Month: July 2018

Flowers and photography, café culture and Korean cuisine – my recent trip to Asia was full of things that delight me. Just for the record, it wasn’t all fun and games. I put in a lot of hard work too, some of which was pleasurable, and much of which just had to be done.

‘Desires’ became the theme of the trip. A helpful discussion with a colleague about the truth that God knows how we are designed and chooses to use our desires in his work stemmed from a comment I made about expecting suffering. Yes, suffering is a reality too, but I emerged from that conversation with a focus on God’s kindness and individual attention to us. I shared this insight with a fellow traveller as we bounced along a mountain road. Later that day, she turned to the devotional book she was reading on her phone (see the screenshot) and found almost exactly the same sentiments there. We both took that as God’s encouragement to enjoy all that we were experiencing.

Godly desires please God. However, it would be remiss not to mention that the Bible also warns against satisfying the ‘desires of the flesh[1]’ and, shockingly, even refers to the desires of the devil as reflected in people[2]. These desires are obviously not helpful in participating in God’s work nor are they good for us personally. Perhaps ‘desires of the flesh’ include things which bring short-term gratification but long-term problems, such as overindulgence in activities or foods we enjoy. I wonder if the desires of the devil include unhealthy striving for prestige, power and prosperity.

Sometimes I feel guilty about my current lifestyle. I get to travel plenty – something which I don’t take for granted. I enjoy plenty of people-time, unlike my last role in an office which I found trying though willingly accepted for a season. I enjoy learning, and academia is a part of my current role, as is dabbling in language study. The café culture is something I enjoy, and I’m quick to support the blossoming café culture in Asia. A couple of significant conversations took place in cafes this last trip, one planned and the other (divinely) coincidental. The joy I get from amateur photography also fits well with regular trips as a tourist to an area which, in recent years, has been marketed as a ‘photography corridor’.

I wrote down these thoughts about desires on paper in a café in Asia. I am typing them up weeks later. At the time, and as true today as it was then,  I penned these words:

“As this trip draws to an end, I look back with gratitude and forward with hope. We serve a good God who loves to satisfy our desires.”

[1] Ephesians 2:3

[2] John 8:44

It felt like the last six years of my life had been pointing towards this moment. The sun’s warmth radiated our backs. In front of us were two classrooms, erected here on a field strewn with summer flowers. These rooms, adapted from shipping containers, are for outsiders like us to have a base for regular involvement in this community – the community to which I had sensed God’s call back in 2012. We were meeting the man who holds the keys to the community – the monk who is effectively, if not legally, the one in charge around here.

At which point a blasted bee buzzed relentlessly about my face.

According to the worldview of Tibetans, it was entirely possible and even likely that the spirit world should intersect with the physical world through a humble bee. Here we were, people of God, enthusiastic about making an impact on this community. Our enemy, the devil, would not be happy. Knowing my fear of bees, stemming from bad reactions to bee stings as a child, it was quite possible that the enemy would force me off the property with a bee.

According to the worldview of we scientific Westerners, I reasoned that something in my body must be appealing to bees … they always seem to buzz around me … and that this one was especially persistent and at a most inopportune moment. I prayed – as most Christians do when in the grip of a crisis – and asked that the bee be kept from stinging me. That would be exceptionally inconvenient.

Disregarding further thoughts of worldviews for the time-being, I threw my jacket over my head – not so helpful when in conversation with a monk – and, after a moment or two, left the property.

Was it a demonic bee that drove me off the land that day? I don’t know. But I do know that our enemy “prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8). He is no less active in agnostic Australia as he is in Tibetan communities in which there is a real respect for and fear of the spirit world.  In my country, the enemy wreaks havoc in less obvious ways, including (in my opinion) an unhealthy pallour about our culture due to an overemphasis on immediate gratification. That’s a topic for another blog post.

I may have left the field that day, but I’ll be back. I hope to return in autumn when the flowers have finished and the bees are quietly enjoying honey in their hives. May all of us who know God resist the enemy and stand firm, for we are not alone in our struggles, as the apostle Peter encourages readers in 1 Peter 5:9. Though it is extra challenging to stand firm when a bee bizarrely buzzes around your face!