Many years have passed since William Ernest Henley wrote in his defiant but ungodly poem “Invictus”:
“Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeoning of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.”
This is a poem of defiance against Almighty God and His command to turn our backs on our own life choices and live only from the Tree of Life, which is Jesus Christ.
The angels with flaming swords that guard the gate of Eden do not guard the gate of the Paradise of God that is coming down from heaven. This is because Jesus through his Cross has opened its gate, and of all who would enter “None shall be denied”.
But on entering The City of God one loses the power of choice and trusts only in “the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory.” Disregard the defiant words of Invictus. Our Heavenly Father knows best.
Years of hitch-hiking up the East Coast of Australia in my early teen years taught me to be self-sufficient. I worked hard on dairy farms for almost four years, and fought and conquered the loneliness that came with living with but not being a part of families. I once slept among reeds on the south bank of the Macquarie River, near the old wooden bridge, while ‘stone broke’ with a thousand miles to go before reaching home.
If anyone told me that I couldn’t do a thing, I did it to prove them wrong. Stubbornness was my hidden name. Invictus? Yep, that was me. Then, at age twenty-one and more settled (but still self-reliant and at times defiant) Jesus came to me one evening where I was living alone and told me to surrender to him. (It was more an order than an instruction.) This year I’ll turn eighty-six, God willing, so I’ve served the Lord for many decades.
What’s my secret?
The Grace of God comes first to mind, and secondly the fact that I’ve never defied the will of God, not once refused to do as He instructed. I’ve not always lived up to the mark set by Jesus and those who served the Lord so well down through church history, and there were times in my early years as a Christian that I thought that I might be wearing threadbare the great promise in I John 1:9 (which isn’t possible).
At other times, I waited for some time after having sinned before asking for God’s forgiveness, so that I could feel bad enough for God to justify His forgiveness! (You’ve not done that? Many Christians have, I’m sure, in moments of religious remorse.)
But never defiant. Not once! No one ever won an argument with the Lord Jesus. The antonym to defiance is submission, which is what I did at age 21. I said yes to Jesus and God forgave my sins and I began a new life in Jesus Christ.
I strongly advise you to do likewise. As Jesus said, if you wish to save your life, you must first lose it.