Mark Batterson - Canary in a Coal Mine

On April 16, 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King penned a letter from a Birmingham Jail. He was responding to critics who questioned his tactics, and this is what he said in that letter: there was a time when the church was very powerful, a time when early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days, the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society.

Are you a thermometer or are you a thermostat? Are you being conformed to the world around you or are you being transformed by the Spirit of God at work within you? What percentage of your thoughts, words, actions, and opinions are a regurgitation of news media or social media, and what percentage is a revelation that you are getting from God’s Word? Are you living outside in? Is your emotional state a reflection and reaction to what’s happening around you? Are you taking your cues from trending hashtags? Is your conscience taken captive by popular opinion, peer pressure, or political correctness, or are you living inside out? Is your conscience taken captive by God’s Word? Are you shifting the atmosphere with faith, hope, and love? Are you living a Spirit-filled, Spirit-led life?

Well, those are a few of the questions we’re going to talk about today. Welcome to National Community Church, DC Nova, in person and online. It’s a joy to have our extended family from here, there, and everywhere. We are in a series called «Fan into Flame.» I want you to meet me in 2 Timothy 3, and we’ll get there in a minute.

Now, in the 19th century, our primary form of energy was coal. There were thousands of coal mines, and they were very difficult, very dangerous places to work because of a colorless, odorless, tasteless gas called carbon monoxide. It was the invisible assassin, and there was no way to detect it until a Scottish physiologist named John Scott Haldane made an interesting connection. He knew that canaries have a unique anatomy that allows them to absorb oxygen while they inhale and exhale, so they get like a double dose of the air that we breathe. This made them the OG carbon dioxide detector. If a canary stops singing in a coal mine, you’re in trouble. It’s an early warning sign that something is wrong.

2 Timothy 3 is a canary in a coal mine, and Paul doesn’t pull any punches as he paints almost this prophetic picture. These early warning signs are called in scripture signs of the times, the end times. 2 Timothy 3, 1-5: Here we go. But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. Now, the last days require a little bit of context, okay? The Bible begins with a cosmology that we call the Book of Genesis; it tells us how we got here. It also includes in eschatology, which we call the Book of Revelation, that tells us where we are headed.

Now, the Old Testament prophets, as well as the gospels and epistles, reveal a wide variety of early warning signs, and each one is a canary in a coal mine. There are technological, geopolitical, geological, and environmental indicators that point to the beginning of the end, which is really a new beginning. Okay, Jesus said there will be wars and rumors of wars—check. There will be famines and pandemics—check, check. And there will be natural disasters that increase in scope and scale—check.

What Paul does, I think, is give us psychographic indicators because here’s the reality: in many ways, we are evolving, and it’s a testament to God’s creativity. I mean, come on, we landed a man on the moon. I mean, with technology, we have found cures for diseases. Our technologies put at our fingertips the ability to do things that, I mean, a hundred years ago would have been unimaginable. So what an incredible evolution! But at the same time, would you agree with me we’re also devolving? This is evidence of the dual nature we have, a sin nature and a saint nature, if you will.

See, we were born on a battlefield between good and evil. But friends, the battle isn’t just happening out there; it’s happening in here, in me, and all of us fight that battle. And so Paul is giving us some early warning signs so that we won’t be surprised. And here’s what he says: People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, and anything else. They will consider nothing sacred. They will be unloving and unforgiving. I mean, that kind of sounds like cancel culture, does it not? They will slander others, and now our ability to do that and then broadcast it on social media platforms—where we’re trolling and baiting and shaming and blaming—is pretty rampant.

I mean, this is hitting a nerve ending. They will be cruel and hate what is good. They will betray their friends, be reckless, be puffed up with pride, and love pleasure rather than God. They will act religious, but they will reject the power that could make them godly. Catch your breath for a second. My whole style of leadership is appreciative inquiry: you want to find out what’s working and do more of that, celebrate what you want to see more of. And positivity is one of my strengths. So there’s part of me that just kind of wants to read right over this. But the reality is we aren’t doing ourselves any favors because some canaries have stopped singing.

Paul comes to this conclusion, and this is the first application: he says, «Avoid such people.» Why? Because in another place, he says that bad company corrupts good character. Can I just say this to our young people and to people who have made more trips around the sun? Choose your friends wisely. I mean, Jim Rohn said that we’ve become the average of the five people we spend the most time with. And I don’t know if he can validate five, but I think it’s true that generally speaking, the trend line of our life, for better or for worse—who do you surround yourself with? That’s why I mean I want to hang out with someone like Dick F, who’s been there and done that, long obedience in the same direction. I want to be around people that stretch my faith. I want to be around people who see the potential in me and call it out, hold me accountable, speak the truth in love. But I want to make sure I’m around people who want what’s best for me, and what’s best for me is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.

Charlie Tremendous Jones said you will be the same person in five years as you are today, except for two things: the people you meet and the books you read. Who are you hanging out with? Are they having a positive or negative influence on your life? And what are you reading? Like you are what you eat physically; you are what you read intellectually. Let me widen the angle lens. I think there are two ways to read the Bible. One is a window, and the other is a mirror. I kind of wish I had a window and a mirror up here, but you can picture it, right?

I think both are legit ways of reading the Bible, but the sequence is significant; we’ll get there. I think the Bible is our window on the world. I don’t just read it; I look through it, and I begin to see things from God’s eye view. This is where we get our worldview; this is our epistemology. Scripture is the final authority in matters of faith and doctrine. As your pastor, I want you to hear me say: don’t take my word for it; I am not the final authority on matters of faith and doctrine. This book is the final authority, and this is how we execute the news. This is how we discern what’s really happening when what’s happening is happening. This gives us prophetic insight into the cultural moment, and I like the way Walter Brueggemann says it. The task is reframing, and this is how we do it: reframing so that we can re-experience the social realities that are right in front of us from a different angle.

Okay, are you tracking with me? So Scripture is our window on the world, but the Apostle James said it’s also a mirror. Like, you need to take a long, hard look in this mirror, mirror, mirror on the wall, because this is where I discover my identity—who I really am. This is where I discover my destiny—what God has in store for me. The Pharisees, okay, don’t miss this: the Pharisees were experts at applying the law to others. And I think sometimes we read the Bible and think, «Oh man, does this person need to know that?» Wow! I mean, you would never listen to a message and try to apply it to someone else, would you?

So the tendency is sometimes to look through the window, and so what the Pharisees then did is they would use this to take potshots at other people and throw stones. And there’s a word for that: self-righteousness. For them, it was masquerading as holiness, but it was holier-than-thou, which is the opposite of holiness; in fact, it’s a form of hypocrisy. All of that to say this: I want to look through the window, but man, we better look in the mirror before we look in the window. Jesus said it this way: you might want to take the plank out of your own eye before you deal with the speck in your neighbor’s eye. How are we doing? So the Bible is a window and a mirror.

2 Timothy 3:14–15: But as for you—again, like all of these psychographic indicators, like it seems like the world’s falling apart at the seams; the compass needle is spinning. It doesn’t paint a great picture. But Paul says to Timothy, «As for you, remain faithful to the things you have been taught because you know they are true.» And I would add this: true north. And you know you can trust those who taught you. You have been taught the holy Scriptures from childhood, and they are able to make you wise unto salvation.

You ever hear about the pilot who came over the intercom and said, «I have some good news and some bad news»? The good news is we’re making great time; the bad news is we’re lost. And it kind of feels like a commentary on the world that we’re in: we are making great time! We have never moved at a pace like this. I mean, wow! Like a 15-minute delay for a plane—like my life is terrible and I got the middle seat? The middle seat? Are you kidding? It’s like the worst day ever! Yeah, try telling that to someone who is packing up their wagon to go on the Oregon Trail.

What I’m saying is your problems would have been someone else’s miracle a couple of hundred years ago. Like reality check, right? Where was I? I’ve said this before, but let me say it again because I think it’s really important to be conscientious in the way that we live our lives. I think social media— and I love it for a lot of reasons— but I do think it’s the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. I don’t think we were designed with the emotional capacity to know everything about everyone, everywhere, in real time. I really don’t. And so the danger is doom scrolling. The danger is getting sucked into these rabbit holes, the algorithms that are designed to outrage, the algorithms that just keep us right in our echo chambers.

So what do we do? Well, we don’t bury our heads in the sand, that’s for sure. How do we process what’s happening in the world, the racial tension, the political polarization? How do we live from a place of conviction instead of just reaction to everyone and everything? It’s easier said than done, but I like the way Karl Barth, the Swiss theologian, said it: he said, «Take your Bible and take your newspaper, and read both, but interpret the newspaper from your Bible.» See, I think there can be a tendency for us to filter our biblical theology through my personality, my history, my ethnicity, my political ideology, and the net result is called idolatry.

Let’s not look through the window at everybody else; let’s look in the mirror and make sure that my decisions, the way I think, my worldview, even my position and posture, are reflections of this book. Why? Because you’re the only Bible some people will ever read. And so then the question is, is your life a good translation?

Let me pull up that Wesleyan quadrilateral for a moment. There is a methodology for theology called the Wesleyan quadrilateral, and I think—can I do a little bit of teaching for a moment? Just kind of turn this into a theology classroom. We can study Scripture from four angles: tradition, reason, experience, and Scripture. But the sequence is significant, and we’ll come back to that.

Now, tradition is the test of time, and so listen, don’t dismiss orthodoxy when it comes to theology. We have 2,000 years of a lot of smart people—Jesus-following, Bible-believing, God-fearing people—that we aren’t just Johnny-come-lately. And I would even say that as a Protestant church, for most of our history, the Catholic Church is much of our history before that. So I think church history, tradition, is significant. There’s a cumulative effect to how we got where we are. Reason is the test of logic, and this is where I would say reason is a gift from God. I would also say that our faith is not logical or illogical; it’s theological, so it adds God to the equation. We believe in revelation beyond reason, but reason is a gift from God.

Now, experience is the test of testimony, and we overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony. Our experience is incredibly significant, and your testimony is as unique as mine. I would also say I’m a data point—0.1. I can’t fully teach this, but Oswald Chambers is one of my rules of life: let God be as original with others as he was with you. Come on, sir! So I think we just have to be careful that my experience is my experience, and your experience is your experience.

But then we get to Scripture, which to me is the test of truth, and this is where the sequence is significant. If you filter everything through your experience—I’ll just pick on experience—what you’re going to end up with is relativism, where my truth is my truth, and your truth is your truth. Then it’s a crapshoot: what do we do with all of that? You know, tradition? You’re probably going to end up in a box called legalism. But I think what we’ve got to do is process experience, reason, and tradition through Scripture.

Mark this: this is so esoteric right now. Bring it down to earth. I’ll just share one little thing that was a game changer for me. I probably heard Erwin McManus say this probably 22 years ago: he said, «Don’t let an arrow of criticism pierce your heart unless it first passes through the filter of Scripture.» That’s what I’m talking about. It’s about processing what’s happening in the news, what’s happening in my life, through the filter of Scripture.

Why? Because listen, feed a man a fish, you feed him for a day; but teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime. The only ceiling on your intimacy with God and impact on the world is daily spiritual disciplines. One of those is a daily diet of the Word, and we’ll talk more about this. But I’ve got to make sure that this is the mirror and the window that I’m looking through.

A couple of weeks ago, I was in California. How do you get anywhere in Southern California? Why? Well, I will not complain about our traffic again. I am not kidding; I had no clue: am I going east or west or north or south? I had no idea where all of those highways were going. If I didn’t have GPS, I would still be there just driving around. I don’t even know what they are—the 105, the 405? I don’t even know what those roads are called.

What I’m saying is hallelujah because we used to have the Rand McNally map. Do you know what I’m talking about? You would get it out of your back seat; you would open it up and follow those directions. But it was the 1987 version that got me there! I love GPS! We live in an incredible world where I can send a cell signal off a satellite that’s orbiting Earth, and it will trilaterate my latitude, longitude, and altitude within inches of where I am and get me where I need to go! Lord, thank you for GPS!

How do I navigate the anxiety and the depression? How do I navigate the difficult decisions? How do I navigate an election cycle? How do I navigate relationship issues? I’m just going to make it personal: it was a hard week for a lot of reasons. I’m not complaining about this, but three days in a recording studio, seven hours recording the audiobook for «A Million Little Miracles,» which Laura and I will give you a copy of on November 17—it’s our gift to you, so don’t go buy it! But I was physically spent. I mean, I have run marathons and biked centuries, and when I come out of the recording studio, I’m wiped.

And then do you ever get kind of multiple pieces of news that sort of depress your emotions? It just came out of nowhere, but I had a ministry friend who died of a heart attack at 55 this week, and I think what it did is it dredged up all of these emotions because my father-in-law died at 55 of a heart attack. And then another friend who I really love—kind of walked with them— their toddler has had six surgeries, and they just found out that the same surgery has to be repeated for the third time, and it’s just heartbreaking to me because I’m like…

And I think what happened is I was just physically spent, emotionally spent, and I’ll be honest: I was in a funk on Friday. I did not feel like a thermostat; I felt more like a thermometer. I felt like the external pressure was more than the internal pressure. I’m like, «Oh Lord, help me! Help me!» What do you do when you find yourself in those circumstances?

I’m going to tell you what I do: I make a beeline to the back of the book, and I’ll explain what I mean. On September 9, 1965, James Stockdale was flying a mission over North Vietnam, shot down, and spent almost eight years in the infamous Hanoi Hilton as a prisoner of war. As a naval officer, he was treated worse than most; he was tortured, he was not given medical care. And how do you survive eight years of that? He said, «Here’s how I survived: I never lost faith in the end of the story.»

This is so important right now! Oh God, Lord! Those who are within the hearing of my voice, who have suicidal thoughts, who feel like it’s over, who feel like the best is behind them, pray with me right now. Lord, we pray hope in Jesus' name. We pray that the reality of the Cross and an empty tomb would invade the dark corners of their hearts and minds and fill them with hope—that God, you have not given up on them, that there is a hope and a future, that God, you have plans and purposes, that it is not over with. In Jesus' name, amen.

I want to let you in on a little secret: we know how it ends! And this is really important. What I’m saying is don’t lose faith in the end of the story. God is writing a bigger story; God is writing a better story. I’m going to tell you how I triangulate: I go to the back of the book. I turn to the Book of Revelation, and it’s probably not the book I read the very most, but sometimes I’ve got to go back to the end of the book.

I read Revelation 5:11: «Then I looked and heard the voice of many angels numbering thousands upon thousands and 10,000 times 10,000. They encircled the throne and the living creatures and the elders, and in a loud voice, they were saying, 'Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive glory and honor and power and praise.'» And then I go to Revelation 7:9: «And there was a great multitude from every nation and tribe and people and language standing before the throne, saying, 'Salvation belongs to him who sits on the throne.'» And then I go to Revelation 11:15: «The kingdoms of this world are becoming the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.»

Okay, let’s go! Like we’re about to start a series, «Stand in the Gap,» and as a way of just kind of preparing us for this election cycle, because someone’s going to win, someone’s going to lose, and about half the country is going to be really upset and half the country is going to be really happy. But I think how we posture ourselves and how we process this season is going to be really, really important.

And I don’t control the outcome, but what I need to do—like I would remind us: we don’t pray, «Our Father who art in heaven, my administration come; my party be done.» Like we pray, «Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done.» I mean, I think if some of us were writing the script, Jesus would ride into Jerusalem on a horse, and he would overthrow the Roman Empire and take the throne of Rome. But he was aiming higher and longer at the throne of Heaven. My primary citizenship is in heaven! I am in the world but not of the world.

And so we’ll process some of this over the next month, but I just want to say one more time for the record: make a beeline to the end of the book. I’ll see if I can close with this. The NFL season kicks off this weekend, so that means I’m allowed one football illustration. In 2020, the Green Bay Packers won the NFC Championship, and just for whatever reason—and this is where I would say I do love social media—I tweeted, back when it was Twitter, that I would preach for tickets. And I was really half-joking, but a pastor from Texas took me up on it and said, «You come preach, and we’ll get you a couple of tickets.»

The Super Bowl happened to be on Josiah’s birthday. That’s just the kind of dad I am! But we get there, we walk into the stadium, and I realized, «Oh wait a second, what if they lose?» And it was the most nerve-wracking experience ever. There was a moment in the second half where the Steelers scored a touchdown. I looked over, and my son, Josiah, was crying. I have to say it’s probably one of my proudest moments as a parent! They ended up winning the game, and we flew home the next day, and Laura had recorded it. So I actually rewatched the entire Super Bowl the next day, but guess what? It was a very different experience—like not as nerve-wracking, very relaxing to watch it.

Why? Because I knew the outcome. Because I knew the final score. Because I knew the box score. Because I know who won. Come on! We know the final score! We know the box score! We just have to live our lives that way! Oh man, there was a whole other thing I wanted to do—maybe in the 11. Oh man, that was like my favorite part of the message, and I’m like, nope, not going to happen.

Let me just close with this because you have your issues, right? The issues you’re dealing with, the demons you fight, the memories that just pop up at unexpected times. The relationship issues—ah! —the personal issues. And then it’s compounded by what’s happening probably in the world that you live in, your workplace, or whoever it is that you hang out with, and it’s a lot.

So I want to show you a picture of a little note card that I keep in my Bible, and we’ll put it up on the screen. I keep it in my Bible kind of as a place marker for where I am and where I’m studying, the window I’m looking through, and the mirror that I’m looking in. It’s an author who said, «Whatever keeps me from my Bible is my enemy, however harmless it may appear to me.»

I think that we live in a world where everything is being politicized, and I would suggest that those who follow Jesus—we theologize. It’s the verb form of theology: treating everyone and everything in theological terms. So maybe I’ll talk about this in two weeks. We have a theology of dignity: the image of God in me greets the image of God in you, even if you don’t look like me, think like me, or vote like me. You’re created in the image of God! And that means I can politicize you and paint you into a corner, or I can try to theologize you and treat you accordingly.

I think Scripture is how we rewrite and overwrite all of the negative narratives, all of the false narratives. Without this book, I’m like a guy without GPS, is what I’m saying. I don’t even know where to go, what to do, or how to think, what decisions to make. I’m grateful, and just pop that last verse up. 2 Timothy 3:16: «All Scripture is God-breathed.» You know what I love about this? The same Spirit that inspired those original writers inspires us on the reading side of the equation!

This book is living and active! We don’t just read it; it reads us. The goal isn’t just to get through the Bible but to get the Bible through us. Why? Because it’s useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for some good works? No, no, no—for every good work!

I will close with this: I have a friend who started having panic attacks; he had never experienced anything like that. He happened to be reading a book by Randy Frazee called «His Mighty Strength,» and in that book, Randy told a story about a moment where he was paralyzed by fear. He was fearful of what might happen to his kids in an irrational sort of way, which caused him to be overprotective and just kind of live in a state of anxiety or panic. And that’s when his counselor gave him a cassette tape—that’s how old the book is, okay? A cassette tape! And told him to listen to the Bible for 30 minutes a day.

This is what he said: Psychotherapists call it neurolinguistic programming, but I call it biblical meditation. Here’s what my friend did, and I kind of love this: he asked his mom and dad — this guy is in his 40s, his parents are in their 70s-but you’re never too old! He said, «Mom and Dad, I’m really struggling, just experiencing panic attacks. Would you record some passages of Scripture so that at night I can just listen to it?» Let’s not overcomplicate this! Let’s make sure that we’re filtering our experience, our reason, our tradition through the Good Book. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen!