There are other treatments, of course.
These are only the standards.
But it is essential that some steps be taken.
There is this sickness, there is this addiction to power.
And there is this spirit who seeks entrance.
Some would prefer to ignore the problem and seek to explain away the aberrations of thought and action. But there are no magic words which will keep it from our door.
If we ascend, or aspire to, we will surely meet up with it.
Whether we identify with Saul or David, we are still vulnerable. This is not one of those ‘diseases of Egypt’ that we may escape from simply by removing ourselves from ‘Egypt’. No. This one can be, and often is, contracted in the wilderness, in Canaan, wherever.
I have spoken of kings and monarchs, but kings and monarchs are only symbols.
As was the case with our young dreamer, pride is a state of mind, and Pharisaism a spirit. A ‘rich’ man does not always live in a mansion nor a ‘poor’ man in a hovel. Literally anything and everything that sets you ‘apart’ from your fellow man can be the catalyst.
“……. God, I thank you that I am not as other men are……”
While it is true that some are at greater risk than others, Pharisaism, like alcoholism, is a threat to us all. And our individual life circumstance is by no means the determining factor.
The peasant and the king,
The private and the general,
The altar boy and the priest.
Moral folks, immoral folks, good and bad, saintly and sinnerly.
Unusually shy or unnaturally extroverted.
As meek as Saul was (at first) or as bold as David was (always) the predilection is there.
I know we have used the example of Saul but David was by no means granted an exemption. In the Psalms he speaks often of any man who sets himself against God, those with the ‘haughty’ heart and the ‘lofty’ eyes.
Yes. We are all made, without exception, and continue to be made, “subject to vanity”, and especially in this area.
And there is, indeed, “death in the pot”, and the young prophets are sick from it. There is this most dread disease, this most formidable adversary.
There is this Spirit of the Pharisee.
But there is also this recovery and this cure!
As for the dream, it was given to one individual but it is a corporate dream. Like salvation itself, we pass this point or the other as individuals, but we all do pass.
Some are still playing the religious game and do not seem to have any choice in the matter.
Others are becoming aware of the game for the very first time, and there is awakening in them a desire to escape the world of make-believe, of bondage, and of play-acting.
Still others are leaving the stage and walking away from the controlled environment.
And there are those, by the grace of God, who are returning in the power of the Holy Spirit to face the issue head-on.
Grant them Your strength and Your courage, oh God!
And so we say. . . To He who is able to save us from failing, or, should we fall, is able to raise us up again.
And to He who can keep us in perfect health, or, should we be stricken, can restore us.
To He who has caused death to be ‘swallowed up’ so that we might ‘live’ before Him.
To such a One be honor and power and all of the glory, both now and forever.
Amen.