On Girls and the Secret Places II

continued...

When a Christian young girl is not cultivating habits to quietly observe older girls and older women, she becomes wise in her own eyes as she ascertains through a default self-focus that she knows what there is to know.  She in essence places herself as a peer with them, and sometimes through posturing as hip and cool, indifferent and disinterested, she postures herself above them.  She then becomes effectively immune from their influence.  She has her friends with whom she is impressed and whom she seeks to impress, and that is the boundary of her world.

When this other world becomes more real, more compelling, than the mental world they find at home, their allegiance crosses over from their parents and the church to their peers.  Their boundaries become what their peers find important, interesting, fashionable, desirable, wonderful and wonder-filled. 

Thinking on those things becomes more natural than being enchanted with the glory of life in Christ and the wonder of God’s character, creation, reality.  Seeking out an increase of those things becomes more natural than seeking out an increase of knowledge of their Lord and Savior and a closer walk with Him, and a more defined and familiar progress in becoming a godly young woman who shines with His countenance on her face.  Thoughts turn inward to the collective world being created by the peer group.

At a young age, this starts with an avalanche of silly talk and mindless, empty chatter.  But the human heart does not operate in a vacuum.  The human heart wants to know, to experience, to be shadowed by wonder.  If that wonder ceases to be satiated with knowledge of God, wonder of God, and the intense joy of being in relationship with Him, that wonder goes to the crevasses of the world and begins to look in.  

Because of the content of the pre-teen books (most containing coming-of-age angst, self-focus, power plays, and at least some references to occult, sex, and all containing worldviews at utter war with godliness); and because of the content of the movies, whether that which is inane and foolish at best, or that which does systematic violence to our life in Christ; because of the content of the stories and the culture that surrounds us….the progressive next step for the empty and silly chatter of young girls is to begin to be drawn into the false realities of these influences.  These stories tell them of the world around them, they titillate their imaginations, they captivate their thoughts, and slowly the reality of their group-think becomes an interest in the bolder things of the world.  Each girl has her particular bent—power, sensuality, dark things of the underworld, love of money, daring exploits—but in the “sleep-over world”, where hours of talk amongst peers has to have more fuel for the fire, more topics to discuss, more shock value to add to a lively interchange, talk begins to turn to these things, because those are the seeds that have been planted by the movies, books,  stories they’ve imbibed corporately (each girl has had her exposure to this or that and it all comes together in a toxic brew of chatter). 

Then, those thoughts become more dominant in the mind and heart.  Then, girls who are in the church begin unconsciously, and without any desire to do so at all, and no understanding, to live dual lives.  Their spoken priorities are church-oriented and their heart’s desire is still to live in Christ and know more of Him but they are feeding the other side of their heart more regularly and their heart’s captivation is leaning toward the world and they don’t even realize it.  But the trajectory of their thought life, their discussions as a group, will be consumed with worldly things.  And as a teenager, actions will begin to follow this reality.

Some of the telling signs of this transfer taking root and “becoming” are, flippant postured behavior that has little sense of otherness; constant empty chatter seasoned with foolish content; disinterest in beginning to understand and assimilate deeper godly instruction; talking about wild things as the fun, the desirable, the “I love---”s; lack of truly engaging or responding attentively/lovingly to the people they’re with; lack of enjoyment of quieter, good things, done together socially; increasing lack inability to exhibit a one-anothering attitude of interaction; and random pop-off comments about things from the world of darkness.

If a girl has a known rebellious heart, and a practiced disinterest in the things of our Lord, yes, I would say she is an unfit companion to be in constant influence with a daughter; for her talk, thoughts, and actions will assume, over time, a normality to her close companions.  The Word warns us against this…

Continued tomorrow...

 teasing the longsuffering brother

On Girls and the Secret Places Underground

Underground, plenty goes on before ever the green shoot rises; before ever the volcanic fire overflows and the grey plume rises; before the tsunami sweeps inland and destroys.  Likewise, underground and in the secret haunts of the heart, while the capital of a Christian home and habits carry a young woman outwardly along in a life of compliance upholding the aura of the Christ walk, things are happening which eventually will become overtly visible in either a life of beautiful abandonment to Christ or a life of compromise and ultimate betrayal of His ways.  How deeply we need to know our children, to recognize the signs of the heart!  What follows are a few reflections on girls’ ways when the secret places begin to harbor the world; a subtle course, imperceptible as the young girls grow up in the church.

That which has been described to me recently, and that which I have also observed on a number of occasions, is “a constant stream of foolish talk”;  it seems like nothing more than a talkative outgoing preteen girl but today I find more going on there.  First, endless chatter of foolish things denotes the overflow of the heart, as Scripture says.  Second, it inoculates a girl against both listening and learning/observing.  Third, it elevates her thoughts to a place they should not occupy, especially when she is in the presence of older girls (as she can look and learn and be infused with what they have to teach), or friends (to whom she should be practicing a one-anothering, esteeming others better than herself).  Soon, her thoughts become a type of self-expression that gains an undue importance, because it is what is getting airspace and is being heard by herself and others, which aggrandizes her careless, empty, foolish thoughts to an elevation inappropriate to a young girl, inappropriate for a noble and gracious young woman, inappropriate to a friend, and inappropriate to a Christian.  She slips into a sphere where she cannot easily be influenced by godly older girls or women because her space is filled with her own opinions being thought and aired, so that she no longer really notices that which is “of good report, praiseworthy”.

When a Christian is inoculated against listening to others, only hearing her own constant voice, she will not be fitted in her habits to listen to God.  In Isaiah, God says, “Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and let your soul delight itself in abundance.  Incline your ear and come to me…”  Habits are formed in early years by response to parents first, and then to preachers/teachers and godly influences second.  These habits transfer in the teen years to a relationship directly with God.  I think we must ask regarding our children, Do they listen with their hearts to us—earnestly seeking then to implement what we have said?  Do they listen with their hearts to the preacher, to conference speakers, to wise teachers?  To wise books?  For young ladies, do they listen eagerly to their mother’s friends, revere them in a respectful and appropriate manner, and take in what they say as so much treasure meant for them?  How about older girls in their lives?  Do they quietly watch and look to emulate?

“Listen carefully” implies practiced silence; “eat what is good” implies an action then embracing good things, mostly centered on the things of Christ, of the character of God, of His good blessings to us.  If we are not increasing in our appetites for these things we cannot actively embrace them, and our soul will not delight in them.

God goes on to say, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, and my ways are not your ways…for as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my thoughts higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.”  If young girls do not have a sense of others having  thoughts worth hearing, apart from themselves, how will they habitually be prepared to seek out God’s thoughts?  If their constant companion is the speaking of their own thought, how will the idea that Someone’s thoughts are higher than their thoughts even have an entrance point?  If they are so busy saying empty thoughts that create a cacophony in their soul, they will be unfit for the life of a Christian and the life of a quiet woman whose gentle spirit is precious in the sight of God. 
continued tomorrow...

 -being silly together-

A Prince Prevailing III

“If two of you…shall agree…”  I feel even when praying alone that there are two concerned in prayer, God and myself…I do not think that a petition which misses the mind of God will ever be answered  (I John 5:14).  Personally I feel the need of leading me in prayer as well as in other matters.”

He found it helpful to start in prayer, not only in meditation, but with a definite request that God direct him in the channels of prayer the Holy Spirit was beckoning him into.

He also found it helpful to make a short list, “like notes prepared for a sermon”, before every time of prayer.  “The mind needs to be guided as well as the spirit attuned.  I can thus get my thoughts in order, and having prepared my prayer put the notes on the table or chair before me, kneel down and get to business.”…

“Overstrained faith is not pure faith, there is a mixture of the carnal element in it.  There is no strain in the ‘rest of faith’.  It asks for definite blessing as God may lead; it does not hold back through carnal timidity, nor press ahead too far through carnal eagerness…”

“I read a testimony… not long ago in which he said that one of the greatest blessings of his life had been his unanswered prayers.  And I can say the same…unanswered prayers have taught me to seek the Lord’s will instead of my own.  I suppose we have most of us had such experiences.  We have prayed and prayed and prayed, and no answer has come.  The heavens above us have been as brass.  Yea, blessed brass, if it has taught us to sink a little more of this ever-present self of ours to the cross of Christ.

Sometimes our petition has been such a good one, to all appearances, but that does not ensure it is of God.  Many good desires proceed from our uncrucified selves…

--More from James O Fraser,  in Mountain Rain

 

A Prince Prevailing II

“He had plenty of time to think about the principles of God’s working as he tramped the trails.  “Preparation, delay, and growth,” he wrote, “are characteristics of God’s working both in history and in nature.”  Just as he saw this truth in the natural processes all around him, he found it in Scriptures like James 5:7:  "The husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience over it.”  

“He realized that the same principle applied to his own spiritual life, and the lives of others,  It also applied to labor done in the Lord.  “A mature Christian is not the product of a day or a month or a year either,” he said.  “It takes time,”, said the late Andrew Murray, “to grow into Christ.”  We must strike our roots down deep in the soil of the word and be strengthened by long, long experience  It is a slow process, and it is right that it should be so; God does not want us to be spiritual mushrooms…

“In the biography of our Lord nothing is more noticeable than the quiet, even poise of his life.  Never flustered whatever happened, never taken off his guard, however assailed by men or demons; in the midst of fickle people, hostile rulers, faithless disciples—always calm, always collected, Christ the hard worker indeed—but doing no more, and no less, than God had appointed him; and with no restlessness, no hurry, no worry.  Was ever such a peaceful life lived—under conditions so perturbing?

“Eternity had already begun for the Christian.  We can afford then, to work in the atmosphere of eternity.  The rush and bustle of carnal activity breathes a spirit of restlessness; the Holy Spirit breathes a deep calm.  This is the atmosphere in which we may expect a lasting work of God to grow.”

 “Let us shake off “dull sloth” on the one hand and feverishness on the other.  A gourd may spring up in a night, but not an oak.  The current may be flowing deep and strong in spite of ripples and counter-currents on the surface.  And even when it comes to temporary setbacks from the incoming tide of evil, we may yet learn to say—as Jeremiah once said under the most distressing circumstances—“it is good that a man should hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.”

--more from Mountain Rain, James O Fraser, pioneer missionary to China

A Prince Prevailing

Great were the strides in his understanding of prayer in those days.  His own exercises in prayer gave him experiences in the things of God, a knowledge of God, a friendship with God.  His study of prayer in the Bible gave him a grasp of the whole vital subject in relation to the work of God.  The Holy Spirit was opening up to him a whole new dimension of power through which he could become a prince with God and prevail…

He had come to see that in past years he had wasted much time praying prayers that were not effective at all.  Praying without faith was “like trying to cut with a blunt knife—much labor is expended to little purpose.”  The work accomplished by labor in prayer depended on faith.  “According to your faith,”  not labor, “be it unto you.”

He was impressed with the thought that people failed in praying the prayer of faith because they did not believe God had answered, but only that He would answer their petitions.  “They rise from their knees feeling that God will answer some time or another, but not that He has answered already.”

This was not, as he saw it, the faith that made prayer effective.

“True faith glories in the present tense, and does not trouble itself about the future.  God’s promises are in the present tense, and are quite secure enough to set our hearts at rest.  Their full outworking is often in the future, but God’s word is as good as His bond and we need have no anxiety. 

Sometimes he gives at once what we ask, but more often He just gives His promise (Mark 11:24). Perhaps He is more glorified in this latter case, for it means that our faith is tried and strengthened….”

taken from Mountain Rain, A Biography of James O Fraser