Life is all about making decisions.  You’ve already made a few of them so far this morning.  Decision number one was whether or not to get out of bed.  (That’s assuming, of course, you didn’t stay up all night!)  Following that were other decisions, involving stuff like getting dressed, eating breakfast, going to church, maybe even praying!

Rush, the Holy Trinity of rock (okay I added that last part!)

A lot of our decisions we make without really thinking about them.  Others require great effort and attention.  Some we eagerly embrace; others we avoid like the plague.  Still, as the rock group Rush once said in their song, “Freewill,” “If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice!”

Our scripture reading in Acts describes a decision made by the eleven remaining apostles—remaining, that is, after Judas’ death following his betrayal of Jesus.  Peter is the one who raises the issue, feeling that the original number of twelve needs to be restored.  So they decide to select a replacement.

(By the way, our scripture reading in the lectionary omits verses 18 to 20: all that juicy stuff about how Judas dies!  Once again, the folks who compiled the lectionary wanted to protect us and our delicate sensibilities from all those grim and garish details.)

I have a question to ask: how do you feel about this whole undertaking of replacing Judas?

This decision has received mixed reviews over the years.  On the one hand, it’s been seen as an act of faithfulness.  The young church sees itself as the new Israel, with twelve apostles corresponding to the twelve tribes.

On the other hand, it’s not that Peter and the other apostles are doing a bad thing.  They clearly have good motives.  They establish what appear to be sound criteria.  They make sure that the new apostle is someone who’s “accompanied us during all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us” (v. 21).  It must be one who’s been there through thick and thin—from the time of Jesus’ baptism until the present day—someone who can provide witness to the Lord’s resurrection.

Two candidates are proposed.  The first is “Joseph called Barsabbas,” alias “Justus,” and the second is Matthias.  They pray that the one God has chosen will be revealed, and they cast lots—in effect, they roll the dice—to get the result.  And the winner is: Matthias!

I said this business has gotten mixed reviews.  Some feel Peter’s use of Psalms 69 and 109, claiming they predict Judas’ deception and their response to it, is a bit loose.  Still, it’s also true that upon reflection, the church saw how the Holy Spirit spoke through certain scriptures looking ahead to the Messiah.  (Having said that, I had teachers who lamented how some people see in the Old Testament every piece of wood and random comment pointing to Jesus!)

But that’s not the main reason the apostles’ decision has been critiqued.  To put it simply, it looks like they go ahead without hearing from God on the matter.  Our gospel reading in Luke 24 shows Jesus, just before his ascension, telling them to wait until the Spirit is poured out upon them.

Lacking any definitive guidance, they plunge ahead and use a method that’s been around for ages—casting lots.  It does seem to be relevant that, after Pentecost, lots aren’t mentioned anymore.  The Holy Spirit directs the young church.

Still, it’s hard to be too critical of them.  I can see why they might feel like they needed to take some kind of action.  Some of them may have been getting a little antsy.  Peter himself was known to be rather headstrong at times.

So I ask again: how do you feel about all of this?  Faced with a decision like this, I wonder how we would fare.

In a way, it’s not fair to ask what you think of the apostles’ decision.  There’s the saying about not knowing what’s happening with someone until you’ve walked in their shoes.  We’ve all been criticized for decisions we’ve made by people who really don’t know what they’re talking about!

Let me tell you a little story about someone who faced a major decision in his life.  As a result of his struggle, the world is better off for it.

I’ve mentioned him before, the 16th century Spanish officer, Ignatius of Loyola.  If you recall, he was a wild young man; he loved chasing the ladies.  While fighting the French, a cannon ball, passing between his legs, tore open the left calf and broke the right shin.  (I also said something about that projectile.  If it were one foot higher, well, he wouldn’t have been worried about the ladies!)

While bedridden doing physical rehab, he requested some of his favorite reading, stories of knights and chivalry.  None of those were on hand, so what were brought to him were stories of Christ and the saints.  He experienced his conversion while reading those books.  In time, he became the founder of an order known as the Society of Jesus, the Jesuits.

What’s relevant right now is that in his book, The Spiritual Exercises, he includes a section entitled, “Discerning the Spirits.”  His use of the word “spirits” reflects a medieval concept; today, we might call these interior movements of the soul a combination of inclinations, attractions, imaginings, thoughts and feelings.

One guide to understanding Ignatius is Stefan Kiechle, a German Jesuit who wrote a book called The Art of Discernment: Making Good Decisions in Your World of Choices.[1]  It’s a very readable book, and it helps you to see what a wise person Ignatius was.

Ignatius stresses the need, when approaching a decision, to become “indifferent.”  That’s not “indifferent” as we tend to think of it.  It’s not an attitude that says, “I couldn’t care less what happens!”

For Ignatius, indifference is “a state where people no longer desire health more than sickness, wealth more than poverty, a long life more than a short life, honor more than dishonor, but instead they desire what brings them closer to the ‘end for which [they] are created.’  Therefore, one ought to be prepared to accept personal setbacks if they benefit a higher goal.”[2]

He sounds a lot like St. Paul, who in Philippians 4 says, “I have learned to be content with whatever I have.  I know what it is to have little, and I know what it is to have plenty.  In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being well-fed and of going hungry, of having plenty and of being in need.  I can do all things through him who strengthens me” (vv. 11-13).

Ignatian indifference is inner freedom.  Only those who have faced up to their own disordered desires—Paul might say “works of the flesh”—can be truly free.  The greater freedom we have, the better our decision making will be.  Still, we rarely achieve perfect clarity in our decisions.

“Apparently sound decisions are impossible unless one can reflect with a minimum of interruption…  The moment we enter silence, our inner self comes to life…  People who are constantly talking and keeping busy never pause to listen.”[3]  (That too often sounds like me.  When I mean to have a time of silence, I focus on the random thoughts that float through my head.  The trick is noticing them, and then just letting them go!)

So far, the advice from Ignatius might sound pretty stern.  In that respect, he’s keeping true to his roots as a soldier!  But he’s quick to emphasize the need for love.  When approaching a decision, even one (or maybe I should say, especially one) causing fear or anxiety, I should “ask myself if I’m making my choice lovingly.”[4]  I need to make my choice lovingly.  A loving spirit helps dissipate the cloud of negative forces that confuse and confound us.

We all have weaknesses; we should acknowledge them.  For example, do I tend to jump right in, or do I put it off as long as I can?  Do I have an exaggerated sense of self-worth; do I strut around?  Do I think I’m totally worthless; do I shrink and try to hide?  Do I tend to ignore reality in favor of some dream world, whipping out the rose-colored glasses?  Do I insist on looking at the dark side of everything, always finding something to gripe about?  We all have our favorite traps.

“Yet the fact remains that only those who make mistakes will learn something; only those who dare will mature as a result of the experiment—an important word in Ignatius.”[5]  It’s easy to sit back and criticize.  God wants us to lovingly stand up and get involved.

We are created in the image of God.  That means plenty of things, but one of my favorite examples of God’s image in us is a sense of humor.

(Humor seems to belong to humans alone.  Still there are some animals, like chimpanzees, who seem to find some stuff funny.  But not my dog.  He never laughs at my jokes.  Although, there might be several reasons for that!)

Ignatius also stresses the need for humor.  When we develop our sense of humor, it enables us to entertain other ideas.  We’re not so rigidly dead set on one course of action.  If we can’t laugh at ourselves, we become rigid and intolerant.  Still, when it comes to laughing at oneself, some of us have more material than others!

So there, we need a good sense of humor.  Oddly enough though, a full and healthy sense of humor carries with it the ability to mourn.  And somehow, the ability to mourn is also a part of wise decision making.  Our Jesuit friend Kiechle tells us: “People who have to choose between two good alternatives are frequently attracted to both of them.  Once an alternative has been selected, the other alternative that has been rejected will have to be mourned.  People frequently overlook this need for mourning.  In the absence of mourning, there will be a tendency to cling for too long to the [rejected] alternative…  One who keeps reproaching oneself for having made the wrong decision after all, feels dissatisfied, indeed restless, without any kind of inner peace.”[6]  We must be able to say goodbye.

What kind of decisions are we facing?  Let me suggest one possibility.

Certainly, we’re not in the same situation as those early disciples, but they have suffered a loss.  I don’t know that anyone here has betrayed the Lord—at least, not in the outward death-dealing way Judas did.  (We all have our own ways of betraying the Lord!)  Still, I don’t think it’s a controversial point to say we wonder about expanding our own number.

If I can push the comparison a little further, drawing on the idea of casting lots, are we prone to relying on our own methods, and being a little less charitable, relying on gimmicks?!  (I didn’t come up with that on my own.  In one of the previous churches we served, a session member, thinking of increasing the membership, said that very thing: “We need a gimmick.”  And that was suggested more than once!)

So there’s that.  I know this happens next Sunday, but after the day of Pentecost, the disciples learn what it means to be led by the Spirit.  And we live after the day of Pentecost.  Understand, that doesn’t mean we drift around, waiting for the Spirit to move us.  If you recall what I said about Ignatius, he provides one example of what it means to test the Spirit, to test the spirits.

As we saw earlier, the Spirit is the promise of Jesus after his ascension.  The Spirit guides us in our decisions.  Part of that means failing, but then still trusting.

When we make decisions and say, in an unnecessarily hurried way, “Let’s just get it done, already,” it limits the power of community.  When one of us takes it upon ourselves to speak for the entire community, it chokes the Spirit.  That is why it is so important as a community to test the spirits, both individually and within community.  And that begins right here in worship.  God speaks in ways we have not even begun to fathom.

Trusting in that is a pretty good decision.

[1] Stefan Kiechle, The Art of Discernment (Notre Dame, IN:  Ave Maria Press, 2005).

[2] Kiechle, 32-33.

[3] Kiechle, 69.

[4] Kiechle, 79.

[5] Kiechle, 91-92.

[6] Kiechle, 76-77.

“Deus vult!”  “God wills it!”  That was the cry of the first Crusaders in the late 11th century.  What began with more or less noble intentions as a pilgrimage to Jerusalem (which, by the way, had been under Muslim control for several centuries), quickly descended into a military campaign.  Conquest, not coexistence, became the goal.

I think I’m safe in saying that none of us have participated in a bloody crusade, at least not knowingly.  None of us have gotten it in our head that that was our mission from God.  Still, all of us have gotten it in our heads, at least on occasion (and frequently, more often than that), an idea that turned out to be ill-conceived.

In the first letter of John there is a warning to his readers to beware of that.  “Beloved,” he says, “do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God; for many false prophets have gone out into the world” (v. 1).  False prophets abound, but we need not believe a false prophet to get a crazy idea in our head—an idea we think is from God!

Let me give you an example.  This was about my proposed plans for life.

In my final semester at Middle Tennessee State University, I got the idea in my head that I should quit school and go to California.

My major was Political Science, but with my exploration of faith—Christianity, and to a lesser extent, Buddhism and Zen—I began to see myself as a seeker of truth, wandering the Earth.  Combining that with my great love of music, I decided that I should return to the land of my first memories of life, San Diego, and get a job in a record store.  I even went to the school library, looked through a San Diego telephone book (this was before the internet), and I found a store near the ocean.

So I made a phone call to my mom and told her what God was leading me to do!  She didn’t have very much to say.  She didn’t ask me, “What in the world are you thinking?”  She simply suggested that I go ahead and finish out the semester, since I was so close to graduating anyway, and then see what I thought.  If God really wanted me to make this major change in my life, waiting a few more weeks wouldn’t hurt.  That turned out to be some pretty good advice.

After a couple of days had gone by, it occurred to me God really did not want me to run off to San Diego!  Who would have thought it?

The author of 1 John says to “test the spirits.”  What are “the spirits”?  Are they supernatural beings?  Are they powers and forces in culture and society?  Are they emotional states of being?  Are they all of those and maybe something else?

The final day of this month, the 31st, is the feast day for St. Ignatius of Loyola.  Ignatius was a military officer in 16th century Spain.  As a young man, he was a wild one.  He was a gambler, and kept himself well-groomed, because he loved the ladies.  While fighting the French in the north of Spain, a cannon ball, passing between his legs, tore open the left calf and broke the right shin.  (If that cannon ball were a few inches higher, well, forget the ladies!)  Ignatius endured many painful months of recovery.

While bedridden, he requested some of his favorite reading, stories of knights and chivalry.  They weren’t available, so what were brought to him were stories of Christ and the saints.  He experienced his conversion while reading those books.  Ignatius decided to use the energy he formerly devoted to warfare to the cause of Christ.  He founded the order known as the Society of Jesus, the Jesuits.

Ignatius wrote a book entitled, The Spiritual Exercises.  In it, he includes a section on “Discerning the Spirits.”  His use of the word “spirits” reflects a concept that today we might call “inclinations.”  One of his main ideas is the difference between what he calls “consolation” and “desolation.”

It’s been noted that, for Ignatius, “consolation means love of God and our fellow human beings.  It is a genuine relationship that moves and fulfills.  It is faith, hope, and [love] and ‘every interior joy which calls and attracts one toward heavenly things.’”[1]  Desolation is the opposite.  It is “darkness of soul, confusion of spirit, attraction to what is base and worldly, restlessness caused by many disturbances and temptations which lead to lack of faith, hope, or love.”[2]

That note about “confusion of spirit” might describe me when I was pitching the idea to my mother about quitting school and taking off for California.

It is not a good idea to make a major decision while in a state of desolation.  It’s not a good idea to do that while in a state of crisis.  That state of crisis might include great anxiety, despair, or a very strong feeling of being rushed into something.  I’m not sure how aware she was of this, but with her word of caution, my mother was utilizing an Ignatian principle!

There are a number of ways to “discern” or “test the spirits.”  Is it the Holy Spirit, or some other spirit?  Kirsteen Kim provides some examples.[3]  The first one is what we see in our scripture text: “every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God” (v. 2).  That one’s really important; we’ll come back to it.

The second way she mentions is to ask, “Does it demonstrate the fruit of the Spirit?”  Thinking of Galatians 5, we ask things like: does it help us to be more loving, more joyful, more peaceful, more patient, better able to exercise self-control?  Does it help us to be more Christ-like?

Another way of testing the spirits would be the presence of charismatic gifts, like healing and speaking in tongues.  Still, in 1 Corinthians 13, St. Paul points out that these gifts must be exercised in a spirit of love.  There can be a temptation to say, “Look at me!  Aren’t I spiritual?”  Other gifts of the Holy Spirit may include empowerment to teach, to give, to exercise compassion (Ro 12:7-8).  In reality, there are numerous gifts of the Spirit.

The final thing Kim mentions is the Spirit leads us to be concerned about the downtrodden, however that appears.  The Spirit wants us to seek justice.  In Luke 4, the Spirit leads Jesus to announce “good news to the poor,” “release to the captives,” “recovery of sight to the blind,” and letting “the oppressed go free” (v. 18).

But what’s going on with that business regarding a spirit from God confessing Jesus Christ has come in the flesh?

At one level, it simply means that Jesus lived as a flesh and blood human being.  It means that Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah, was embodied just like you and me.  He wasn’t just a spiritual being, without physical substance.

The thought that follows in verse 3 is that “every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God” (v. 3).  There’s an alternate reading that says “every spirit that does away with Jesus [or “dissolves Jesus”] is not from God.”

Here’s another meaning: if Jesus were not incarnate, in the flesh, our faith in Christ need not be in the flesh.  We would do away, or dissolve, Jesus.  It would be enough to go through life thinking or wishing something were so, but without doing anything in the body—without taking action in the real world.

Again, some words of wisdom from my mother apply.  At one time or another, I expressed my belief that praying for someone or some situation was enough.  It was now in the hands of Jesus.  But my mom asked what was I going to do about it.  That’s a good and often uncomfortable question.  I said, “I’ve prayed.  Isn’t God all powerful?”  Her response was that by now acting on it would “give my prayer wings.”

I realize there are times when things really are out of our control.  Sometimes there are forces at work we can’t help.  At those times, it really is in the hands of God.  But prayer is also about changing us; it’s also about changing our vision towards the world.

Notice how verse 3 ends.  A spirit that does not confess Jesus “is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming; and now it is already in the world.”  The spirit of the antichrist: a word which, by the way, does not appear in the book of Revelation.  What is this antichrist?

Here’s one answer.  It’s the spirit that says we need not live as though we belonged to Christ.  It’s enough to have the idea, but don’t dare put it into practice!  The spirit of antichrist says that faith should be a strictly private matter.  Just keep it to yourself.  Hide your light.

Johannes Baptist Metz has an interesting take on this.  “Satan wants the Incarnation to be an empty show, where God dresses up in human costume but doesn’t really commit totally to the role.  The devil wants to make the Incarnation a piece of mythology, a divine puppet show.”[4]  I like that.  A divine puppet show.  Again, it’s about not living our faith in the flesh.

Here’s a question.  What do we make of verse 6?  “We are from God.  Whoever knows God listens to us, and whoever is not from God does not listen to us.  From this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.”

If we take the time to test the spirits, if we take the time—with God’s help—to listen to the Holy Spirit, then we can develop the capacity to know the difference between the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.

Even so, we are not infallible; we make mistakes.  And we should be ready, we should allow ourselves, to be surprised.  We should allow ourselves to be surprised by what, and who, we once would have rejected out of hand.  Returning to my original image, we can go on our own crusade, but without love, we’re just being self-righteous.

So, what is love?  That has been asked by many people.  That includes Haddaway, in his 1990s dance song, “What is Love (Baby Don’t Hurt Me),” a song that inspired a popular skit on Saturday Night Live.

Is love just a dreamy, sentimental state?

Dorothy Day, founder of the Catholic Worker movement, once quoted, “Love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing compared to love in dreams.  Love in dreams is greedy for immediate action, rapidly performed and in the sight of all.  [People] will even give their lives if only the ordeal does not last too long but is soon over, with [everyone] looking and applauding as though on the stage.”[5]

“The devil wants to make the Incarnation a divine puppet show." —Johannes Baptist Metz

(Maybe even a stage with a puppet show?)

Love can be a harsh and dreadful thing.  It can be painful, because it takes time.  It isn’t just one and done.  And as our friend Dorothy suggests, love can mean taking actions and making decisions for the sake of Christ which might not be popular with others.

So, as our scripture ends, “Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God,” that involves testing the spirits.  “Everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.  Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.”

Imagine that.  Loving our neighbor, loving each other and giving ourselves to each other means loving God, giving ourselves to God.

How can we act as though Jesus Christ has come in the flesh?  Is there something you have tested and know is from the Holy Spirit?  What are we waiting for?  The love of God does the heavy lifting.  That’s when we can truly say, “Deus vult!”  “God wills it!”

[1] Stefan Kiechle, The Art of Discernment (Notre Dame, IN:  Ave Maria Press, 2005), 56.

[2] in Susan Rakoczy, “Transforming the Tradition of Discernment,” Journal of Theology for Southern Africa 139 (March 2011): 96.

[3] Kirsteen Kim, “How Will We Know When the Holy Spirit Comes?” Evangelical Review of Theology 33:1 (January 2009): 95.

[4] Johannes Baptist Metz, Poverty of Spirit, Inclusive Language Version (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1998), 11.

[5] Rakoczy, 107.