Soaring Achievement or Faulty Bows?

Bill Brown ... Xiamen University
"Like their fathers they were disloyal and faithless, as unreliable as a faulty bow." Psalm 78:57

"We are the bow and they are the arrow" (Kahlil Gibran)

Li Chengfen (1600 A.D.), said that archery flowing from the heart to the hands creates a sense of "inexpressible soaring achievement." Given that the Bible likens us to bows (some faulty, some faithful), I wonder if the Archer who wields us feels such a sense of achievement? I'm certain he was pleased with John Lloyd, who came to Xiamen in December, 1844 to serve in the Amoy Mission.

Within two years of Lloyd's arrival, he spoke Amoy Dialect so well that locals said they could not tell from his voice that he was a foreigner! It seems a waste, therefore, that this diligent and gifted man died within four years, in Dec. 1846.

But the arrows that Lloyd let fly during those four years are hitting their target even today, because his notebooks on the Amoy Dialect were the foundation for Carstairs Douglas' Amoy Bibles, and the Amoy dictionaries used by businessmen, diplomats, missionaries, and even the Chinese. Lloyd was certainly no "faulty bow." Are we?

1. The Archer. If we are bows, there must be an archer. What do we know about Him? The entire Bible echoes Jesus' theme that God is our Father, and wants not rites and religion but love for God and one another, not sacrifice but obedience and justice.

Samuel said, "To obey is better than sacrifice." 1 Sam. 15:22 And what are we to obey? Jesus said the entire Bible was summed up in, "Love God, and your neighbor as yourself." (Matt. 22:37-39). If we have love, justice and mercy will follow.

2. What Kind of Bow? Our life would be meaningless without direction or purpose. Fortunately, even as there are many kinds of bows for different purposes--long bows, cross-bows, compound bows, recurve bows, we too have been individually crafted for special purposes befitting our unique personalities, abilities, likes and dislikes. Are we faithful to our design? When the master wields us, do we bend, or do we balk until we break?

3. Our Arrows Bows are useless without arrows. Lloyd's arrows were his gift for languages, his diligence in studying, his perseverance, and his winning personality. We develop our own arrows as we gain experience and knowledge and sharpen our skills and abilities. Are our arrows dull sticks that bounce off the targets, or straight and finely feathered, and sharp enough to stick?

4. The Targets. We can tell the kind of target we are to be used for by looking at the kind of bow we have become (who we are), and the kinds of arrows we have (what we can do). Are we faithful to our purpose, or are we the unfaithful "faulty bows" of Psalms?

5. Soaring Achievement. We all want success, but that is okay because that is the way our Father created us. We were each created for a unique purpose, and when we hit the target, both we and our Father experience Li Chengfen's inexpressible joy of "soaring achievement".

Conclusion: Other Bows To be used by the Master is a privilege, not a right. If refuse to be used, the Archer has many other bows. As Talmage wrote after Lloyd's death, "What a lesson this, that we must not overestimate our importance in the work to which God has called us. He can do without us."

God can do without us, but he does not want to do without us--and we most certainly cannot do without Him. Your Father wants you to share with him the "inexpressible soaring achievement." Discover the unique target he has prepared for you and go for it.

Related Blogs:
Discipline or Death: (why the 1000 mile journey does not begin with the first step!).

Trust God, but Keep your Knife Sharp:

Have Faith, then Shovel Mountains (Faith and works):

Grandpa's Pearl Knife (Ready for what we pray for?):

Snake or Fish (Xiamen Univ. "fish story"):

Chinese Archery Quotes:
Confucius was an archery instructor, and taught that archery was mastered in the mind, not in the hands (even as Chinese strategists said battles were won or lost in the mind before entering the battlefield).

An archery quote attributed to Confucius: "Thus archers were required to meet the requirements of the rituals on entering, leaving or making turning movements in any direction. When their minds were composed and their posture straight, they grasped the bow and arrow and concentrated. Only when the archer had grasped the bow and arrow and concentrated was it possible to talk of meeting the requirements of the Rituals."

The Ming writer, Li Chengfen (c. 1600), wrote:
But in the end, a bow and arrows are just tools. Archery is no more than a skill. The ‘tool’ represents the lower form, the ‘method’ represents the higher form. ‘Skill’ represents preparedness at the lower level, ‘virtue’ represents preparedness at the higher level. [Confucius said:] ‘There is more to the rituals than jade and brocades; there is more to ritual music than bells and drums.’ [Likewise,] there is more to archery than bows and arrows. The pulling of bows and grasping of arrows is a method of ‘study at ground-level’; but when [the skill] comes naturally to your hands and flows from the heart, then it becomes ‘a soaring achievement.’ I can write about the ‘study at ground level’, but words cannot express the ‘soaring achievement.’
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