HOW TO LOVE YOUR ENEMIES (And Why It Seems Impossible)

Encircled by gnashing critics, Reformer John Calvin referred to his detractors in 16th century Geneva as "tearing wolves." These were not stuffed kids' toys; they were leaders in the church, leaders in the political life of the community, snarling enemies with power and the will to use it against him.

About men like this, Jesus said, "Love your enemies" (Matt 5:44). Our reaction to the Savior's words depends somewhat on our relational circumstances. When all is well and we are far removed from the dust and grit of battle, Jesus' command feels pretty manageable. There's nothing to it. Loving hypothetical enemies is as easy as singing opera in your car by yourself--until we are confronted with the real article, a flesh-and-blood, teeth-slavering enemy.

It feels like somewhat safer ground when Jesus tells his disciples to love their neighbors (Mark 12:31). That's easy. Not all our neighbors are enemies. In fact, many of our neighbors we sort of like. But, touching a raw nerve, Jesus implied that their neighbor was the Samaritans, the despised dogs living on the wrong side of the border. Deep down, we all know that putting up with our neighbor is worlds apart from loving our neighbor.

So, who is your neighbor today? Who is my neighbor? It's not the kindly soul who bakes chocolate chip cookies for you, or the octogenarian farmer across the way who pitchforks a load of hay from his own field and delivers it, just to be neighborly (true story). It's the neighbor who has leveled his cannons at you, seeks your ruin, and has become your enemy.

POWERFUL ENEMIES

Loving our enemies. It's a tall order, a hard saying. There's nothing easy about it. Let me get this straight, we say, you want me to love the people who hate me, who have set out to harm me, who've plotted to bring about my downfall. How am I supposed to love those who discredit me, who disenfranchise me, who spread falsehoods about me?

Have you felt this? Who are your real enemies today, those who drop trouble on you, who bear an angry grudge against you (Psalm 55:3), those who have used their power to lay traps for you? Browse throughout the Psalms and you will recall the psalmist feeling the full weight of abandonment and betrayal from his enemies. Worst of all, some of the psalmists' enemies were once friends, members of his own household, people he had worshiped with, his partners in ministry (Psalms 55:12-14). And Jesus tells us to love these enemies.

Let's not sugar coat things when we say enemies. As a writer, I've been blessed with many readers and reviewers who appreciate what I write, and who kindly let me know that in various ways--including by continuing to read my books. But that's not how everyone responds. I have enemies. Not of the Teddy bear variety. They are critics who feel like tearing wolves with claws and fangs, powerful detractors who use their influence to do harm, who make it their business to extinguish this “faintly burning wick” (Isaiah 42:3).

FORGIVING ENEMIES

It is no good saying I love my enemies unless I feel the full weight of their chosen status as genuine enemies. The enemies Jesus calls us not just to put up with, but to love, are the real article, enemies with swords and clubs, and hammer and tongs, and power and the will to use it against us. Enemies whose offences against us are real and costly. These are the enemies you and I are called to forgive and love. Let’s be honest, loving enemies feels impossible.

Only Jesus, tempted in all points like as we are (Heb 4:15), perfectly demonstrated this love for his enemies. Betrayed, bloodied, bludgeoned beyond recognition, and dying in anguish on a Roman gibbet, Jesus prayed to his Father to "forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). I must confess, my response, however, is to cast about for a loophole. Okay, Jesus' enemies may not have known what they were doing, but my enemies know exactly what they're doing.

Have you felt that? Maybe you've lost a job as the result of a witch hunt, your reputation slandered, your career in jeopardy—and your boss knew exactly what he was doing. Or you've been falsely accused of doing something wrong by someone who knows you didn't do it. There's nothing new under the sun; recall the Salem Witch Trials in 1692, at least twenty souls going to their deaths because of false accusations made by neighbors who took concerted and knowing steps to become deadly enemies.

SPLENDID SINS

The best of our good works done this side of glory are, as Augustine called them, merely "splendid sins." The accused witches in Salem Village were likely not witches, but they were sinners; they may have all been true Christians, being sanctified, but in need of daily grace for the forgiveness of their sins, and for the mixture of motives in their obedience. So it is for all of us. Our enemies don't know the half. In the dark recesses of our hearts, we're worse than they think. It's not just they who are enemies. We have done what they are doing. Every flirtation with the world aligns me as an enemy of God (James 4:4). Who among us does not have our lingering pet friendships with the world? We are the enemy.

Jesus' supreme expression of love for his enemies, however, is far more personal. If we are true Christians, it was while we were yet sinners and enemies of Christ's that he died for us (Rom 5:10). Jesus, who calls us to love our enemies, supremely did so when he laid down his life for me his enemy, fully to pay the debt of sin I owed for my cosmic offenses against a thrice-holy God.

IMPOSSIBLE

"Love your enemies." It's far more than a tall order, a hard saying. It's an impossible one. You've tried. I've tried. As an act of will power, or new resolve, love for my enemies is impossible. A few lines after this impossible command, Jesus concluded with an even more impossible one: "You therefore must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matt 5:48).

Wrongly understood, that has to be the most terrifying verse in the Bible. I can't manage ten minutes of perfection, let alone a life that is pronounced perfect as God himself is perfect. We must have an Advocate, a substitute, one who acts vicariously on our behalf and for our eternal perfection. Jesus himself is our righteousness, the one who faultlessly obeyed his Father's will, and imputed his own perfect righteousness to my account (Phil 3:9). Without the imputation of Christ's righteousness, I can no more love my enemies than I can measure up to the perfect holiness of Almighty God. But as I grow in grace and the knowledge of Christ (2 Peter 3:18), and he continues his gracious work of sanctifying me--and using my enemies unwittingly to aid in that sanctification--I come to love him more as he first loved me (I John 4:19) while I was yet his enemy. The God who changes enemies like me into friends and fellow heirs, is at work in me. In Christ, I can do all things through my elder brother who strengthens me (Phil 4:13), even forgive and love the tearing wolves encircling me.

 Join me as I abandon hope in my efforts to love my enemies. Let's press on in the all-powerful strength of Christ today, as we--once intractable enemies ourselves--seek his gracious enabling to do the impossible--love our enemies.

Douglas Bond, author of Grace Works! (And Ways We Think It Doesn't), has written numerous books of historical fiction, biography, devotion, and practical theology. He is lyricist for New Reformation Hymns, directs the Oxford Creative Writing Master Class, speaks at churches and conferences, and leads church history tours in Europe. Watch for his forthcoming book God Sings! (And Ways We Think He Ought To). Learn more at bondbooks.net.

The Literacy Crisis—The Way Forward? Go Back

60% of American students read below grade level

True confession. I am a slow reader. My wife blows through a book at three times my reading rate. While on a flight once, we found ourselves with only one book (pre E-book world, but more of that in a moment). She was drumming her fingers on the armrest when I was still solidly on the first page. She maintains that she remembers almost nothing of what she reads while I seem to retain much more. She retains more than she thinks; I wish I retained more than I do. Some of this is DNA.

My father had dyslexia and was held back in elementary school for the crime of writing in mirror image and reading too slowly. His writing looked fine to him and it worked better that way with his left hand. He read Scripture every morning with us, one word at a time. I was embarrassed when I had a friend over, but look back on it now, thirteen years after his homegoing, in an entirely different light: he was given the gift of being a slow reader and loved every word of it. He read God’s Word with such affection and appreciation—of every single word. When he was writing his doctoral dissertation, my mother (who reads like a hummingbird hovering over a hibiscus) read his source material out loud to him, he stroking his chin, nodding in thought, and jotting a note down here and there, his mind retaining and processing every word.

SCREEN TIME

Some of this is the way God has made us. But not all. I’ve often told my children and students that the more they watch movies and television and play video games the more it will destroy their creative imagination. Unlike a book where my imagination must be awake and doing its job: creating images, awakening my senses, getting me involved in the story; on the screen, it’s all done for me. I become a passive receptor not an active participant, and my imagination grows dull.

Screen time retards our reading ability. But not only our ability, our interest in reading wanes as a direct result of too much screen time. Recent studies are piling up that indicate there are many disadvantages to spending excessive time on screen, including anxiety, depression, and more serious mental health issues that are being correlated to screen addiction. Studies show that, while Americans check their phones on average seventeen times a day, we are reader fewer and fewer books.

I hate my phone. Some of my best days are when my battery dies early in the day and I don’t bother to plug the thing in. I catch grief later for not replying to a critical email or answering texts or private messages from those I love. But the day was bliss and imminently productive. As a writer I’m forced to spend far more time in front of a screen than I would like. I’d prefer a goose quill or, better yet, a hammer and chisel and a chunk of rock. But that’s not the world I live in. So, I sit here in Iceland where I began this article, awaiting my connecting flight to London typing on my laptop, and staring at these words magically popping up on the screen before my bloodshot eyes.

C. S. Lewis never learned to “drive a typewriter,” as he termed it, because he knew it would destroy his sense of rhythm. He wrote by hand with a dip pen and persuaded his devoted brother Warnie to drive the typewriter for him. But the screen removes us another giant step from the tactile world of the typewriter with its ink ribbon, levers and gadgets, and real paper.

HOW TO RETAIN LESS OF WHAT YOU READ

Because I find myself travelling quite a bit, and because I’m a firm believer in travelling light, I do read some books on my phone while flying. But I do so with great frustration. I never quite know where I am in the scope of the argument or story. However unscientific and unsophisticated it sounds, I retain much less when I read on a screen. For a time, I tried memorizing Scripture using my phone, but I discovered a significant barrier to my ability to retain, a barrier that was only broken when I returned to writing down the biblical passage on 3x5 cards. Call me a dinosaur.

I do occasionally read my Bible app on my phone, at the dentists, or while waiting to pick up one of my kids, or while flying. But, there again, it’s with enormous distraction and peril to my ability to retain what I’m reading. One reason is all those pop-up notifications telling me that so-and-so just got a new puppy, or posted a picture of what they’re eating for their anniversary dinner, or of their lost cat. Think where I’d be if I didn’t know these things! My mind is flouncing here and there, assaulted by the chaos of busyness called modern life. I’ve discovered that by putting my phone on airplane mode, I can eliminate the pop-up notifications, but I usually remember this after the fifty-seventh notification has derailed my ability to concentrate.

Visual stimulation distracts me, as does being an extrovert. I like interacting with people, but the older I get, the more the Bond hereditary dyslexia kicks in, and I find myself far more easily distracted. When I’m in a church service where there’s a band and instruments stretching across the stage (yes, they even call it a stage), as I attempt to murmur along with the rest of the folks, I find myself studying the different people singing, swaying, crooning, strumming, and drumming on the stage; the words on the screens (so much for too much screen time again), well, they’re far from the most important part of what we’re supposed to be doing. It may be the sense that something is out of proportion that makes worship leaders keep repeating the words over and over again. Surely vain repetition will help us cut through all the distractions and get at the meaning of the words.

THE WAY BACK

What are ways you and I can help solve the literacy crisis? Unplug your phone. Let it go dead, for long stretches. Sing from real hymnals. Read real books, you know, the kind with paper pages and real letters and words inked on the paper. The tactile activity of reading a real book will slow you down. This is a good thing. As you read real books do so with real pen or real pencil in hand. I jot notes down, yes, with paper and pencil, and sometimes I use 3x5 cards or post-it notes, then organize the ideas I’ve jotted on the notes by moving them around on the desk or table. Sometimes I brainstorm using a white board and erasable markers, adding sketches of characters, or diagramming the progression of thought that I just read.

Read challenging books from dead authors (what am I saying!), and read them slowly. We will descend further and further into the illiteracy abyss the less we are intentionally letting ourselves be shaped by the ideas and stories of the past. Reading old books will make us far more able to discern nonsense when we see it flit across the screen. We gain a vantage point from which we can see our own world more clearly, where it is going, why it is going there, and what we can do to halt the decline. Sometimes listening to the best music from composers living in other places and in other times, uncluttered by the distractions and presuppositions of our world, can aid us in understanding and appreciating challenging literature from the past.

But best of all, have a concerted family time where all devices are shut off and put away and everyone sits in the same room and reads their own copy of the Bible silently (we do this aloud too). We’ve started doing this in our home. Afterwards we talk together about where and what we read, and give a brief summary of what we learned. It’s remarkable how quiet it is, how uncluttered, how together we are—without distractions--and how much of God’s Word we can read and take in without being interrupted by cat videos.

It’s not rocket science, nor is it more information technology or more social media platforms. There’s no app that will solve the literacy crisis. The solution to mounting illiteracy in our new social order is simple. Augustine took the advice of children playing a game. “Take and read! Take and read!” And so must we.

Douglas Bond, author of numerous books of historical fiction, biography, devotion, and practical theology, is lyricist for New Reformation Hymns, directs the Oxford Creative Writing Master Class, and leads church history tours in Europe. Watch for his forthcoming book God Sings! (And Ways We Think He Ought To). Learn more at bondbooks.net.

How Does a Cathedral Mean?

Notre Dame Paris, 2013

I've been thinking a good deal about Notre Dame burning in Paris. I know I am not alone. My first of many visits to the most visited monument in Paris (yes, more than the Eiffel Tower) was in 1982; our Armistice Centenary Tour visited Notre Dame ten months ago. I will never forget or ever be able to fully express in words what walking into an 850-year-old Gothic cathedral feels like. It still feels that way. 

To the thousands who participated in building it, what did all the splendor mean? To a world secularizing at warp speed, what does a centuries-old stone church mean? I explore some of these questions in chapter 27 of my WWII historical fiction book The Resistance (available at bondbooks.net). My protagonist downed B-17 pilot and his French Resistance escort are forced to hide from the encircling SS manhunt on the precipitous tiles of a Medieval house directly across the street from another French Gothic structure, Bayeux Cathedral. Here's what happened:

27

HEIGHT OF TERROR

T

he alarm now wailed in Evans’ head, unrelenting, inescapable. Then, abruptly, it was no longer internal.

From the street came the roar of engines, tires thrumming on the cobblestones, brakes screeching to a halt, doors slamming, jackboots clonking on the pavement. Crisp knocking on a door. Silence. Fists beating a door. Shouting in German. Rifle butts pounding on a door five stories below.

“Maybe it is another door,” hissed Andre, his face ashen. “Perhaps for someone else?”

Hasty footfalls came from the stairs, then rapid knocking on the door of Andre’s studio.

Through the keyhole came a breathless voice. “They are coming! Waffen SS!”

“For us? Are you certain?”

“Absolutely. At the door of the shop.”

“How much time?”

“Three minutes. No more,” and he was gone.

Aimée grabbed Evans’ arm. “We must hide you!” He drew in breath sharply. His shoulder was not fully healed yet.

“Forget me,” said Evans. “Hide Ruben.”

“It is you they are searching for,” said Aimée, her green eyes wide and imploring. “You are an American flyer. If they find you, they will arrest all of us, including Ruben.”

She turned to Andre. “Is there anywhere?”

“The roof.” With a sweep of his arm, he cleared the workbench. “Out the window. Climb along the gable. Do not fall. Hide behind the chimney. Be sure they do not see you.”

“I want to go home.” There was a quaver in Ruben’s voice; he tugged at Aimée’s hand.

“Evans, you must hurry,” said Aimée, leaning toward him as if to give him farewell kisses on the cheeks.

“No!” said Andre. “You must hide as well. I will take the boy down. He is my cousin. It will look normal with the boy. They are not searching for a little boy.”

Aimée began to protest.

“There is no time. Go now! Hide with the American. We will stall them.”

Swallowing the lump in his throat, Evans followed Aimée out the window and onto the steep, slate roof. He tried not to look down. The hard cobblestones, he knew they were far below.

Scrambling behind the chimney, Evans drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. He’d flown bombing missions high over enemy-occupied Europe, antiaircraft riddling his Fort, Fw190 fighters swooping in for the kill. Why more raw fear at this?

He heard the SS captain barking orders at his men in German, the harsh commands echoing across the street below and bouncing back at them off the west façade of the cathedral. Dropping bombs from 20,000 feet on munitions factory buildings, dangerous as it was, was detached, impersonal, done with machines. This was close, human, intimate, and—he feared—soon to be face-to-face.

Aimée and Evans pressed against the brickwork of the chimney. It wasn’t much cover, but it was all they had. A soldier glancing up from the street at just the right angle, and they would be seen. They pressed closer together, hard against the ridge and the chimney. Evans heard and felt Aimée’s heart pounding next to him, and the clutching staccato of her breath. Or was it his own?

“All we can do is wait,” whispered Evans, his voice barely audible.

Aimée’s face was pale. “And pray.” She mouthed the words. “I could not bear it if anything happened to my little brother.”

He nodded, trying to slow down the hammering of his heart. Directly across the narrow street loomed the massive cathedral. Evans studied the intricate medieval statuary adorning the west façade. The resurrection of the dead, souls rising from tombs, some to heaven, more to hell. Clearly the stonemason was more interested in the howling torments of the damned in hell.

A spasm fluttered in Evans’ left hamstring muscle. He tried to ignore it. The spasm hardened, constricting and contracting, tightening into an iron fist. If only he could change positions. The pain was excruciating. He tried to relax, but it was impossible, not while clinging to a precipitous roof on a medieval house far above the street. Teeth clenched, a tremor ran through his body.

“What is the matter, Evans?” whispered Aimée.

He swallowed hard and attempted to control the quavering he knew would be in his voice if he spoke.

“Are you ill?”

 “Cramp,” he managed to mouth, “in my leg.”

“I am sorry for you,” she whispered. “Perhaps, pressure directly on the muscle?”

He nodded. Holding on for dear life, how was he going to apply direct pressure to the back of his thigh?

“Think of something else,” she suggested. She bobbed her head at the cathedral façade. “Think of that.”

He looked again at the medieval stonework; the muscle in his leg felt like hard stone. The writhing condemned in the Last Judgment scene looked like he felt at the moment. Evans studied the north portal. It began to make sense. The mason had chiseled stony vignettes from the Passion of Christ. There was the Last Supper, the betrayal, Jesus praying to his father in the garden; and there was the kiss of Judas, the arrest, torture, carrying the cross, brutal crucifixion.

Evans shuddered. The war, the SS bursting into homes, arrests, torture, senseless killing, reprisals, ambush, spies, double agents, secret radio transmissions—being shot down, bailing out, hunted, others in grave danger because of him. How would all that look in stone relief? 

He scanned back through the stone vignettes, the knot in his hamstring subsiding. Why had they done it, carved those scenes in stone, built the entire structure, all in stone?

It suddenly occurred to Evans that from this angle, cowering high atop the roof of a medieval house, he and Aimée were seeing parts of the cathedral others never saw. Statues so high up, so out of sight from passersby, they were impossible to be seen from the pavement. Slowly, he scanned the facade, higher and higher it continued. People had lived in the shadow of Bayeux’s cathedral for nearly 1000 years, and how many hundreds of intricately carved statuary had never been seen by anyone? Yet humble stonecutters had tap-tapped away for years, decades, generations, each successive mason doing his part to create this magnificent place, whether his work would ever be seen by anyone or not. What was so important that centuries of workers would do it?

As Evans mused, the sun began to set and a golden glow radiated from the façade of the ancient edifice. Even if it had been safe to speak aloud, what was on display at that instant was so spectacular, wonder alone would have hushed them.

What had the voice on the BBC broadcast said only a short while ago? “When Christ died, he died for you individually just as much as if you’d been the only man in the world.” Evans wasn’t at all sure what it meant; Sunday School had been long ago; he needed to think more deeply about it. But whatever it did mean, it made him feel that there had to be something bigger, far more important than his own troubles.

Jolted abruptly back to the peril of the moment, Evans and Aimée heard the harsh barking of the SS captain apparently reentering the street below. They could not see anything, but his words echoed from the gulf between the house and the façade of the cathedral.

“Please, God, not Ruben,” whispered Aimée.

Evans nodded in agreement. He wanted to see what was going on five stories below, in the street. He felt so helpless. What good was a flyer without his weapon, his plane? If only he could do something to stop the Germans.

“When will they leave?”

Evans shook his head. He had no idea. How long would they have to hide? All night?

The yelling continued, guttural, harsh, brutal. There was nothing to do but wait. Oddly, as they waited, involuntarily crammed together behind the chimney, high atop the medieval house, they began to feel detached from the commotion, as if their vantage point made them safe, at least for the instant.

“If I tell you something,” whispered Evans, “can you promise not to tell anyone else?”

Aimée looked wary. “Oui, bien sur.”

Evans cleared his throat, loosening the scarf at his neck. “I-I am not a big fan of heights.”

Aimée looked wide-eyed at him, and then her lips twitched slightly, as if she were restraining herself; it was hardly the time for humor.

“You are a pilot. You fly the mighty B-17, the Flying Fortress. The high-altitude bomber of your Army Air Corps. Are you telling me that you are afraid of heights?”

Evans nodded. “Always have been. Never liked climbing trees. Never slept in the top bunk. I told my younger brother it was the best mattress. Until one day he figured it out. I had to pay him off with marbles to keep quiet. And then we got older, but he still remembered.”

“It is courageous to do this.”

“What, to tell you?”

“I suppose. But I think it is courageous to fly high-altitude bomber airplanes when you are afraid of heights, in defiance of your fears.”

“Courageous? Maybe, or maybe just dull-witted.”

Aimée smiled. “You being dull-witted this morning at the checkpoint, it was merely a ruse de guerre.”

Evans nodded. “I get a hitch in my innards just hearing the words high-altitude. I really should have volunteered to do something closer to the ground.”

“Then you would not be here.” Aimée said it as a matter of fact.

Evans stole a glance at her.

“Ruse de guerre,” she said. “Comprenez-vous?”

Evans swallowed, avoiding her gaze, her green eyes that looked right through you. Ruse de guerre, he understood. Deception of war. Everyone in wartime engaged in it—generals, prime ministers, spies, deep-cover agents. And so was he.

It was nearly dark. The yelling abruptly stopped. For an instant there was silence in the invisible gulf below them.  Suddenly, vehicle engines roared to life, and the SS sped north down the Rue de Bienvenu.

Read all of The Resistance by Douglas Bond

Riches to Rubbish--Van Gogh's Unstable View of the Bible

Vincent Van Gogh self-portrait

"Theo, woe is me..." On my flight home last night I became engrossed in Dear Theo, the unvarnished letters of Vincent Van Gogh to his attentive younger brother Theo. Penned by a desperate man, writing to a brother whom he deeply loved and implicitly trusted, Van Gogh exposed every tattered thread of his tormented soul. It is many things, but one is a chilling psychological study of the artistic temperament and culture, which compelled Vincent to caution his brother, "you must beware of getting your young family too much into the artistic setting."

What sobered me the most while reading was the gaping contrast between the desires and aspiration of Van Gogh in his early twenties and what he became at the end of his short life (he died at thirty-seven). Growing up in a Dutch Reformed family in the Netherlands, surrounded by the Bible and the gospel, his father a pastor, Vincent wrote, “...it is a delightful thought that in the future wherever I shall be, I shall preach the Gospel; to do that well, one must have the Gospel in one’s heart; may the Lord give it to me.” His appeared to be a single-minded vision for his life's work. “Theo, woe is me if I do not preach the Gospel; if I did not aim at that and possess faith and hope in Christ, it would be bad for me indeed.”

By all his earlier accounts of his father and family, the Van Gogh household was no nominal Christian home; there is no sense whatsoever that his father led them in merely perfunctory expressions of religion. While in England, he wrote of his parents, “...so strong is the family feeling and our love for each other that the heart uplifts itself and the eye turns to God and prays: ‘Do not let me stray too far from them, not too far, O Lord.’” What parents would not want their son or daughter to feel this way about the home and family? 

Vincent's passion for his family concurred with his passion for the Bible. “You do not know how I yearn towards the Bible. I read it daily, but I should like to know it by heart, to study thoroughly and lovingly all those old stories, and especially to find out what is known about Christ.” This seemed to be a young man who not only read his Bible, but read it christologically, eagerly searching to find the Lord Jesus in its pages. 

I read on. Long and minutely detailed letters, covering months, several years. And then something began to change. My gut lurched (not simply from the turbulence as we bounced over the Rockies toward Seattle). Whole letters contained an obsessive fixation on his painting and on being successful as an artist. Repeatedly throughout the autobiographical account those letters form, Vincent begins to reveal a systemic shift in his values, his priorities, his passions, his aspirations. 

In one sense, Van Gogh's letters form a chronicle of poverty; he was in perpetual need of fiscal bailouts from his family, and the dependence frustrated him. “I hate not to be quite free." Meanwhile, his attitudes toward his parents, especially his father, incrementally shifted. "Father is not a man for whom I can feel, for instance, what I feel for you. He cannot sympathize with or understand me." Vincent felt his father owed him the money he needed to survive as an artist, but he resented his father's Christian beliefs. "I cannot be reconciled to his system, it oppresses me, it would choke me." 

The most tragic change I observed in the letters, however, was Vincent's attitude toward the Word of God. "I too read the Bible now and then, but in the Bible I see quite different things from those father sees, and what father draws from it... I cannot find in it at all." He goes on to explain his new way of reading the Bible. "When I read-- and really I do not read so much--only a few [biblical] authors, I do so because they look at things in a broader, milder, and more lovable way than I do, and because they know life better, so that I can learn from them; but all that rubbish about good and evil, morality and immorality, I care so very little for it. For, indeed, it is impossible always to know what is good and what is bad, what is moral and what is immoral.”

What a dramatic shift! From yearning for the Bible, getting its truths down in his heart, knowing Christ revealed in its pages, Vincent was honest enough to admit that he now rarely read the Bible, and only very selectively, dismissing much of it as "rubbish." In one sense, Van Gogh was a man ahead of his time; his moral relativism was well formed long before post rationalism. 

Throughout the rest of the letters, perpetually destitute Van Gogh is obsessed with perfecting his craft, and with making money from his artwork. "I am a devil for work... I consider myself decidedly below the peasants... Very difficult, very difficult." In an artistic frenzy, Van Gogh created over 900 paintings and 2,000 drawings.

Soberly, I read on. Theo's heart must have broken as he watched his beloved brother slip further below the line of despair into insanity. Van Gogh described his increasing fits of madness, the "abominable nightmares," the frequent "terrible fits of depression" that came over him, his regrets, his "self-reproach about things in the past," his grinding unhappiness, his toying with the idea of giving up painting, "which costs me so much and brings in nothing." But he is forced to conclude, "at my age it is damnably difficult to begin anything else." 

By this stage in his art, Van Gogh's subject matter had altogether changed. "Of course, there is no question of doing anything from the Bible." Though he feared his own derangement would land him in the old cloister in Arles where lunatics were housed, he was, nevertheless, drawn to painting the inmates at the asylum. Plunged more deeply into despair after a violent argument with fellow painter Paul Gauguin (scholars disagree about how it happened), Van Gogh resorted to self mutilation; he took a straight razor and sliced off his own ear, sending it to a prostitute at the local brothel. Whereupon, he found himself for a time confined in the asylum.

In between bouts of derangement that became more protracted, he wrote, "my life too is threatened at the very root, and my steps too are wavering." The man who would be heralded as the greatest post-impressionist painter--now impoverished, lonely, his skill as yet undiscovered and unappreciated--two days before he died July 29, 1890, in his last letter to Theo Van Gogh wrote, "What's the use?"

Van Gogh's story is shot through with complexity, and I do not intend to over simplify it, but one compelling question must be asked. How did a man who was in his youth so earnest for the Word of God, for the gospel, for Christ, for devoting his life to serving God--how did he come to such a miserable end? Perhaps Van Gogh himself told us:  “Theo, woe is me if I do not preach the Gospel; if I did not aim at that and possess faith and hope in Christ, it would be bad for me indeed.”

And so it will be for you. "Little children, keep yourselves from idols" (I John 5:21).

Douglas Bond is author of twenty-eight books, conference speaker, church history tour leader, Oxford Creative Writing Master Class tutor. Listen to Bond's podcast The Scriptorium for a version of this blog post. Follow him on social media, and subscribe here and at bondbooks.net

The Vastly Immeasurable Value of Few Words--Inkblots

Oxford Creative Writing Master Class nearly filled for April!

Five Blots this chilly evening (with more snow predicted for the morning), and chatting about final editing, dangers of "find and replace all" (beware, something will always glitch), better to find next and inspect carefully; make the Word program do what you want it to do rather than be the patsy of grit (sand). John is in final editing on Saving Grace, a labor of love for some years, great cover art, the final push to publication, and a real book in hand, more important thematically now than ever. John has said over the years of writing this book and learning his craft in the process, that if one abortion-minded young woman reads it and does not consent to killing her baby in the womb, he will be happy. May it have this effect on many. There's a lesson in this about how a writer measures success. 

I want to briefly distill the important elements of good writing that we explored and honed this evening (below are pasted notes more relevant to the specific writers who penned the words). Cheyenne is entering a UK unpublished novel contest and must write a 350 word synopsis as part of her entry process (you can read her first draft below). In a synopsis, be concise, every word must have work to do. Avoid proliferation of names, especially if there could be any confusion. Keep the main character and the main plot in the forefront. A synopsis is often the debut of a writer's ability to a publisher, contest judges, potential distributor, and reader, hence, one must spend careful time writing, rewriting, revising a good synopsis. Rules that are important in your manuscript are equally, or, if possible, more important in a synopsis: Show don't tell. Avoid vague language. Be concise. Use action verbs. Diagram your entire plot on an anatomy of fiction timeline (status quo, inciting moment, rising action, etc.). Try writing your synopsis in sonnet form, fourteen lines of iambic pentameter. This will do many things for your writing, but it will certainly force you to be brief and to choose words that are loaded with meaning and purpose. 

Next, we discussed when to end a chapter or episode. Hannah wrote a frightening ending to an episode, but added a touch more than was needed. Keep your reader in suspense. End a chapter with the protagonist uncertain, off balance, teetering. Don't stabilize the situation or character at the end of a chapter (there are exception to this). Generally, if a chapter begins in stability and certainty, it must end in uncertainty. If the episode begins with uncertainty, it should end with something else, either more uncertainty, or a interlude of certainty (or perceived certainty).

We also discussed shifting points of view within a chapter, when there is no obvious break. This can throw readers off balance, confuse them, lift them out of verisimilitude; it is so unlike the way we experience reality. If the shift in point of view is necessary (they are not always necessary), then signal your reader that the shift is happening with a chapter break, or an internal division of some kind, extra space, *** in that space (which I used to use but don't really like anymore), or, as Daniel Silva does from time to time, create an internal chapter break with space and a drop-cap first letter to the new point of view. I return to caution with shifting points of view. It is not for the novice and can have perilous results. There is a reason for the rule to stick with one point of view, your protagonist's. Break it to your peril. 

I concluded with a brief word about the non-fiction book I'm beginning. I’m calling it tentatively God Sings, comparing and contrasting how God and his people sing in the Bible (there’s tons of this) with how we are attempting to do so in the glare and glitter of an entertainment ethos. More coming on that front, God willing.

Register today for the final spots available in my writing intensive literary tour of middle England, Oxford Creative Writing Master Class, April 2-9. "The Oxford Creative Writing Master Class was above and beyond my wildest dreams. I learned so much about writing, history, theology. OCWMC has truly changed my life," so said one of my recent OCWMC grads. Check it out today, but do not delay, bondbooks.net or email me at bondbooks.net@gmail.com. 

Desperate for adventure, or anything to distill the monotony of her life, JULIET [why caps?] goes hiking, and finds a sprawling, upside-down tree. [Can you make us hear the chomp?] It swallows, transporting her, and she wakes in a different [sounds too vague, bland] place where she arrives at the town of [I wouldn't use the name in the synopsis] Umi no Machi: a Japanesque town with a medieval [can you use more specific language? what makes her feel like it's medieval?] feel. 

[keep us in Juliet's point of view] There, a woman named DAYNA warns of impending doom [specific kind of doom? Sun will die... invading army...], but the townspeople pay no heed. Raiders attack in the night, but Juliet evades their clutches. She, Dayna, and the UNKNOWN begin a quest to rescue the townspeople.

While on the trail, Juliet slips up [slips up how?], causing Dayna to demands answers concerning Juliet’s past. 

[under cover of darkness] Finally, they catch up to the raiders and rescue the townspeople under the cover of darkness, but Juliet is ambushed and captured. The Unknown [is he called this or his name?] rescues her, and she learns his name—ADNAN. 

During an attempt for Juliet to return home, the three are taken prisoner and led to TRISTAN, who forces them to help in his uprising against KING JAIIN. 

They are separated during an attack. Seeking refuge, Juliet meets HANIEL and MARI, two of Tristan’s trusted rebels. She embroils herself within the uprising, while dealing with conflicting feelings concerning Tristan, the uprising, and all the secrets surrounding her. 

Aware of how she is looked upon by the rebels, Juliet accuses Tristan of using her, and he agrees to let her leave on a foray with Haniel, but the king’s men take her. She escapes and, on foot, makes it back safely on the verge of collapse. 

Juliet urges Mari to go be with her niece [too many people in this sentence] who is expecting a baby, and soon after realizes Tristan cares for her [which her?]. Without Adnan to counsel her, Juliet decides to commit to the uprising, but when Tristan asks to court her for the sake of his people, who see her superstitiously as the Otherworlder, she turns him down. 

Juliet and Haniel leave to warn his and Mari’s village of wandering raiders, but they’re too late; everyone is dead and there are no survivors. Angry at what she has seen, Juliet agrees to fight with Tristan, and agrees to his courtship proposal.

In general, I would strongly suggest that you kill names, tighten prose, ramp up the dilemma that Juliet finds herself in with Tristan making advances. Draw the anatomy of fiction and place each episode of rising action on the diagram. This will clean the story arc in your own mind and help with writing the synopsis. Additionally, you could write the whole plot in iambic pentameter 140 syllables, a sonnet. This forces you to choose your words careful, each having important work to do.

Hannah read next, a romp in the forest. “Mommy, look at the flowers!” Charlotte ran off the trail and darted over to a cluster of small pink flowers surrounding the base of a nearby [what kind of tree?] tree. Amber stopped and slipped her backpack off her shoulders to dig around in it for the book she’d brought to identify plants with.

As she thumbed through the pages, she occasionally glanced up to watch her daughter. Another few pages and she stopped.

“Hey, Charlotte, those are-” Amber froze when she looked up and didn’t see her. She turned around in a circle. “Charlotte?”

No answer, except for the wind rustling the firs and cedars around her. “Charlotte, answer me,” Amber said, moving further up the path. “Charlotte!”

She checked behind a rhododendron shrub. Nothing. Her stomach twisted.

Could the Woodsman have gotten her?

Amber shook her head at the sudden thought. “It’s just a fairytale,” she told herself, her steps and heartbeat quickening. “Charlotte!”

She wasn’t behind the huckleberry bushes either. Amber didn’t bother to pause even for a second to grab the backpack as panic propelled her off the path.

Her prayers became more desperate as time passed quicker than she wanted. When sunset came, there was still no sign of the curly-haired little girl.

Amber tried to force herself to continue despite her legs feeling like jelly and the fact she didn't know where she was.

But one more step and she stumbled onto her hands and knees. Her shoulders heaved as hot tears dripped down her nose onto the dirt.

She remained that way for another few [be specific on time] minutes.

A rustle in the bushes startled her and she sat up, wiping at her red-rimmed eyes as a sliver of hope ignited. “Charlotte?”

A doe and her fawn appeared, and her shoulders slumped. The animals seemed to regard her for a moment, then turned and walked away.

Amber’s throat tightened, her eyes refilling with tears. A sudden squeal startled her and her head turned.

“Charlotte?”

Another squeal. Amber scrambled to her feet and rushed forward in the direction she thought it had come from. She batted at branches which tugged at her clothes and hopped over moss-covered logs. Her ears picked up more squeals. If they came from Charlotte, it sounded like she was happy.

           The trees became sparse, eventually ending at the edge of a small [small is not a helpful adjective here] slope leading down to a meadow full of [specific] wildflowers.

Among them was Charlotte, running to and fro, picking as many as she could. Amber nearly collapsed from relief. She opened her mouth to call, but was stopped short not just by the sight of her daughter running up to a newfound companion, but that person’s appearance as well.

Her eyes darted from the gas mask to the trench coat to the work boots and back to the mask.

Charlotte had found the Woodsman...or had the Woodsman found her? [leave off this final line and end the chapter]

Dave reads next. Rewriting older manuscript.

Steven laughed out loud inside his car as he watched [could you name him so the pov shift is more natural down the page?] his prey walk into the jewelry store. This is going to be more fun than I thought. I get rid of this big ugly guy, then take his girlfriend as the spoils. He wiped a bead of sweat from his brow. He hated humidity, and here he was stuck in a small car in Knoxville. Even in the middle of October, the humidity was still bad until late afternoon. He looked back at the store, the big guy was still in there standing at the counter yakking with the clerk. Come on, how long does it take to pick out a stupid ring? He turned the key in the ignition and turned the air conditioning on full blast. Steven re-checked his guns. He wanted to be sure there was plenty of tranquilizer darts for the girl. From what he’d been told, she was a feisty one and he didn’t want to deal with fighting her after possibly having to fight the big guy. A slight glint caught his eye. The first target was on the move. He came walking out of the store with a smile on his face and a small bag in his hand. Ugh. This guy’s got it real bad. Steven slipped the car into gear and followed him up S. Central street. He let out a groan when his target turned into a diner just a couple blocks later. He pulled the car over and left the engine running. Five minutes went by and Steven started banging his head on the steering wheel. He picked up his guns for the third time and started to get out when they both came bouncing out the door. Finally! He watched with baited breath as they walked down to a Suburban parked on the street. He smiled as he saw them climb in and pull into the light Thursday afternoon traffic. With shaking hands, he pulled out a few car lengths behind them. [these shifts in pov can be moments where readers get confused, and confused readers usually stop reading] Bruce swerved a little as he pulled into traffic, making Alexis laugh. “What’s up? Your arm still not healed up all the way?” “Nah, it’s fine, my hand just slipped a little.” He smiled sheepishly as he rubbed his left arm. It was still a little weak after being in a cast for six weeks.

...“Alrighty, I won’t be long.[this should be a coma]” S[this should be lower case s] he said as she walked away. Attributions are not capitalized. ...“Hmmm. Must have been a S[no cap]quirrel or something[coma and lower case s].” Said Bruce.

...Just a few minutes [Moments later--be concise] later, they were all [a]lone in their favorite spot, right next to the lake. The sun broke through the morning overcast and warmed them up a little as they set up their [little twice in same sentence--find a better adjective] little picnic.

I felt like the proposal scene was stalling a bit, then the brother assassin appeared. John suggested changing the girl's name so it wouldn't make readers think of chatting with cutting edge technology. Gunfire would have been heard by other hikers on the trail. Silencers maybe?

Snow and the Best Laid Schemes of Mice and Men

I took this after sitting on the tarmac for two hours

Most of us keep our composure just fine--as long as things are going just fine. We plan things out and have this odd expectation that the million-and-one variables (and people) out there will simply comply, fall in line with out plans, do as we have ordained. You know, "My will, not thine, O Lord, however foolish it be." We do this--we?--I do this almost everyday. Even when my declared theology shouts otherwise in my ear.

I was musing on this from sunny Central Valley Fresno California this past weekend where I was keynote at the Christian Writers Seminar hosted by Fresno Pacific University. Between my two plenary addresses, a TV interview on the importance of teaching history to our children, two Sunday morning messages on 7 Biblical Reasons Every Christian Ought to be a History Geek, and an evening exhortation on Psalm 46--I kept watching the weather in Snowmageddon Puget Sound. My wife was reporting to me about the 18" of snow that had dumped on our farm, how pretty it looked, but how much more work it was to keep all the animals fed, watered, and warm. She had not even tried to drive down our steep driveway onto the icy roads. Schools were all closed, as were many roads. Trees snapped under the weight of the snow and ice. Power lines were down throughout the region. Law enforcement urged people to stay home, do not drive unless it is an emergency.

As I boarded the Alaska flight (bumped up to first class), the pilot told us that SeaTac Airport was covered in compact snow and ice and more snow was falling. The flight attendant mouthed to us to be prepared to land in Portland since she thought there was no way he would try to land in the middle of a winter storm. Who would do that? He did, expertly, one of the smoothest landings ever. Then we sat on the plane for two hours, just sat, waiting for a gate to open. And sat some more. As it would turn out, that was the simplest part of the next twenty hours for me.

Ordinarily the shuttle from the park and ride near our little farm to the airport took one hour. This was not ordinarily. The shuttle never showed up. So I took public transport to Tacoma, but many routes were closed, so had to detour to get the connection that would link to bus 100, the Narrows Bridge, and homeward. Bus 100 never showed up. I was dressed for seventy degree CA weather. It was dark and cold. My finger was shaking so much I was having trouble texting. And my phone had 6% battery. Then 5%. Then 4%. There were no Lyft cabs moving anywhere. Finally spent the night on my son and daughter-in-laws couch; I'm several inches longer than that couch.

In the morning, my daughter-in-law dropped me at the bus 100 stop again. I waited, in the cold, chatting with an older woman who was waiting in the cold for the same bus across the Narrows to the Peninsula and home. It never came, again. I checked my Lyft app. There were only three brave drivers crawling the city streets. But I had a 50% discount special on weekday Lyft rides. So off we went.

Meanwhile, my adult son was plowing our steep downhill driveway so he could take my tractor down the road and plow his steep uphill driveway and get his truck out and pick me up. The valve stem on one of the tractor tires sheered off. Another part broke in the cold. I'm drinking London Fog Lattes at Cutter's Point Coffee in Gig Harbor, wondering if I was ever going to get home. My wife reported that in all the flurry to dig out of the snow, a gate was left open and the cows were out belly deep romping in the white stuff, two dogs nipping at their heels. Somehow along the way I had forgotten to eat anything.

Robbie Burns was right. The best laid schemes of mice and men often do go awry. The writer of Proverbs put it better still: "The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps" (16:9). Looking back, there were so many components of this adventure over which I had no control. The plane, the weather, the shuttle, the transit cancellations. I was powerless to change any of these things. But my God is sovereign and all powerful, and he presided over all, the minutest detail--sparrows falling, hair falling from ones head--precise orchestration of all things for his ultimate glory and his expansive kindness to his children. What a marvel.

After confessing my sins of frustration, I now meditate with Horatius Bonar on the mysterious and wonderful ways of our Sovereign Lord.

1. Thy way, not mine, O Lord,
   However dark (or cold, or snowy, or disrupted) it be;
   Lead me by Thine own hand,
   Choose out the path for me.
2. Smooth let it be or rough,
   It will be still the best;
   Winding or straight, it leads
   Right onward to Thy rest.
3. I dare not choose my lot;
   I would not, if I might;
   Choose Thou for me, my God,
   So shall I walk aright.
4. Take Thou my cup, and it
   With joy or sorrow fill,
   As best to Thee may seem;
   Choose Thou my good and ill.
5. Choose Thou for me my friends,
   My sickness or my health;
   Choose Thou my cares for me,
   My poverty or wealth.
6. The kingdom that I seek
   Is Thine: so let the way
   That leads to it be Thine,
   Else I must surely stray.
7. Not mine, not mine the choice
   In things or great or small;
   Be Thou my guide, my strength
   My wisdom, and my all.
8. (Horatius Bonar, 1857)