We’re learning this morning that the US has sent Iran a fifteen-point plan to end the war in the Middle East. The plan was delivered by way of Pakistan, but it is unclear how widely it has been shared among Iranian officials.

However, Israeli journalist Amit Segal reports that Israeli leaders fear the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) will undermine any agreement with the West. Yesterday’s announcement that Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr, a former IRGC commander, will replace the slain Ali Larijani as head of the country’s security council reinforces their fears.

Why would the IRGC want to continue fighting a war that is so devastating to their nation?

Winning by not losing

According to an extensive report by the Middle East Institute, the IRGC has developed in recent years from a militia into a “parallel state” within Iran. Its leaders and members understand the world through the prism of Mahdism: the return of the twelfth divinely ordained Imam Mahdi, who will rid the world of evil and injustice through “one final apocalyptic battle” between the dar al-Islam (land of Muslims) and dar al-Kufr (land of infidels).

They believe that the 1979 Islamic Revolution marked the first stage in the Mahdi’s return. The IRGC now exists to “prepare the world for the emergence of Imam of the Age” by fighting the “enemies” of Islam.

In such a conflict, they win by not losing. The survival of the IRGC and the Islamic regime constitutes success, enabling them to continue their aggression against Israel and the West until they are defeated and/or the Mahdi returns. In this sense, the US and Israel are fighting a military battle against an ideological foe.

For anyone who doubts whether the spiritual is real or relevant, this conflict should be proof enough.

“The wind blows where it wishes”

A bench beside a pond in our neighborhood is my favorite place to visit. When I spend time there in the early morning, it often seems that the veil between the physical and the spiritual lifts just a bit. I sense the Creator in his creation and feel more than hear his voice in my spirit.

Sitting by the pond yesterday, my attention was drawn to a fish jumping in the water. By the time I heard the splash it made, it was too late to see it, but the ripples it created cascaded to the shoreline.

The thought came to me: like the world beneath the surface of the pond, the world of the Spirit is often most evident through the effects it produces in our fallen world.

Consider wind as an example. I’ve experienced it all my life, but never wondered why. It turns out, wind is primarily caused by the uneven heating of our planet’s surface by the sun. As air moves from areas of cooler air to warmer air, wind is produced. The earth’s rotation (known as the Coriolis force) also deflects air movement, and friction with the earth’s surface causes diverging winds as well.

All that to say, we don’t see the forces that produce the wind, but we feel what they produce. Jesus made this point to Nicodemus: “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes” (John 3:8a).

Then our Lord added, “So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit” (v. 8b).

This is as it must be. The God who is Spirit must work in nonmaterial ways in our material world. He leads us through his inner voice, the truth of Scripture, and the circumstances of our days into obedience that manifests itself in tangible, material ways. We see what he does by the results in and through our lives.

When “we walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7), we see the effects of our faith on our walk. And so does the world.

The faith to have faith

This fact relates first to our salvation.

When a brilliant friend and I were talking the other day, he asked me how I knew with certainty that I was a child of God and that I would go to heaven when I die. I told him that I had learned over the years this fact: it takes faith today to believe God saved me, just as it did when I asked him to do so.

I still cannot prove through scientific means that God exists, much less that he loves me, his Son died to pay the penalty for my sins, and now his Spirit lives in me as his temple (1 Corinthians 3:16). These are all relational truth claims. And while objective evidence from archaeology, history, ancient manuscripts, fulfilled prophecy, and changed lives is strongly compelling, relationships cannot be proven—only experienced.

Just as I cannot prove to you that my wife loves me, I cannot prove to you that God loves you. But I can invite you to experience your Father’s love for yourself by faith.

“Though I was blind, now I see”

This conversation points to a second reality: our changed lives are often our most compelling apologetic for Christ.

I can show you through the ancient writings of Tacitus, Suetonius, Mara bar Serapion, Pliny the Younger, and Josephus that Jesus existed and was crucified, and that his early followers believed him to be raised from the dead and worshiped him as God. But you can say they were all wrong. Or you could make a postmodern move and say that’s just “their truth.”

What a skeptic cannot so easily dismiss is the change Christ makes in a life fully surrendered to his Spirit (Ephesians 5:18). Like the man born blind, we can say to the world, “One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see” (John 9:25). Others may dismiss our theology, but they cannot say that our experience is not our experience.

And when they see the difference Jesus is making in our lives (cf. John 10:10), they may be drawn to seek that difference in their lives as well.

Church baptizes four hundred in one weekend

Lead Pastor Jason Britt of Bethlehem Church in Georgia was recently teaching a series on Acts 2 and the Day of Pentecost. He felt prompted to call for spontaneous baptisms, and four hundred people were baptized across the church’s three campuses during one weekend.

He explained: “A Spirit-filled church is full of Spirit-sensitive people, and Spirit-sensitive people obey.”

How sensitive to the Spirit are you today?

Quote for the day:

“Without the Spirit of God, we can do nothing. We are as ships without wind. We are useless.” —Charles Spurgeon

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