimes it's spiritual. And sometimes, we really don't know what it is. Well, if healing is what you need, then today's message … is for you.
The reality is, that some people aren't well. We all get sick, sometimes it's just a cold, or the flu for a couple of days and we feel miserable, but other times it can be much worse. My Mother, who's seventy-five years old, just had shingles, which is an incredibly painful disorder and a bit dicey at that age. She's out of the woods now and on the mend.
I, for one, am a shocking patient. I'm so active and out there doing things, that within about half a day of getting sick, I've had enough. I just want t get back on my feet. Fortunately, I'm a pretty healthy beast so it doesn't happen too often. But when we're sick, it's easy to see the rest of the world getting on with life and we feel like we've been left behind or deserted.
At our website www.christianityworks.com, lots of people come and ask for prayer. Often, we have people ask for prayer, either for themselves or for family, or friends in times of sickness. It's a very common reason why people ask for prayer. A couple that just came in this other week; was to continue to pray for someone who was involved in a tragic motorcycle accident (just recently). And to pray for a friend who was in hospital with a critical condition of pneumonia. They asked us to pray for full recovery for him and that Jesus would give him the strength to fight this.
It happens you know, people have accidents, and it happens so quickly, a motorcycle, a car. I remember when I was younger, my young two-year old son reached up and caused me to pour boiling water over myself and over him. It was just a normal everyday morning and within a split second, it all changed, and boiling water was all over my face.
Sickness can be so unexpected. Everything is going fine, we're just drifting along and then the doctor tells you … you have cancer or your husband has a heart attack. We feel so helpless, so lost. We go into shock and when that sinks in, despair, and anger, and all sorts of different emotions. Or there's the person suffering from chronic pain, arthritis, back pain, all sorts of disorders, or mental disorders – both sufferers and carers. How can a loving God let this happen?
Come on, how can God let these sorts of things happen to people? Then we look around at all the other people and think, "Well, we used to be like that. We used to have a normal life-like that until, until this happened." And it hurts so much. People pay a bit of attention to us in the first week or so, and then they just get on with their lives. You even watch a high-profile Christian preacher on television and they're talking about how to succeed and stuff. Or you listen to some joker on the radio and you think, "Well, it's okay for you, God's with you but what about me? I'm sick?" Got the picture?
My hunch is … this is pressing a few buttons out there. God seems to be doing stuff everywhere else, except right here where I need him at the moment. That's how we tend to feel so often when we feel sick. Have you ever felt that? Have you ever had this sense of abandonment and, "Well, what's going on in my life? How long is this going to last? How long is it going to hurt? How long am I going to be disabled?"
Imagine what it must be like to be perfectly healthy and fit one minute and a quadriplegic the next, for the rest of your life? That would take an enormous amount of adjustment – take an enormous amount of courage.
So, whether we have a serious disease or whether we have the cold, or flu, or feel miserable, sometimes we get this sense we have been left alone and deserted. I'd like to shine just a little bit of light into that, with a very simple statement "Jesus, Jesus specialises in sick people". It's not the "hoi faloitin" preachers He hung around with; it wasn't the wealthy businessmen.
When they accused him of hanging out with the flotsam and jetsam of society, you know what He said? He said, "Look, the physician came to heal the sick people not the ones who are already well". Jesus specialised, specialised in sick people.
You know how we get this funny thing when we're sick and we're crook, and we're lying on the couch or the bed, and we're thinking "Jesus can't possibly be here with me. He must be with that fancy preacher out there, or He must be with that wealthy Christian business person out there. That's where Jesus is, He's not with me." Exactly the opposite is true, exactly!
You read just one of the four historical accounts of the life of Jesus Christ, the first four books of the New Testament – Matthew, Mark, Luke or John. Just pick one. Mark's the shortest one, it's a two to two and a half hour read and have at look at who Jesus spent his time with. And it wasn't the people that we expected Him to spend His time with. It was the sick people – the ones in the lonely place, in the nursing home, and the hospital, and the bedroom, and the lounge room – so alone.
When we're sick Jesus chooses to be with us in that place. Now, we can know that in our heads. We can hear some guy say that on the radio, we can hear that, read that, write that a million times. But all of a sudden we get sick (when the doctor tells us we have skin cancer, when the doctor says you've got five times the risk of having a heart attack because of your blood disorder), all of a sudden when the reality of sickness hits us – the reality of who Jesus is and who He wants to spend His time with, and His compassion, His grace, and His desire to bless us in the middle of sickness – all of a sudden that disappears out the window.
Maybe you're sick right now and maybe you need to hear this right now – Jesus Christ is in that place with you. And maybe God's plan, the reason that you're listening to this program today, maybe God's plan is just to tuck that away in your heart. For one day, when you might need it. To tuck away the reality that Jesus Christ spent His time with people who are marginalized, people who are hurting, people who were alone and people who were sick, He healed some of them.
And some of them He healed in such an amazing way but others He didn't. Why does that happen? How come God does some amazing miracles in some people's lives and not in others? If I could answer that I'd be God and I'm not. I don't know why God chooses to heal some people and not others. I just don't know, but He does, and He cares.
And when we're sick, He is more powerfully, profoundly, amazingly, intimately, personally, beautifully present with us than we can ever imagine. That's a blessing. That is an enormous blessing! Jesus is a healer.
The Old Testament says that He is a God who heals our every disease and He's the lover of our soul. He's there to be with us when we're sick.
I know that when someone has cancer and when someone has a serious health issue, they can be Christians, they can pray for healing but it is not always God's plan that they should be healed. We all die eventually, our bodies all give out eventually. And the only instance in which that won't happen is if Jesus Christ comes back before it's my time to die or yours. That's the reality of the life we live, we are mortal, we will die physically but never spiritually.
Spiritually we will live on, either in the presence of God or in the outer darkness called hell away from Him. Jesus is in this place when you are sick.
And Father, I pray for anyone who is sick today, that you will just give them the most amazing sense of your presence with them right now. Father, I pray for their complete healing in their body, their soul, their mind, everything that's wrong with them. And above all Lord, whatever your will is in terms of this person's health and future and life, I pray that you'll bless them with the knowledge of your presence that is indescribable. In Jesus name I pray, Amen.

Loneliness is a tough gig and it's way, way more common than you might think. But God is a God who speaks into our loneliness. God is a God who shows up in our loneliness. God is a God who takes away … our loneliness.
It never ceases to amaze me how we can be surrounded by people and yet, still feel lonely. That's probably because loneliness has nothing to do with how physically close we are to other people. It's more about how emotionally connected we feel. I remember in a restaurant, recently, having dinner with my wife and there was an older couple at the next table, hardly talking and completely bored looks on their faces. It's so sad, isn't it?
Loneliness can strike anyone, anytime, anywhere. We receive so many requests for prayer on our www.christianityworks.com website and one of the most common requests has to do with loneliness.
I'd like to share one of those requests with you today (quite anonymously of course), so we can look at the whole issue of loneliness – from A Different Perspective.
Just the other day, we received this prayer request from a University student who's away from home studying overseas.
I ask you to pray for me for comfort from the Lord as I'm feeling really lonely just at the moment. I'm away from my family and friends overseas. And I'd ask you to pray for renewed strength and confidence for me over this coming year to lean more on the Lord, to lift up my worries to Him. Thank you so much.
And he signs his name.
It's so natural, isn't it? So real and everyday, this problem of feeling lonely. Me, well, I actually enjoy my own company a lot. I don't like to have a lot of people around me. I'm happy to spend days on my own reading and praying and thinking and walking. But even so, I still (sometimes) feel lonely.
Now, we're not all like that. Some people depend a lot more on company. Some people, to tell you the truth, are over dependent on other people and that's not healthy. But whatever our balance is, whatever our fit is, we can all end up lonely. I know people who call themselves Christians who feel desperately lonely.
Now, in part you can understand that. We all need human company – women need female friends, guys need their mates, we all need people around us. But there's another part of me that is so profoundly sad when I hear that.
There are two promises of Jesus that I'd like to look at today, in this context of loneliness. The first one, He made to His disciples, He said, "It's good for you that I go away, because if I don't go, the promised Holy Spirit won't come." And the second one was, He said to them, "I will never leave you or forsake you."
You put those two together and really what He's saying is, just the way that He was physically present with those disciples, a couple of thousand years ago, by sending His Holy Spirit (and this took me a while to come to grips with. I have to tell you, the notion that when I believe in Jesus the Spirit of God comes to dwell in me), so He was saying … just as He was present physically with those disciples two thousand years ago, today, He is spiritually present with His disciples, with those of us who say, "Jesus I want to follow you", here and now. Just as real, just as amazing.
Sometimes I hear people talking about praying as though it were a chore. I just struggle to believe that. Jesus said:
It is good for you that I go away, I will never leave you or forsake you, I will send my Spirit. He said, "It's good for you, it's almost better for you that I've gone away physically so that you can experience me spiritually through the Holy Spirit.
On the one hand, people are desperately lonely. And yet on the other hand, they're hungering for some authentic spiritual experience – something that's more than pews, and choirs, and stain glass windows. You know, something that is real and alive. And so sadly, so many people never put the two together.
We can do that. We can, in faith, put the two together – our problem of loneliness and our hunger for an authentic spiritual experience. Because if Jesus said, it's good for you that I go away because I'm going to send my Holy Spirit to dwell in you, to make My home in you, through My Spirit … if that is true, if we can believe in that (just with the smallest bit of faith), Jesus wants to do something here. Jesus wants to show the lonely that they don't have to be lonely anymore.
I remember being desperately lonely when I was going through marriage breakdown, ten years ago. And Jesus did something in me and just gave me that little bit of faith that I needed to believe that He is here, right now. That the moment we say, "Jesus I believe in you," He sends His Holy Spirit to dwell inside of us – today, tomorrow, forever and ever because He will never leave us or forsake us.
I believe that I can come boldly before the throne of grace. And that I'll find God's help with exactly the thing that I need at the time that I need it.
When we have a desperate hunger after human company that just isn't being satisfied, maybe you're there now, maybe this is something that you've got to tuck away for the future, if only we would just hunger first after God's company, just as much. In fact, I don't think that until we've been drenched in God's company, in God's presence, we're going to be any good company to anyone else.
And in the same way, I don't think we can really enjoy other peoples' company (the full and rich thing that relationships with other people have to offer), until we've been so hungry for company that we've found in the company of Jesus Christ. That we've found the joy of that quite beautiful relationship with Jesus Christ, that can sustain us through every high and every low, and everything that this earth has to throw at us.
So often, Jesus allows us to wander in a lonely wilderness to give us the space to discover Him. And maybe, if today, you are desperately lonely, or you know someone who is desperately lonely, maybe today is the day that He is speaking to you and saying, "The reason I allow this loneliness is so in the midst of it all, you would hear my quite still voice. In the midst of it all, you'd notice I'm waiting for you. I'm here, I'm with you. I so want to have a relationship with you."
For me (for my part), as I look back on that time in the middle of loneliness, where I got to discover Jesus and have a relationship with Him, I know that I could not be the husband that I am for my wife, Jacqui, today, if I hadn't first discovered Him. I know that I wouldn't enjoy the fullness of our relationship, if I hadn't been lonely and bumped into Jesus in the middle of that. And I know, I couldn't love her and honour her and bless her with who I am unless first, I discovered who Jesus was. Unless first, I let Him change me, take out some of the rubbish that was swimming round inside me.
I'm not perfect, nor are you, none of us are. Some days, I'm just not your perfect husband. Some days, I'm grumpy and tired. But you know something, most days, I'm not. Most days, I get to enjoy the life that Jesus gave me and enjoy the relationships that He has brought me because of that lonely dark time in the wilderness when there was just One Light. And that light was called Jesus Christ!
God has a plan. That plan is to bless us. And when we are starving and hungering for company and there's just nobody around, there is – Jesus is! And He's waiting.

What happens to us in life happens to us in two different places. On the outside, and on the inside and in fact it's on the inside where we experience emotions like joy, delight, fear and failure. So … have you ever found yourself feeling like you're dying on the inside?
I was sitting next to an older man, recently, in the bus and I thought I would just love to know your life story. Yet through the anonymity of the internet so many people come to our website, www.christianityworks.com and ask for prayer for things in their lives that (in most cases) they could never talk to anyone else about. And it never ceases to amaze me how great their need is.
This week, anonymously, I'd like to share some of those with you starting with someone who writes, "I'm just dying inside."
I always remember the story of a young doctor who used to visit wealthy houses in a suburb, near where I used to live. And he said that, it doesn't matter how many houses he went into, all these large wealthy people, in big houses, he said, 'Time after time after time, in almost all of them, there was some form of tragedy or abuse or drug abuse or marriage breakdown'. And I guess, that's the thing, isn't it? At the train station or the bus stop, you just don't know.
You look at a person and you see a blank face and you think 'what happened to them yesterday or last night or today? What's going on in their hearts? What are they feeling right now – joy or pain or boredom or emptiness or loss or gain? You don't know. And sadly, so often, no one cares either.
It's the same with us too. We go out there in life, we may have had an argument or a hurt or a pain or you maybe feeling desperately, desperately lonely and we go out to the bus stop or the train station or to work and we put the face on that hides what's going on in our hearts.
When people send prayer requests to our website www.christianityworks.com, it's interesting how the anonymity of the internet allows people to be much more open and frank with what's going on in their lives. In a way, that's quite different to face-to-face contact, where they would be much more inhibited about talking about themselves.
This week, on A Different Perspective, I'd like to walk through some of the common types of prayer requests we get (quite anonymously, of course). Not talking about anyone's names or particular circumstances but just look through some of those things because, to me, those many prayer requests and kind of like a cross-section of what's going on in the lives of the people at my bus stop and my train station.
One of the ones that we often get, and this is a typical example, is the sense of "I'm falling, I'm plagued by dread and doubt and depression. I've stopped having contact with people and I'm afraid of being judged". Now recently, I had one like that from a person who said, "I'm just dying inside", and this person identified themselves as someone who actually believed in Jesus Christ. They identified themselves as a Christian.
I wonder how many people feel like they are dying inside? Despite all the worldly goods and things we have around us – whether they have ever met Jesus before or whether they are Christians – they live in this centreless, materialistic world with more choices than we can poke a stick at. And yet, they have this sense that they're dying inside. It's so sad to see people to be surrounded by all the good things they could ever want, every comfort, every luxury and yet still, to be dying inside.
All sorts of things promise a new life and a new beginning. And I tried a lot of them before I became a Christian and they're okay for a while. But ultimately, they lead to disappointment. They don't work. Religion doesn't work. I love the fact that Jesus specialised in people who were dying inside.
The prostitute, this woman who is so despised, yet obviously, still had a business. Obviously, there were men in the society who were using her and paying for the privilege. But this prostitute, who just kind of saw Jesus and He encouraged her and He stood up for her when the religious leaders wanted to belittle her and to kick her out.
The demon possessed man, the Gerasene demoniac. This man who was like an animal, living in a graveyard amongst the gravestones and Jesus went and touched him.
All sorts of people; weirdos and unhealthy people. Jesus went and healed them. But something more than that … there was compassion. There was a reality an authenticity, a Jesus just wanted to put His arms around these people and love them.
I remember a time in my life when I drove a large flash car and lived in a huge house with gold taps. And was so full of my own self importance as an International Consultant, that sat with Boards and CEO's of large Corporations. And the first time I met Jesus, under a tree, after a Church service (I got to tell you, I hadn't been to a Church for years other than the odd wedding or funeral), I went to this Church service and I went out afterwards and sat down under a tree and for the first time – I encountered life.
When I gave my life to Jesus it was like I was a little balloon full of helium, you know, it was like I was floating. It was the most awesome experience of my life. And it wasn't until after I did that, that I could look back on my life and think, there I was with the big car and the big house and the self-importance but all along, deep inside, I had a sense of being an impostor, a sense of dread and doubt and depression. Just like this person (who sent this prayer request to us last week), afraid of being judged, I wanted to be so high and mighty. But inside, there was a secret fear and so I put on a strong exterior, a strong face.
That stuff is completely, completely gone. Why? What happened? Because over the last ten years, I have spent hours and hours and hours, quietly, in the presence of God – praying, listening, reading His word. Just sitting quietly to hear what He had to say; and tasting His goodness, seeing His hand on my life; feeling the blessing of His goodness all around me and what He did; and how He interacted with me as He puts His spirit inside each one of us.
And the greatest thing; the most important thing for me was (over a period of many years of spending time with Him), finally coming to grips with the fact that all my failures, all of them, were paid for by Jesus on the cross.
And today, I know I have a right standing with Him. There's no dread, no doubt, no depression, no fear of being judged because in Jesus Christ, God accepted me. In Jesus Christ, God accepts me and in Jesus Christ, God accepts you.
We need never, ever, feel as though we are dying inside. And the reason, quite plainly, is this – because Jesus has already done the dying for us, because Jesus has already suffered the pain of all our failures and inadequacies, and He just waits. He longs to spend hours and hours and hours with you and with me, quietly, beautifully, gently pouring His love and His grace and His blessing and His goodness into our very soul and spirit and being.
We need never… ever again feel as though we are dying inside.

There's nothing like sharing in someone else's loneliness to get a handle on overcoming your own loneliness. And today, we're going to meet a man who, well, if anyone has a reason to wallow in self–pity, it's this guy. But that's the last thing he ends up doing in his loneliness.
For me, I think prison would have to be one of the loneliest places on the planet. The loss of freedom, infrequent visits, perhaps none at all, the threat and the danger of prison politics. I was re-reading a letter from a guy called Paul who was on death row (in Rome, around about 60 or 61 AD), the letter he wrote to some good friends in a Roman outpost called Philippi. And there's one bit in there that really struck me, the sort of thing you just wouldn't expect from this guy in a damp dungeon, waiting to die.
The reality of prison … I cannot begin to imagine being in jail let alone, like the Apostle Paul, being on death row. You see, Paul had quite some fall from grace. As a young man in Jerusalem, he was a religious hot-shot. He was a member of the ruling body of the Sanhedrin. He was well-known academic. He was busy persecuting Christians. Man this guy had his career all cut out. And then one day, as he was traveling to Damascus, on the road he encountered Jesus and that turned his whole world upside down.
He left all of the prestige and status behind and spent over a decade traveling around Asia Minor, preaching, telling people about Jesus Christ. Now, Paul was thrown out of synagogues; Paul caused riots; Paul was beaten and flogged and run out of town and imprisoned several times. And now as we look at this letter that he wrote to the Church at Philippi (it's known as the book of Philippians in the New Testament), he is on death row in Rome.
He has every right to feel lonely, has every right to feel resentful, has every right to say to God and shake his fists, "Come on God, what's going on here? I did all the stuff you asked me to do and now I'm on death row in Rome, what's going on?" And while he was locked up there are others out there doing what he was supposed to be doing, getting all the limelight.
Got the picture? A dark, dank, dungeon, in chains, actually chained to a guard. Now I am sure that prison today is no cakewalk but this, we cannot begin to imagine. Got the picture?
And this is what he writes towards the end of this letter. You can read it in the book of Philippians, the last chapter. He says to them:
Finally my friends, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about those things. (Philippians 4:8)
I think this is one of the best pieces of advice from someone who had every right to be lonely and resentful, to someone who is lonely, that I have ever heard.
You look at loneliness and there's this kind of downward spiral. People are lonely, they're not in meaningful connections with other people, there's no one to encourage or support or to strengthen them. And so the mind wanders and wanders and goes down the gurgler. It focuses on rubbish. It focuses on regret, on anger, on revenge, on disappointment, on the inevitability and on the powerlessness of the situation.
You know, when we feel lonely, we want to blame someone. When we feel lonely, we want to exercise our right to be resentful don't we? When we feel lonely, we just want to grumble and because we are alone we got time to do that, and do it "par excellence'. Often, lonely people spend all of their thinking time and feeling time in this bad, rubbishy, regretful, angry, revengeful, disappointed place.
And Paul, our buddy, sitting on death row there, who has every right to feel angry, says, "Hang on … no, don't do that. Think about the good stuff, anything that is honourable or just or pure or pleasing or commendable or excellent or worthy of praise." What do you think about that stuff?
Now, what are you saying here Berni? Are you saying, "Just think positive thoughts. Be positive?" I don't think that's what Paul is saying. I think he's saying, "Consume positive stuff, exercise your mind in a space, that's healthy". You know the routine: eat junk food, you'll carry extra weight. You don't do any exercise and your cholesterol will be up – your triglycerides will be up, your blood pressure will be up, your blood sugar will be up, you'll be diabetic, you get a heart attack, you have a stroke, you die young. Right? Simple. They're the consequences.
On the other hand, you eat cereal, fruit, go walking and exercising, lose some weight and all of a sudden the consequences are good. You have energy, you feel stronger, you're not as tired, you reduce your health risks, your blood levels go to all the right levels. There's vigour and sparkle and joy, because there are consequences to what we do with our body. It's simple cause-and-effect stuff. We all know this.
If it is true with our bodies, it's also true of our hearts and minds. It depends on what we read, what we listen to, what we say, what we think, what we believe.
"Oh, I'm never, ever, ever going to get over this loneliness. I'm never going to be able to do this." Well, that's one place you can spend your time. Or maybe, you can go and buy a book like The Mystery According To Susie, which is about someone who struggled with loneliness and depression and fear and overcame it. We can spend time mulling over the bad stuff or – we can take deliberate steps to consume good stuff.
Paul goes on though. He doesn't stop there. He says, in effect:
I have learnt to be content with whatever I have. Whether I have a lot or a little, whether I am happy or sad, whether the world is good or bad. I'm going to be content anyway.
And then he reinforces it with this, he says:
You know why, you know why I can do that? I can do all things through Christ Jesus, who strengthens me. (Philippians 4:13)
He can do this stuff. He can be sitting there on death row and instead of grumbling, he can be saying to his friends, who are free, "Think about good stuff, do good stuff. Don't get tired of doing that." Why can Paul do that, on death row, in the dungeon? Answer, he tells us. Because he can do anything, he can do everything through Jesus. He can give this good advice to someone who is lonely and disappointed. He can give this advice because, and only because, he has a real relationship with Jesus Christ.
I would challenge you… pick up a Bible or go on the internet, and read the letter in the New Testament called Philippians. It's Paul's letter from the dungeon to some dear friends of his. You will not find a more encouraging, upbeat piece of prose than those four chapters of that letter written by a guy on death row.
What does that tell you? We can choose to exercise our mind in disappointment; or we can decide to consume good things. We can choose to let our heart rest in loneliness and fear; or we can choose to give our heart over to Jesus Christ. That positive language and positive sentiment wasn't coming out of positive thinking, it was coming out of a mind and a heart given over to Jesus Christ. It was coming from a heart flooded with the presence of God.
The dungeon of loneliness can be a reality. But it's an opportunity to get to know ourselves, to get to know God, to reach out to other people with our gifts and to consume goodness and grace and peace and joy from the one person that will never disappoint – Jesus Christ.