Monday, February 1, 2016
VIDEO
So humble yourselves before God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
James 4:7(NLT)
My friend, Fawnie used to talk about “devil-itis” sometimes;
once she explained to me what she meant[2].
Fawnie lived only a quarter mile from the church she attended
all her life. As a young girl she took
piano lessons and was told someday it would be her turn to play for the Lord in
worship services. In those days, this country
Methodist church was the center of community life and therefore, playing the
piano for the congregation was a big responsibility.
One Sunday the inevitable happened, the preacher came to
Fawnie in Sunday School, which was held in the little room just off the sanctuary,
to tell her today’s the day!
The regular piano player was sick, and in a little bit they would gather
for worship.
Well, nerves being what they are in a pre-teen, as soon as
Sunday School class was done, Fawnie exited the side door running, and didn’t
stop until she’d found the safety of her room at home.
When asked later what possessed her to duck out like that,
she simply replied: I guess it was just devilitis.
Fast forward a half-century and you find the postscript – or,
as Paul Harvey used to say, the rest of the story.
It was the first year after I became pastor at that little
church. Sometimes (when we had a pianist)
our Wednesday evening Bible study and prayer time began with a song. If we didn’t have a pianist, we would begin
with prayer, and the standing joke was that the preacher would call on the last
one to arrive.
One Wednesday night our regular pianist (my bride, Elizabeth)
was under the weather, so I joked to the gathering group, the next one through the door
will play our hymn so we can start.
Well – God’s humor being what it is…my words had hardly settled
down when, on cue, Fawnie walked through the door. I had no clue she could play the piano, so I
said it jokingly, expecting a quick, declining growl): Ahh…Fawnie’s the last one through the door;
she’ll play Shall We Gather at the River.
Let’s turn to #723 and sing.
Without batting an eye, or breaking stride, or melting under
the spell of “devilitis”, Fawnie walked past the group to the piano behind me,
sat down and began to play a hymn that had been longing to move through her
fingers for over fifty years.
One of the truths about the Christian life that is my personal
favorite about the grace of God is that it is more important how
you finish than how you start!
Fawnie told me she regretted many times the failure she
experienced as a child, intimidated at the thought of performing in front of
all those people. Mostly we would explain
it away, or dismiss it as stage-fright, or a simple case of shyness; after all,
children will be children. But, perhaps
Fawnie labelled it more correctly – devilitis – the pain brought by our
adversary as he tempts, accuses and generally works on disrupting our lives so
our service to God is diminished and sometimes disappears altogether.
James, the half-brother of Jesus, advised us to resist
the devil and we would find the bully fleeing out the side door of
the Sunday School room. That’s Godly
advice; he can’t bring you devilitis when he’s running away.
For You Today
Decide
before you leave the house that this day’s temptations and trials will be
resisted with all that is in you. God
promises to join you in that fight; all Satan can do is flee – heels and elbows
is all you’ll see.
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