Sometimes holding on takes all the strength one has. Other times using every last bit of strength to avoid letting go is the hardest challenge anyone faces. Like the old meme of the cat clinging to the frays of the cord with the caption, “When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot, and hang on.” The real question is, “How much longer can you hang on?”
In 1987 Henry Dempsey was Eastern Express captain of a 15 passenger plane whose flight plan included hugging the Atlantic Ocean coastline from Lewiston, Maine to Boston. At 4000 feet he heard an unusual noise from the back of the plane. He turned the controls over to his co-pilot and walked through the fuselage to investigate. When he reached the tail section, the plane hit roller-coaster-like turbulence, throwing him against the rear door.
About then, Dempsey realized the source of the strange noise. Despite all preflight preparations, someone had failed to double check the back door which, when the plane hit the turbulence and threw him to the door, it swung open and sucked the pilot outside over the ocean. The co-pilot, rightly thinking the captain was lost, diverted the flight to a nearby airport and called in for an aerial search and rescue. Dempsey was not found and presumed lost.
The plane safely landed, where the ground crews discovered where Dempsey was located. Apparently, when the rear door flew open, he managed to reach for the railing of the stairs and held on. He held on while the plane descended 4000 feet. He held on at 200 miles per hour. He held on managing to keep his head from scraping the landing strip by matters of inches. He held on while crewmen took ten minutes to dislodge Dempsey’s hands from the rails. He held on for dear life.
Paul was at the end of his rope. We don’t know the specifics, only some generalities. Unlike us, the Corinthians were somewhat aware of Paul’s circumstances (1:8). Somewhat. Like us, though, they did not know the severity of what Paul was facing in Asia Minor. We can piece a little of it together and maybe, just maybe, we can figure out what Paul endured.
We know he was in Asia Minor, which is modern day Turkey. While in Asia Minor, he suffered such extreme hardships, admitting that the amount of pressure he was under was more than he could endure. In a very self-disclosing moment, he revealed that he “despaired even of life” (2 Cor. 1:8). Allow those words to wash over you for a while. Paul was at rope’s end and did not know where or how things were going to unfold. Even more so he describes the ominous feeling as a death sentence (2 Cor. 1:9). What happened in Asia Minor that traumatized Paul to the point where he felt death creeping at his door?
The region of Asia Minor held at least one major city, Ephesus, a place Paul stayed two years (Act. 19:8-10). We know Paul revealed he “fought wild beasts in Ephesus” (1 Cor. 15:32), language that heightens the intensity of the event. If it were wild or demonic animals, we have no record of it from Acts. Paul does not explain himself to the Corinthians nor to the Ephesians when he writes their letters, because they probably already knew about it. Also, one might ask, what is the connection, if any, to his “fighting wild beasts” with his comment to the Ephesian Elders that he was “severely tested by the plots of the Jews” (Act. 20:19)? Something of serious nature happened to Paul, and we may or may not have the details.
The only event we know of is the riot in Acts 19:23-41. Riots are known for being extremely violent and chaotic. Being swept up because you are in the center of a mob activity would be anything less than scary. If it is the riot or related to the riot, Luke’s information does not support it. Either Luke skims the surface of what happens in the Ephesian riot or it’s not the riot at all and Luke leaves the event out of Acts altogether.
The result is that the events in Ephesus left Paul depleted and at wits end. He had nothing left to give and he saw the writing on the wall, and it wasn’t promising. Anyone in his shoes might wonder how do you face tomorrow?
In the late fall of 2000 I found myself on the floor weeping uncontrollably. The children had been put to bed and my wife had gone to bed too. I had decided to watch a game on TV before turning in myself. For over a year our lives had been on a roller coaster. The church I preached at ended badly. My family was embroiled in a legal battle because we had been attacked; such a statement is saying it mildly. Churches where I interviewed at best saw me as the “bridesmaid and never the bride,” while other churches refused to consider me. I found out later that the leadership of my former church was submarining my application and interviews. We had sold our home, and fortunately, God had opened a place for us to stay rent free as friends had temporarily relocated to St. Louis while her father battled cancer. Because we were living with the “in between” we were homeschooling our daughter. Actually, since my wife secured a job at a local Presbyterian Church, I was homeschooling our daughter. I felt like I was failing as a homeschool teacher, about as much as I thought I was failing at ministry, about as much as I felt I was failing as a father and husband. So that night I started watching the game and something in me broke. I started weeping. I started weeping uncontrollably. My wife heard the noise and she came to me. She spoke to me. She needed me to stop the road I was traveling because she could not parent alone. More importantly, she reassured me that our story had not ended and that there was more to tell. I couldn’t see it at the time, but I felt that life had given me a death sentence. She reassured me that I was not under a death sentence, and if I were, it had been revoked.
Still, the question remains as to how to hold on at ropes’ end, especially when holding on gets harder and harder.
As we circle back around to Paul’s self-disclosing fraught to the Corinthians, he pivots his message by sprinkling it with hope like one sprinkles a dish with salt. In a moment of self-awareness Paul realized that what he endured was a means for him to show that he can trust God (1:9). The ease at which to enact your default setting of relying on yourself, your whit, your insight, and your strength gives way to fully trusting and relying on God. All the pretense or pretending melts away. Sometimes the trauma we experience is a means to strip away all the falseness so that a pure faith remains. Mind you, not all the time, but at least that’s what Paul is saying what happened to him.
Paul does not leave it there. He drops one word and repeats it twice noting the past, present, and continuous nature of God. The glory goes to God because he delivered Paul, past tense, from his deathly experience. Then he adds that God will, future tense, deliver him again. Finally, with the foundation of his hope laid, God will keep on delivering Paul from the trials and tribulations he faces (1:10). Paul’s hope is on God’s character who will keep his promises and continue to deliver Paul from the things he faces.
I once read about a Chinese minister who pastored a struggling “underground church” of 150. He was arrested and sentenced to 20 years of hard labor, five of which were spent in solitary confinement. He lost touch, not only with wife and family, but also with his church. With no news from the outside world, and though he prayed for his church every day, he believed his church was shriveling on the vine. Still in all of his years in unbearably harsh imprisonment, he said the best moments he discovered was when they made him shovel human excrement. That’s right, when he was sent to move the manure pile from here to there, he found his solace. He said that the stench was so overwhelmingly nauseous that the guards left him alone. It was only time the abusive guards left him with his own thoughts. So while he shoveled the human waste, he sang his favorite hymns, including . . .
I come to the garden alone ● While the dew is still on the roses ● And the voice I hear, falling on my ear ● The Son of God discloses ■ And he walks with me ● and he talks with me ● and he tells me, “I am his own” ● And the joy we share as we tarry there ● None other has ever known.
Sometimes hanging on means participating in the most disgusting, abusive service while clinging to hope and to a hymn. Oh, on a side note when he got out of prison, he was welcomed by his wife and family and the small underground church that grew to 15,000.
So going back to the meme of the cat holding onto the rope or to Henry Dempsey clinging onto the ladder of the plane, one thing I know. Some people, whom I love and respect, seem to make it through life without nary a problem or difficulty. They don’t, but it just feels that way. Their faith is so rich, so deep, and so strong that when their life comes to an end they will waltz through heaven’s gate like they own the place. But that’s not my story, and that’s probably not your story either. For me I will be holding onto Jesus for dear life so that when I finally see him face to face, the first ten minutes he’ll have to pry my fingers off of him. To be honest, I don’t think that’s a bad thing either.
Soli Deo Gloria!
(i.e., only God is glorified!)