Personal Matters

Somewhere in the middle of the night in the centre of Saigon/Ho Ch Minh City I was lying awake pondering on my insensitivity to human suffering. Earlier that day we had visited the labyrinth of tunnels at Củ Chi used by the guerrillas during the Vietnam War. The range of ingenious booby traps employed to agonisingly impale Americans was startling. The sheer inventiveness of human cruelty was astounding. We had then moved on to the War Remnants Museum, filled with photographs of bombed cities, maimed civilians and children grotesquely deformed by the chemical Agent Orange sprayed by the U.S. during the war. One of the most famous photos was of a screaming girl whose clothes had been incinerated off her body by a napalm bomb[1]. Finally there was the former Presidential Palace, and images of Buddhist monks burning themselves (self-immolation) alive in protest against the conflict[2]. Somewhere during the same day our hotel TV news featured the bushfire inferno sweeping the eastern states of Australia. Yet lying in bed I felt so emotionally distant from it all. Then I realised I wasn’t insensitive – I was traumatised once again. My thoughts swiftly sped to my recent Africa trip and discussions with the massacre survivors at Barlonyo and the impact of touring the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem some years ago. Then the Lord started to communicate something about the void of Australian spirituality. How a nation periodically ravaged by murderous bushfires can come to trust in God. Vietnam held a key.

Ultimate Trust

The Vietnam War ended a generation ago, and the great North Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh, guerrilla fighter against the Japanese, defeater of the French, planner and inspiration of “the war of reunification”, died in 1969. Ho however still appears on all currency and his face is featured on numerous billboards and monuments around the nation. He is revered as the father of the nation and idolised as “uncle Ho”, a man who never indulged in corruption or lived above the level of the people. It became totally plain to me that “uncle Sam” was always going to be defeated by “uncle Ho”. Annihilation would have been chosen over shameful retreat and betrayal of the memory of this great father figure. Ho is not unique in his influence; images of fatherhood dominate the political and cultural landscape of human history. Despite the diverse images of fatherhood across the globe, what really matters in the final analysis is whether the patriarch is viewed as a father who suffers for his children!

Jesus in the Fire

The forerunner of Jesus came warning of the need to flee “the wrath to come”, and heralded an impending Messiah who would “baptise with the Holy Spirit and fire”, a fire he immediately expounded as the “unquenchable fire” of divine judgement (Luke 3:7, 16-17). This is precisely the language used by the apostle Paul of the saving work of Christ, “who delivers us from the wrath to come”, a vengeance presented as “flaming fire” (1 Thess 1:10; 2 Thess 1:8). It is however Jesus own words and anguished cry that reveals to us exactly how such costly deliverance comes.

“I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how great is my distress until it is accomplished!” (Luke 12:50). The baptism that Jesus refers to is his immersion in the fiery vengeance of God on the cross. The cry, ““My God, my God why have you forsaken me?”” (Mark 15:34) is a personal plea to be delivered from God-forsakenness and the dereliction of Fatherlessness. This however is no solitary or selfish plea; it is the place where Christ makes “intercession for transgressors” (Isa 53:12) because they will never intercede for themselves. Where men and women turn to their idols in times of deepest distress[3], Jesus cries out to the covenant God to be to him a delivering Father. This is an expression of absolute pure and total trust in divine Patriarchy.

The deepest mystery of the cross lies however beneath the visible humanity of the Son of God. Paul teaches us that we see “the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor 4:6). This means that it is not merely the face of Jesus we see in the fires of hell at Golgotha, but the face of the Father. The Father does not ask the Son while he enjoys the comforts of heaven. Christ’s resurrection testimony to us today is that the Father can be trusted whatever the pains of life. This revelation is meant to inspire us to sacrifices far greater than any image of a human father ever could.  Surveying the indulgent spiritual landscape of contemporary Australia provokes us to ask, “What is missing in the Church?” The answer is prayer!

The Intercession of the Church

The intercession of Christ for the lost is at the heart of the mystery of what it means to be the Church. We are summoned to pray in the strength and passion of Christ’s own prayers from the cross. The Spirit of grace who inspired the intercession of Christ for deliverance on the cross (Heb 5:7-8; 9:14; 10:29) can likewise inspire us to cry out on behalf of others that they be “delivered from the wrath to come”. This same Spirit of sonship testifies to us in the midst of our trials that God is our ““Abba! Father!”” (Rom 8:16) who can be absolutely trusted in all the circumstances and disappointments of life.

As the Church enters into Jesus’ own urgency in prayer that all may be saved from the unspeakable horrors of hell, horrors he himself experienced and overcame, radical transformation can come to the spiritual climate of our land. Through our prayers previously apathetic Australians will mysteriously find in themselves an intense desire to be “saved” (Acts 16:30). This is the grace and purpose of our Father.

Conclusion

Until the realities spoken of in this article are the experience of the people of God we will most certainly continue to be dominated by the distractions and avoidances that fill Church life today. Without the inner knowledge of a Father who can be absolutely trusted, no matter how fiery our trials (1 Pet 4:12), our familiar idols of mammon and ease will continue to prevail. Without knowing these things the task of praying for the lost is just too hard.

The LORD needed me in Vietnam to speak with such intensity of the intercession of Christ, but if you ask him to speak about such things wherever you are he surely will. Why? There is a burning flame far hotter than that of napalm or self-immolation or even the fires of hell, it is the burning heart of the inextinguishable love of the Father. This is what Jesus came and died to reveal.