SHOULDER TO SHOULDER #37 ---- 9/27/98
Posted by: root <root@...>
As We Fight The Good Fight
TITLE: "Victims or Victors"
Dear Friend:
Today as I write to you, Jo Ann and I are on our sixth journey to the
former Yugoslavia in the past three and one-half years. Depending on
when you read this we have probably just arrived within the past few
hours in a little village of Uebersee, Germany, between Munich and
Salzburg, Austria on the shores of Lake Chiemsee in the Bavarian area of
Germany.
Off in the distance is the majestic "Herren Chiemsee", located on an
island in the lake. Patterned after Versailles, this was one of many
castles built under King Ludwig II. Uebersee is a quiet pastoral village
where you stay in private homes rather than bustling hotels, and, along
with a nice clean room, enjoy a German home-style breakfast included in
your room cost.
You may wonder why we are here when we insist we are on a ministry
journey. Jo Ann and I learned early on in 1995 that it is wise to let
your body adapt to the new time schedule some seven hours different from
our own. To do that we arrive in Europe in the morning, keep going as
long into the day as we can, then go to bed and sleep as long as we want.
When possible, we then take a "relaxing and sight seeing" day to catch
our breath. Then we take a day of train travel where we can sleep and
adapt even more, before arriving at our destination in Croatia.
Besides that, even with added lodging and food cost, it is still much
less expensive than flying into Croatia.
So ---- Monday will be a sight seeing day (and lots of sleeping, most
likely), and Tuesday we travel to Rijeka, Croatia, via Salzburg and
Villach, Austria and Ljubljana, Slovenia. We will arrive in Rijeka at
5:17 p.m. where we will be met by Life Center staff. After a late supper
we will get some sleep and then rise Wednesday morning for a day of
meeting with staff to discuss future ministry, and waiting for our
teaching partner Jeff Floyd and his friend Jack Shoaf to arrive on the
same train.
Thursday we will go to the Hope Center up in the mountains where an old
orphanage building is being renovated to house highly traumatized people,
offer restoration counseling, and also train them in some occupational
skill that will enable them to generate income for their families.
Later Thursday we will go to Karlovac, Croatia, a city where major
fighting went on during the war. Spending the night there and visiting
with pastors and other believers we have met in the past, we will be met
Friday morning by Franjo Spicak from Sirac and will travel a few hours to
that city where we will then begin our first conference at 4:00 p.m. that
day.
That will be around 9:00 a.m. CDT, so if you think of us about that time,
please pray for us. The first session is my responsibility, and I need
God's wisdom to discern the attitudes and needs of those attending so I
can say the things that will set the stage for the entire conference.
THE MOUNTAINS SPEAK:
I'll never forget the very first time I saw the Austrian Alps, traveling
by train from Ljubljana, Slovenia to Munich, Germany. As we neared
Salzburg, Austria, I heard them. As certainly as if they had been in the
same rail car with me, I heard them ---- clearly ---- beautifully.
"The hills are alive . . . . with the sound of music!" It was the Von
Trapps ---- and Julie Andrews, of course!
At that point in time, the story leaped off the wide screen of the
theater where I had seen it in Des Moines, Iowa years earlier, and became
living reality as I watched through the giant window of our car. gazed
at the snow capped mountains in all their grandeur standing tall against
the mixture of brilliant blue skies and white clouds, with the long
fertile and green valleys stretched at their feet and sneaking up the
mountain draws.
All of a sudden I saw. I saw the story. I saw the places. I saw the
beauty of a land ---- and its pain caused by the destructive scarring of
a war long past. I wondered ---- "how can such beauty be taken in? How
can it be so ravaged? How can such a place as this in all it's majestic
splendor also contain an evil presence that is committed to either
destroying or owning all that is before it?
But it was the sounds of the music ---- the laughing children ---- the
twittering bird and the soaring eagle ---- that captured my heart and
mind as we sat there, awe struck by the scenes passing before our eyes.
How could we take it all in ---- the ski slopes, the occasional castle,
the pastoral villages below, the sun's rays breaking through the clouds,
the brilliance of the blue sky, the graphic etchings of the mountain
shadows, the mountain flowers along the tracks ---- it was all too much.
Far too much.
ANOTHER DAY:
We were in the mountains another day ---- last November. I had just
finished preaching in the third church and was on the way to a fourth
that day. Jo Ann and I had been in Duga Resa for a 9:00 a.m. service,
and driven to a noon service at Plaski, and then up in the higher
mountains to Blata ---- a little Serbian town that used to have about 250
peaceful and gentle inhabitants. The day we were there, about 30 had
returned ---- all old, and mostly widows with no place else to go but
back home.
When we turned off the main road onto what I I thought was a long
driveway, we drove perhaps a quarter mile on an asphalt road about ten
feet wide.
Then we saw the buildings ---- two rows deep on either side of the road.
All were empty ---- save about six or eight. Some were totally
destroyed, others badly damaged. There were a few chickens, a couple
dogs, and an occasional pig.
The army had told the people to get out fast because fighting was on the
way. But ---- it would last only a day or so and then they could come
home.
That was seven years ago. Just the 30 have returned.
When we got to the church building, I saw the bullet holes on the side of
the freshly painted edifice. The houses on either side of it were
totally destroyed. Little did I know at the time that one of them
belonged to a man we had met the week before while ministering to a group
at the Life Center some 150 miles away. He was one of the deacons there
---- now with no place to live except the home of Stevo Vuletic, a
retired pastor living in Karlovac. We visited together again there a few
days later.
We walked into the building ---- it was as cold as a freezer. An old man
---- the only man left in town ---- came and built a fire in a cylinder
looking stove about three feet tall and twelve inches across. He
insisted Jo Ann and I sit next to the fire. We felt embarrassed ----
guilty ---- ashamed. We tried to move, because our coats were heavier,
but they would not allow that.
I suddenly had the urge to go to the bathroom. There was none. So, I
followed the example of our translator, Imir, a young Muslim man recently
converted to Christ. As we walked down the road a little distance from
the church building, he said, "Stay on the road. Don't go out into the
weeds or trees; it has not been cleared of mines yet."
I thought ---- "I wonder if any of these dear people will accidentally
step on one someday?"
Finally, about twelve people arrived ---- all women, save the old man.
He got up and spoke eloquently of our visit ---- and of God's
faithfulness.
After the services we tried to get into the car as people would cling to
us. It was hard leaving ---- beyond words to describe.
As we drove out of that little fragment of a village, I looked at the
mountains through the misty rain now falling. It was almost an
unbearable thought ---- I wanted to say to Jo Ann, "the mountains are
weeping", but I couldn't form the words. They just lay there ----
silently ---- on the tip of my tongue ---- unformed ---- but understood.
Finally we were able to talk about it. "I wonder what the mountains have
seen? I wonder about the stories they have to tell. I wonder how many
dead lie up there? I wonder how many soldiers were hiding there before
they came rushing down into the village?"
No wonder the montains were weeping.
I still do.
ANOTHER MOUNTAIN:
There was another mountain I remember ---- not so beautiful, but much
more significant. Not so majestic, but much more profound.
Then I remembered the answer as to how love and hate, beauty and horror,
can co-exist.
You already know where I'm headed ---- to Calvary.
When that mountain speaks, it makes all others fall silent. When you see
that mountain, all others pale beside it. When you see it's size, it
brings all others ---- yes, even Everest ---- down to the size of ant
hills.
It is what happened on the other mountain that makes it possible for us
to climb all the others placed in our lives. It is because of that one
that I could enjoy the amazing splendor of the ones in Austria. It is
because of that one that I could weep with the people who lived in Blata.
It is what happened on that one that enables you to face yours.
May we never forget that.
VICTIM OR VICTOR:
Every time Jo Ann and I travel to the former Yugoslav countries, I am
captured by the thought of just how much misery and tragedy these people
have suffered ---- not just for the past ten years, or even 50, but for
over 1500 years!
The Balkan Peninsula is not called the "powder keg of Europe" for nothing
---- there have been more wars begun in, brought to, or traveled to
through the Balkans than any other place on the earth. From pre-Roman
Empire invasions to the conquests of the Roman Empire, the Crusades, the
Austro and Hungarian empires, the Ottoman Empire, the First and Second
World Wars, right up to the present day.
War is horrible; it is destructive; it is demonic to its core ----
whether it is national, international, regional, or even in individual
interpersonal relationships. No matter how great or small, there are
always destructive actions that result in casualties.
In light of this trip we're on, and in light of Jeff Floyd being with us
on this trip and teaching on forgiveness, I thought it would be
appropriate for you to read another of his timely "Today" articles,
entitled "Victim Or Victor".
I believe it says a lot about how we respond to those periodic "wars" and
"battles" that come our way through circumstances, environment, our own
conduct, or that of others.
Why? Because, you see, friend, the real mark of survival and growth is
not what happens to us, but how we respond to what happens.
In my opinion, one of the most devastating attitudes ever to come to this
world is the attitude that everyone is a victim. To be quite honest,
being a victim is ultimately a choice. Just because I have been
victimized doesn't mean I need to become a victim as well.
As you will read below, no matter what kind of experiences you have had
in life in general or ministry in particular, and no matter how painful
it may have been, you have been given the choice of either deciding to be
a victim or a victor.
Enjoy Jeff's insight.
Today
Victim or Victor
It pleases the Father when we live in simple obedience to His will and
desires
and in total dependence upon Him. Unfortunately for us, we tend to let
emotions, reasoning and other human factors come between us and a life of
total trust.
I'm sure all of us struggle with errant feelings and reasoning to some
extent.
The question never changes: how long we will listen to our feelings and
reasoning, even as believable as they may, be instead of listening to
Him.
Who knows best--Him or us?
There are times when people will behave in very hurtful ways--people who
are
close to us--offering the potential for us to feel utterly despised and
rejected. In such times should we give in to feelings that are contrary
to
the heart of Jesus; yielding to self-pity and victimization? To do so
will
take away our victory, making us the victim--a very undesirable
perception to
have of ourselves.
Humanity in general loves the feelings of victimization and its
companion,
self-pity. These feelings are the result of, and result in, a self
centered
life--one which focuses on personal rights and desires rather than the
victory
which is our heritage through Jesus Christ.
Neither the situation nor the outcome of it causes us to be the victor or
the
victim. Both victory and victimization are attitudinal rather than
situational. A situation ruled life will ultimately lean toward defeat.
The
greatest struggles we have are not the problems or troubles we face in
life.
The challenges we have are within ourselves--our own attitudes.
All of us are prone toward feelings of victimhood at one time or another.
Victimhood is the dandelion of the soul, popping up in awkward places and
times. It is seemingly impossible to root out. Just because the
potential is
there, however, doesn't mean that we must give creditability to it.
Conversely, to be stable, secure and victorious persons requires that we
take
issue with such feelings.
In hurtful times we dare not trust how we feel or even our perception of
ourselves. We must look to Jesus, lean on Him and draw from Him every
necessary resource, trusting Him no matter how people treat us or
difficult
the way. Job appropriately defined the attitude of a victor when he
said:
'Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him' (Job 13:15).
The primary difference between the victim and the victor is his focus.
The
victim looks inward to his own feelings and outward to the injustices of
others. He relishes the proffered sympathy of others which strokes his
feelings of self-pity and rejection. He will use every outward and
positive
relationship as a means of authenticating himself since he has no
security
within himself. As a result he will tend to drain those relationships
through
his self-pity rather than to enhance them through his victory.
The victor focuses determinately on the Lord Jesus Christ, realizing that
to
focus on anything else will produce despair and defeat. To focus on
Jesus is
a choice, a determination and a commitment. It is impossible to look
inward
and upward at the same time. A person must choose.
When we choose to depend totally on Him, vacating every soulish and self-
centered desire and feeling, He gives us wonderful peace and assurance.
In
our relaxed position in Him we will see people and circumstances totally
different. Nothing can really touch us or hurt we are resting in Him.
Jeff
Jefferson H. Floyd, Director
Jubilee Ministries
P. O. Box 3202
Carmel, IN 46082
Copyright July, 1998 by Jefferson H. Floyd. All rights reserved.
I hope Jeff's article was a blessing to you. If you use any of it,
please do the honorable thing by giving him credit as indicated just
above.
PRAY FOR US:
As we travel toward our first ministry opportunity at the Life Center
this coming Tuesday night, we will be there only a couple days and then
go to our very first "Restoring The Nations" Conference being held in
Sirac, Croatia. We will speak there on Friday and Saturday, then speak
in churches Sunday through Tuesday before going on down to Sarajevo.
If connections can be made, I'll have another letter for you next week
while we're in Sirac.
FINAL WORD:
Here's a little humor sent to me several months ago by an evangelist
friend, Les Snyder ---- just in case you're into the art scene and love
impressionism. To those of you who live in non-English speaking
countries, the humor may not be quite so evident.
---- Forwarded ----
The famous artist Vincent Van Gogh, had many relatives. Among them were:
His obnoxious brother..........Please Gogh
The brother who ate prunes..........Gotta Gogh
The brother who worked at a convenience store..........Stopn Gogh
The grandfather from Yugoslavia..........U Gogh
The brother who bleached his clothes white..........Hue Gogh
His dizzy aunt..........Verti Gogh
The cousin from Illinois..........Chica Gogh
His magician uncle..........Wherediddy Gogh
His Mexican cousin..........Amee Gogh
The Mexican cousin's American half brother..........Grin Gogh
The nephew who drove a stage coach..........Wellsfar Gogh
The constipated uncle..........Cant Gogh
The ballroom dancing aunt..........Tan Gogh
The bird lover uncle..........Flamin Gogh
His nephew psychoanalyst..........E Gogh
The fruit loving cousin..........Man Gogh
An aunt who taught positive thinking ..........Wayto Gogh
The little nephew..........Poe Gogh
A sister who loved disco ..........Go Gogh
And his niece who travels the country in a van.....Winniebay Gogh
Well ---- as Van Gogh's great grandson, I'm, as always,
Onde Gogh.
In Christ's Bond,
Bob Tolliver -- (Rom 1:11-12)
Copyright September, 1998. All rights reserved.
Life Unlimited Ministries
E-Mail: [email protected]
Ph: 417-275-4854
Fax: 417-275-4855
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Hang in there! I'm with you!
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