RENOUNCING THE DEVIL [M, 2-10-25]

BEYOND WINTER: The Irrelevant Musings of An Old Man—RENOUNCING THE DEVIL [M, 2-10-25]

 

One of my cousins, in her 80s, raised her great-grandson. Two generations of their family were either unable or unwilling to provide a home for him. I greatly admire her. Raising a child is difficult at any age, but in your 80s?

At his confirmation, like any thirteen-year-old, he was a bit anxious, being up in front of all those people in a solemn ceremony, and distracted, so when the pastor asked him, “Do you renounce the devil and all his works?” he looked quite startled and shouted out, “No!”

My cousin was quite relieved when they got it sorted out. It wasn’t because, coming into puberty, he thought the devil and all his works might be quite appealing, like Brutus P. Thornapple, of “The Born Loser” comic strip, who, when asked by his pastor if he were troubled by bad thoughts, said, “No, I rather enjoy them.” The boy had heard the reverse of what he had been asked; he thought he was being asked to affirm the devil and all his works.

Pastor, congregation, and great-grandmother all had a big and relieved laugh together.

These are times when it is easy to become anxious and distracted. Indeed, the devil tries to confuse us so that we’ll not hear correctly the question God puts to us. We are asked by so many forces in the world, in so many ways, to affirm the devil and all his works.

The only way we renounce the devil and all his works is by loving. Love is the only thing that trumps the devil. [Yes, I understand my use of that word.]

If we try to defeat the devil with anything other than love, we shall fail.

Love is not weakness. It does not try to avoid confronting evil. It uses all the power that God provides. That power of God is love.

But love is not vengeance. It is not disrespect. It is not schadenfreude. Love is patient and kind. Love is not boastful. It’s not proud. It keeps no scorecard of wrongs. It is faithful. It is hopeful. Love never fails. [I Corinthians 13 paraphrased]

I’ve had contact recently with a distant friend whose wife died. He said, “I’ve been comforted by something you wrote a long time ago. ‘Love and I looked death in the eye; death blinked.’”

As we travel through these current dangerous and difficult times, God asks us, “Do you renounce the devil and all his works?” It is important to remember that the only way to renounce the devil and all his works is by loving God and all of God’s works, all that God loves.

John Robert McFarland

We know that there are approximately 2.3 million grandparents raising grandchildren in the US, but there are no stats on the number of great-grandparents in that role. From my own pastoral experience, though, I know that there are way too many, far more than we realize.