The Battle For Our Minds

The Battle For Our Minds

by June Crawford

Transcribed from the original recording; may contain errors.

I’ll tell you a little story about my daddy, who was not fortunate enough to have been able to go to high school. When he got out of grade school, he had to go to work, and it broke his heart. He was a lover of education. So, he did everything he could to educate himself. That’s the reason I grieve so, for those Amish children who are plucked out of the school at eighth grade. But I remember my daddy telling me, “June, you can learn whatever you would like to learn if you read.” I can see my dad yet sitting in our living room, reading the dictionary every night to learn three new words. And at his death, he was chief of plant protection for Caterpillar Tractor Company, and had a very responsible job. So, think of what he did without an education, and look at the challenge that gives to you.

I tried to begin my talks with something to lighten things up. If you meet my husband, Laughing Jack over here, you will know why that’s been necessary in my life. The reason she’s so smart, she lays next to her brains every night. The Lord must forgive him. I chose this morning a little blip I saw in a magazine about, “I owe it all to mothers.” To show you how important we mothers are in melding the lives of our children. It said, “Behind every great man is his mother.” If you don’t believe it, just think about these things. Mrs. Morse said, “Sam, stop tapping your fingers on the table. You’re driving me crazy.”

Mrs. Lindbergh said, “Charles, can’t you do anything by yourself?” Mrs. Armstrong said, “Neil’s got no more business taking flying lessons than the man in the moon.” And Mrs. Washington said, “George, if you can’t pick those cherries any faster, I’ll never get this pie baked.” I also read that there are three ways to get something done. Mr. St. John, do it yourself. Hire someone to do it, or forbid your kids to do it. And you know which one’s going to get finished the first, the fastest.

Thanks, Stan. Stan, I read something this morning about Beethoven, and how he was stone deaf. I expect you to have a concerto written by the end of the week. This morning, I want to talk about the battle for our minds. And the scripture reading that goes with this text is Matthew 4, verses 1 to 11. And if you have your Bibles, follow along. “Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. After fasting 40 days and 40 nights, He was hungry. The tempter came to Him and said, ‘If You’re the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.’ Jesus answered, ‘It is written, Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ Then the devil took Him to the holy city and had Him stand on the highest point of the temple. And he said, ‘If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written, He will command His angels concerning You, and they will lift You up in their hands, so that You will not strike Your foot against a stone.’ Jesus answered him, ‘It is also written, Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’ Again, the devil took Him to a high mountain.

And he showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in their splendor. ‘All of this I will give You, if You will just bow down and worship me.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Away from Me, Satan! For it is written, Worship the Lord your God, and serve Him only.’ Then the devil left Him, and angels came and attended Him.”

From the beginning of human history, we’ve all had to deal with the reality of evil, with Satan’s battle for our mind, which is the title of this talk, “The Battle for Our Minds.” It’s a very real power, a spirit, a force, calling persons and groups to do what God does not will. This was Adam’s problem in the Garden of Eden. Temptation is an experience common to all of us. Even the Son of God was not immune to it. He was tempted in all points, like we are. Luke says that after Jesus was tempted, the devil withdrew for an opportune time, an opportune time to return again. Remember when Peter told Jesus, “Turn away from the cross. Oh no, Lord, don’t take the cross.” Well, Satan was certainly working through Peter that day. Also, Satan was present in the Garden of Gethsemane, as Jesus faced the shame and agony of the crucifixion. The timing of Jesus’ temptation is really significant. It was right after His baptism. And what did He hear? Oh, words we would all love to hear. “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” Then what happened? He was whisked away to be tempted of the devil. We must always remember that many times after a mountain top experience, such as our week at CFO, we experience our greatest trials and tribulations.

Every increase in privilege is accompanied by some new danger to the soul. I have to stop a minute and tell you, someone said to me, “What is this thing, CFO?” Well, I heard somebody say it was for crazy folks only. No matter what it looks like, it is not camps for the stout. It is Camps Farthest Out. It was started by a college professor at Macalester Park by the name of Glenn Clark. Perhaps you’ve been privileged to read some of his writings. If not, there are some books over there on that table of his. He’s been dead for some time, but a marvelous work he started. He took his Sunday school class apart for a retreat. The first one lasted three weeks. They went to a point of land, the farthest away from land, and they called it Camps Farthest Out. So that’s how we got our beginning. That’s what we are. Don’t be afraid of us. We’re not a bunch of crazies. We don’t have any denomination. We are all denominations coming together with our source and center, the Lord Jesus Christ. So don’t be afraid. You’ll hear something here that will steer you wrong. We hope you don’t. If you hear me say anything that’s controversial and you don’t believe it, you raise your hand and I’ll be happy to talk to you about it.

I would never want to stir you in the wrong direction. The temptations that came to Jesus are typical of those that come to each one of us. First of all was a temptation to enjoy, to satisfy His normal physical desires in the wrong way. There was temptation to do this spectacular thing, to call upon the supernatural care of God and throw yourself off this building. And God has said, “Give His angels charge over you.” So He was tempted to do the spectacular. You know, as people followed Jesus around, they were always looking for a sign or a miracle. And oftentimes, Jesus would turn around and berate them. “You don’t need a sign or a miracle.” If we’re waiting for that today, we’re waiting for the spectacular thing. I would urge you to be very cautious when you are involved in that kind of ministry or pursuit. He was tempted to be somebody by satisfying His own personal ambitions on the devil’s terms of compromise. Beware of compromise. Now, all of life’s temptations are simple variations of these three basic approaches. I’ve heard lots of sermons on these three temptations of Christ. And I will give you an interpretation that our pastor at the present time at our church gave. It’s pretty good. It’s a little different than what I heard before.

But you will hear this in lots of ways. But the simple definition I just gave you: to give in to compromise, to try to be somebody you aren’t, to satisfy your physical needs in the wrong way. Those are the basic temptations of life. And everything’s going to come right back to that. Jesus overcame temptation by using the word of God. Each time He answered the devil with a statement, “It is written.” The word of God is powerful. We read in the book that it is a two-edged sword. It can break through the guard of the enemy and disarm him. However, remember the devil also quoted scripture back to Jesus.

Temptation is the proving ground of Christian character. Do not be ashamed if you are tempted. The way you reacted to it is whether you’re a boy or a man. And it takes lots of courage to resist. Or a girl or a woman. One recent experience that points to the evil in the world today is one that I know you are all aware of as I am. And that was the Branch Davidians and their leader, David Koresh.

Think of the tragic episodes whereby Koresh drew disciples to him long before you and I ever heard of him. And he kept them. They were so loyal to him, they went to a fiery death. Or maybe they weren’t willing. Maybe they were just trapped in that burning inferno. And I know this has affected each one of us. I don’t know if you saw that building burning as I did. And I thought at the time, I wonder if it’s hell. It was such a frightening thing to think that those people would have willingly burnt to death. I guess some of them were shot in the back of the head. At least that’s what we’ve been told. But it’s an agonizing thing to think that through. And it makes me ask many questions. And I’m going to give you these questions. I don’t know the answers to them. Are there many other such groups in our country? I’ve heard that there are. I’ve seen several shown on TV. But are there many more groups like that? What does that say to us as a society? Is there anything we can do or should do about such groups?

Was a decision to storm the compound a wise one? What do you think about that? Was that a wise decision? Is it a good thing that our religious freedom allows such groups to prosper? When we come to the tough theological questions, why does God allow systems of belief in Him that become so distorted?

I ask that all through this. I prayed, “God, why? Why do You let these things happen?” And I know part of the answer to that is it’s our free will that we’re granted. We’re not puppets on God’s strings. But this is a teaching about God. And how could that have grown so? Then if God is all powerful, and I believe He is, and if God is all good, and I believe He is, how can such terrible things happen?

The awfulness of the Branch Davidian tragedy caused us to forget for the moment the other evil in our world. I was reminded when you talked the other day about praying for Saddam Hussein about those 600 plus oil fires burning all at once all over Kuwait. What a pity. We worry so about our environment. We burn up not only our environment and pollute it, but we destroy one of our most precious assets, the oil in that country. And I’m sure Saddam Hussein had that in mind when that happened. We forget about the slaughter of innocent civilians in the fledgling republics of the former Yugoslavia. We rejoice at the freedom of Russia. Look at the problems that they have in becoming free. Look at the evil that is existing in that society that is being brought to life. Which Betty told me about how they’re faced with terrible alcoholism and all of the things that are going on there that we were unaware of now that they’re free in the same way in Germany. Germany really bothers me. My husband is a man of German descent. And when I see what has happened to that country since that hideous wall fell down and how they’re having such problems melding together and becoming one society. A month or so ago, you and I were asked to remember the Holocaust.

The extermination of more than 6 million Jews. That was in my time. I remember when that happened. I remember them telling about throwing children and mothers and fathers into the fire and burning them up. They would call forth so many people from the prison each day to be fodder for the fire. Can you believe it? Many children and youth and yes, even adults honestly don’t know what the word Holocaust means. God help us. If there is… If we cannot remember our history, we will not benefit from the lessons that we should have learned. Mr. Hitler was an ogre. That’s another one I have a hard time praying about. And I have asked the Lord, “Lord, You mean You could even forgive him?” And He says, “Yes, I could forgive him, June. And you should be able to, too.” But my point is that that was so evil. And our country and every country were hesitant to get into that fight and to do anything about it. Some people, my age, refused to say it was true. It was true. It is true. Don’t forget it. You don’t want another person in the world who will pick up people because of their skin or because of their nationality and say, “We want a pure race. We don’t want any Jews.”

And that was what he did it for. “We want the German race to be pure.” Do you know what? That’s happening in Germany again today. The rise in Nazism in modern-day Germany is unbelievable. We have no idea of the numbers of boys who are into Nazism. It isn’t only the skinheads. It’s also adults who lived in that border. It’s the battle for the mind.

I read recently about a Washington mother, a woman who had three children, a happy home. She was a former bank teller. She dressed her children one morning, made breakfast, and let them watch cartoons. Then she smoked some crack cocaine. And while the children were busy, she got higher and higher. Then with a clothesline, she strangled eight-year-old Christine, four-year-old Eric, and attempted to strangle the two-year-old baby. But she left the little girl still breathing on the kitchen floor. When the police came, she told them she loved her children. And they said, “Then why would you kill them?” And in genuine bewilderment, she said, “I don’t know. I don’t know why I did it.” All she wanted was a high. But that drug had traveled quickly to her brain. And it had destroyed even the most powerful of emotions, the love of a mother for her child. Think of that. I have told you that the prisons, particularly the women’s prisons, I have heard stories that are similar to this, and things that would curl your hair, and certainly frighten you away from any sort of drugs or alcoholic stupor.

One of the women I love dearly killed two of her children when they were under two years old. They drowned in the bathtub. And she buried them and hid them, and they were later discovered. And she was convicted. And if you were to say to her, “Why did you do it?” She would say as this woman, “I don’t know. I was high. I don’t ever remember doing it. I loved them with my life. I can’t believe I did it.” She’s serving her life in prison, and will never, ever be released. Did her husband not have a child? Yes, her husband did not want girl children. So he locked the mother and the girls in the basement in total darkness. They were permitted to come upstairs to eat their meals. And to her, she felt like the women feel in India today. If you have a girl child, it’s a liability. And many of those girls are killed as soon as they are born, simply because they have to have male children. That may get that country so imbalanced someday that that problem will solve itself. But for now, it’s pretty dangerous to be a girl in India. And it was the same in this home. So who or what was responsible? The woman herself, she did smoke the crack.

But she was looking for a high, not for a way to destroy her children. Her brain was so burnt up that it destroyed any part of human civilization that lived there. Was it the crack itself? Or was it the dealer who sold it to her?

This message was not written for you, but I’m sure glad you’re here to hear these good grandmother words I would have said to you had I planned it this way. Was it the kingpins and the mules who brought the cocaine in from South America? Was it the peasants in Colombia who grew the coca plants in the first place as their means of livelihood?

Is AIDS evil? Is it the people? If so, who’s responsible? Is it human nature? Is it the victim? The government or medicine for not finding a cure fast enough? Is it God? Is this a disease inflicted upon people because of the immorality in our society? I’ve heard that sin. And it’s hard for me to believe. Is it Satan? At any rate, you and I know that evil exists. Evil constantly changes its priorities, its targets, its cast of characters. Satan’s plan of attack is deception. My former pastor and mentor calls him the deceiver. What a wonderful description. He is out for our mind and the source of our reason and understanding.

Think again about the temptations of Jesus. Clearly, the Gospel I read tells us that following His baptism by John the Baptist, Jesus was tempted. Matthew says, “Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.” The Holy Spirit seems anxious for Jesus to be tempted, to experience temptation. Our pastor says this temptation set the stage for the kind of Messiah that Jesus was going to be. For instance, by refusing to turn the stones to bread, Jesus rejected being an economic Messiah or a Savior to show us how to make money easily. By refusing to jump from the pinnacle of the temple, He rejected being a priestly Messiah.

By refusing to rule the worlds that He could see from the high mountain, Jesus rejected being a political Messiah. I must confess, I get very nervous the closer the evangelical community gets to politics. I hope they move away from that. Jesus deliberately chose being a Messiah of faith. I’ve heard many explanations of this, and this is just one given by my pastor. It certainly doesn’t tell the whole story. We’ve been hearing this wonderful teaching from Dan this week, and he’s told us to go over and over and over the scriptures. And that as we do, and as we refer to our concordances and our Bible dictionaries, we will get new insights, new things will come to us. And it’s true and it’s exciting when you read a piece of scripture that’s very familiar, and suddenly something comes to you and you know it’s a Holy Spirit giving you a new insight.

Well, it was the devil or Satan who tried to steer Jesus wrong. And it was the power of God that enabled Him to resist. As we read in that portion of scripture, we do discover again that not only Jesus quoted scripture, but the devil quoted it right back to Him.

No one has ever questioned the wisdom, the craftiness, nor the deceit of Satan. One of the most deceiving teachings about Satan is that he has horns and a red suit and a tail. Did you ever see that picture? Don’t you believe it? He’s the best looking fellow you ever saw in your life. Or the best looking woman that ever walked the street. Evil comes wrapped in a very pretty package. Otherwise, we’d be smart enough to turn away from that red horn thing. We wouldn’t be that dumb to fall for that. He’s cunning enough to disguise himself. He’s alluring. I like to say he. I hate to say she.

Always looks good. Is captivating. Is cunning. Evil is contrary to the nature and will of our holy God. God allows evil. And we are given the choice to choose right or wrong. What a responsibility. Sometimes I think it would be a lot easier, Lord, if You just laid it out for me and You made me do it and You pushed me in the right direction. He won’t do it. He’s a gentleman. You make up your mind. And my mother used to say, I hated to hear it, “You make your bed, you’re going to lay in it.” And that was Emma Glenn saying, if you want to quote that.

Well, what are some of the things that you and I can learn from that Branch Davidian incident? That and the other evil we see in our world. First of all, all of us are tempted. The power of evil is attractive. And it plays on our best intentions. One of my absolutes, I have tried in my lifetime to write down in the back of my Bible things that I have found are true for myself. One of those things is, when I would do good, evil is close behind. When I would do good, evil is close behind. Satan plays on our best intentions. We have to be strong and use the power God gives us to resist evil.

I’ll tell you about my friend. I hesitate because she’s heavy on my heart this week. My friend Mary is half Indian and half Mexican. Mary went to fourth grade in school. She sure didn’t have the benefit of an education. When she writes me, I can hardly read her letters.

Mary is about 40. She had a boyfriend, a live-in boyfriend. There’s the evil in this story, which she tells me often. She had a live-in boyfriend. He was very abusive. And she told him, “I don’t want to see you anymore.” And he said, “Mary, give me one more chance. Come with me to Chicago.” She lived in Arizona, down around that Four Corners area. “Come with me to Chicago. I’m going to take a trip and come along. And let’s make peace between us.” And Mary said, “I was so dumb, I believed him. So I got in the car. And when we got up around Princeton on Route 80, the police stopped us. I thought it was for speeding. But instead, they said, ‘Get out of the car.’ They threw me up against the car. They began to frisk me. They opened the trunk. They pulled the seat out of the car.” She said, “I didn’t know even what they were looking for.” Suddenly, they found what they were looking for. This man had built a second gas line at the bottom of his car. And it was filled with one million dollars worth of drugs. Mary said she didn’t know they were there. And I believe her. Maybe it isn’t true.

But I believe her. Mary was very poor. We have a system of justice in our country. But if you don’t have money, you don’t get much justice. I’m sorry. There just isn’t enough legal help for indigent people. Mary was thrown into the Princeville jail, where they walked past her every day and said, “Dirty Mexican, dirty Mexican.” One sheet in three months. One sheet on her bed. It was an experience that took away her dignity and almost blew her mind.

When they went to court, the man refused to say. Mary did not know it. He was afraid it would be harder on him. He had since recanted his story, but to no avail. They were sentenced to 35 years in prison. Mary’s about 45. And she says to me over and over again, “If only I hadn’t been so dumb as to get into that illegitimate relationship. Why did I do it, Mrs. June? Why did I do it?” And I can do nothing but love her and say, “Mary, Jesus forgives you. You must forgive yourself.” She is so frustrated at being in that prison. And each time I visit her, I want to pick her up and carry her out with me. And I can’t.

A little example of evil and how easy it is. Did you ever see that book with the frog in the pot of water on the cover? And it says how to cook a frog. You don’t put him on the stove in hot water. He’ll jump right out. You put him on in a pot of very cold water. And you just turn that gas up a little bit. And let it get warmer and warmer. And it feels so good to the frog that before he knows that he’s cooked. So it is with evil.

We have to know what we believe. And never leave religious interpretation to any one individual. Broaden your minds. Study. Study the Bible. Begin to write down your statement of faith. Begin to write what you believe when you take Jesus into your heart. Write down number one. “I believe in Jesus as my Lord and my Savior.” If you come to believe that He was born of a virgin. Number two. “I believe He was born as a virgin.” I have such lists in each of my Bibles. And believe me, I have a stack. But that’s my contribution to my grandchildren. Believe me, they’re not going to get any money. But at least the notes in those Bibles will say to them, “This is what grandma was.” I loved your teaching on the families, because we’ve lost the value and the closeness of our families. Sometimes I love my grandchildren so much I can just squeeze them to death. I want everything best for them. And I pray each day, “Oh Lord, send those angels with them. Don’t let them get in any trouble.” And I get to working on a talk like that and I think, “Oh, dear Jesus, keep them safe.” But their grandma prays for them every day, the first thing in the morning. And my children and my husband also.

And my pastor and our country and its leaders. No matter who its leaders are, I pray for their very highest good. And that God will help them to make laws and enact things that will let you and me live the Christian life freely.

We have to know what we believe in. This is the responsibility of the Christian community, the church. Lock yourself into a church. That isn’t just an old lady talking. You will learn a lot. It’s taken our churches 200 or some years to get these tenets together. You may not agree with all of them. Put it on the shelf if you don’t right away. I sure don’t believe now as I did when I was your age. That comes with a lot of experience. Some of it good and some of it not much fun.

But when you see anything such as that David Koresh’s ministry, it was based on just one scripture or, in this case, one part of scripture. Beware. Beware. If it doesn’t tie in with the rest of the book, beware of that teaching. Beware of anyone who gives you a teaching on one part of scripture and doesn’t go back to the background.

Temptation can make us wiser or it can make us weaker. It can make us stronger or it can take away everything from us. As I said before, Jesus, through His temptation, set the course of His Messiahship as a Messiah of faith. How I wish the course of my life I had stuck to my beliefs and not fall prey to the deception of the evil one. My husband is a recovering alcoholic. He has been sober some 30 years. But the first 17 years of our life, we battle that disease of alcoholism. In that time, I prayed many times every day that God would make him stay sober. When he’d be out in the middle of the night, I’d be saying, “God, don’t let him be drunk.” I knew he was drunk. But that’s how the evil one played on my mind. Here I was praying a prayer when I knew better. So what happened to me? I lost my faith. My faith was not strong enough to withstand what I went through. Believe me, that much sorrow and pain can take it out of anyone. If you haven’t lived with that experience, you don’t know what it is. So I didn’t even believe in God by the time this all was over. And it was over 17 years later.

But by then I thought, if there’s a God, He would have answered me by now. I prayed every single prayer you can imagine. I was a Protestant’s Protestant and still am. And yet… Oh, my husband’s giving me the eyesight. And yet, I was saying all the wrong things. I even did the novena prayers to try to get him sober. I went and lit a candle in the Catholic Church and thought, well, I’ll sneak out of here before they see me and maybe it won’t matter.

Let me wrap up here very quickly. Jack’s giving me his watch and saying, “June, now look at that.” As we confront evil in our lives, we have a need to confess our sins. 1 John 1:9 says, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us of all unrighteousness.” My favorite verse. That’s why I memorized it. You can guess why that’s my favorite. We need to make a vow of faithfulness to Christ. Above all, Jesus came to overcome evil with good. And that’s God’s will for you and for me through faith in Jesus Christ. Let’s pray together.

Lord, we have lots of questions about this and other things that happen in our society. Someday we’ll know the answers. In the meantime, we believe that You did overcome evil with good. Help us to be the ones in our world to do the same. May that light of ours shine, Lord Jesus, and dispel the darkness, so that people will see and give You glory. This we pray in Your name, Lord Jesus, our Lord and our Savior. Hallelujah. Amen.