Are You Still Trying to Beat the Kobayashi Maru?

Do you manage your expectations?

Do you hold back from good that comes into your life because you just know the universe will find a way to balance it out with something bad just around the corner?

Do you withhold all of yourself from relationships, friends, congregational involvement to protect a heart that’s been disappointed too often?

Recently I asked someone if they’d heard news about a new job. “I’m trying not to hope—managing my expectations so I don’t get too disappointed.”

I ran into another person at the wake of a friend. She worked briefly with this friend and told me, “I’m glad we didn’t really get close. She was clearly a wonderful person and I’d hate to have experienced the grief others here are feeling.”

Living life at arm’s length is certainly one way to go about it but while we’re busy protecting ourselves from the bad, we’re missing out on truly immersing in the good. And there is much about life that’s good.

It all has the appearance of wisdom but it’s a worldly wisdom that keeps us living small and tends to reinforce itself with self-fulfilling prophecies because when we do attempt to break out, we hedge our emotional bets.

 

By not committing fully to whatever we attempt, we’re more likely to experience what we expect to experience.

Jesus said this: “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” (John 10:10 ESV)

There is a thief in this world and he’s not only out to steal our souls, he’s also set up systems to rob us of joy, of living in the abundance God has provided, and of destroying our hopes of ever getting out of life what it appears to promise.

Conversely, Jesus came that we may have life and have it abundantly.

Abundant life can be had. It doesn’t consist in an abundance of possessions, achievements, or dreams come true, but it is available to us.

Abundant life has riches, joys, pleasures, and possibilities. It also has sorrows, pain, hardship, and trial. To try to dull ourselves to the pain, we numb ourselves also to the joy.

Jesus set us free to experience it all with His presence, His Holy Spirit, living within us, guiding, guarding, healing, and freeing. With Him as our protector, we can open ourselves to life in living color and escape the endless gray of half-living.

We can love deeply. Get our hopes up and survive if they’re dashed but rejoice, all the more, if they’re realized. We can celebrate one day and mourn the next and celebrate again with a depth of spirit that lives with Jesus in the gift of every present moment.

But, we have to hack the loop. We must recognize the fault in the test the world presents us every day.

Like the Kobayashi Maru test on Star Trek.

Yes, God spoke to me this morning about the Kobayashi Maru. In the fictional Star Trek world, every Star Fleet officer had to take the Kobayashi Maru test and every officer failed.

They were told it was a test of leadership—of character. They were told it was mandatory. Some tried many times and each time they failed.

There was one problem with the test—it was designed so that everyone who attempted it would fail. It was a no-win test. No matter who attempted it or how they responded, the test would ensure failure.

So, one man reprogrammed the test.

He hacked it. He cheated. Which doesn’t say a lot about one aspect of his character but one thing it does tell us is this—he opted out of the endless no-win loop. He called out the deception. He bought a ticket off that relentless ride to failure. He recognized the futility of it and decided not to play.

We can do that, too.

Satan has set up countless no-win loops in this world. We endlessly replay childhood trauma, church trauma, relational failure, career failure, broken dreams, broken hearts, and dashed hopes.

These are all realities in a broken world but the devil whispers to us that the only option we have is to keep repeating the same test, over and over and over.

Jesus calls out the deception. He beckons us off the loop. He promises that He has beaten the test by losing His life for us and rising again so that now, when we lose, we win.

Matthew 16:25, “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”

Jesus invites us into love that will break our hearts. He calls us into ministries that will sometimes dash our hopes. He walks with us into congregations of people who will irritate us, disappoint us, and frustrate us along the way.

But, love will also delight us. Ministries will engage us. Congregations are full of people who will also surprise us, support us, and love us back.

If we hold ourselves back hoping to save our lives, we lose. Self-protection is a lie. Jesus is our guard. Jesus is our deliverer.

He provides armor that protects us, not from the bumps and scrapes of living for Him but from the real enemy—the deceiver who wants us to spend forever on the treadmill of muffled existence.

This is how we become like children. Jesus said in Matthew 18:3-4 “’Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.’”

If we meet a child who holds back from life, from trying, from loving, from dreaming, we worry about that child and wonder what harm has come to them. We invest great effort to draw them out so they don’t miss out.

Stop trying to keep the child you are inside from running to Jesus and experiencing the full life He wants you to know. He’s invested great effort to draw you out so you won’t miss out on all He’s sending your way.

The test is fixed. Get off the loop. LIVE.

Are you stuck in the endless loop? Want to escape the no-win life you're experiencing? There is a way. https://t.co/g8HjTIJhEU #Jesus #amwriting

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) August 16, 2022