This is the text copy of the devotion I presented in my Souls Week stream of Hollow Knight on Monday, October 28, 2024. You can watch/listen to the highlight on Twitch by clicking here.
My original plan for the Extra Life marathon this week was a joke. Not in the sense that it was going to be terrible, but that I found it amusing and felt others would, too. That plan? Make myself suffer through a Dark Souls game, dying repeatedly for the entertainment of viewers, letting them take joy in my frustrations and potentially donate pity dollars to Extra Life. People have always enjoyed the Souls games simply because they’re difficult, and it took me a long time to understand why that was good in their mind.
Welcome to Souls Week: my week-long marathon for Extra Life, but also a series of discussions about why starting again and persistently struggling isn’t as bad as it sounds. This is Day 2: Called According to His Purpose.
Yesterday we talked about salvation and how it is the free gift God offers to everyone who chooses to follow him. But how do we start following? What do we do as Christians to be in the world but not of it? How do we know what our purpose is? (Proverbs 19:21 says: “Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.”) We talked about how to start following yesterday: by accepting God. By doing so, we are acknowledging a desire with us to change and to turn away from the person we’ve been up to that point. This is regeneration, being born again to live a new life in Jesus, with the Holy Spirit coming to dwell inside us as the helper we so desperately need. It’s every Christian’s starting point, though it is different for everyone and each of us has a different testimony which led us to it.
Today’s game, Hollow Knight, is full of bugs. No, not the technical kind – actual bugs. It takes place in Hallownest, a fallen insectoid kingdom beneath the earth. Like any good Soulslike game, it doesn’t lay out all the story specifics like the opening of a Star Wars movie. A lot of exploring, investigating, solving problems, fighting battles, and piecing together bits of information leads you to understand the history of Hallownest and the purpose of the Knight by his creator. This is exactly what we do as Christians to determine how we are to serve God in this life. (Proverbs 20:5 says: “The purposes of a person’s heart are deep waters, but one who has insight draws them out.”) Our best guidance for this is found in the Bible and through prayer, because our own wants and desires are based on our emotions and the fallen world around us.
So how do we motivate ourselves to adhere to God’s word even when it’s difficult or even painful? We are given a very important promise in Romans 8:28: “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” A lot of people leave out that last part, but it is the MOST important part of the verse! It is not enough to simply profess to love God–you must also be doing good works which glorify Him and bring others to a saving knowledge of Him! By serving this purpose, by giving Him the glory He so rightly deserves as our Creator, we are then assured all things will work for our good. Not our wants, not even for our happiness–but for our good. Meaning everything that is beneficial to us in the big picture, something we may not even be able to imagine while we’re on this earth.
Having undergone regeneration, we enter into a lifelong stage of growth called sanctification. It is a never ending, ongoing process of us learning to live as Christ did in order to give glory to God. We have to explore, investigate, solve problems, fight battles, and piece together information to understand who God the Father is and how to be more like the Son with the aid of the Holy Spirit within us. (2 Timothy 1:9a says: “He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace.”)
So, will the Knight come to understand and accept the purpose for which his creator made him? You’ll have to play Hollow Knight to find out for yourself, but I know that I am working on my own path of sanctification every day for God and I welcome others to step onto this path today. For as Job 36:5 says, “God is mighty, but despises no one; he is mighty, and firm in his purpose.”
God, thank you so much for every listener hearing my words today, whether they’re watching the stream or checking out the video at a later time. This path we walk in your name isn’t easy, but we know that as long as we are following You and Your purpose that You will look after us. In your holy name I pray. Amen.
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