Isaiah 40:11

He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young. (Isaiah 40:11)

How shall I bless your people, O Lord? How shall I minister?

Among the ruins

Somehow I feel we need the warmth of the un-encompassable love of The Lord, painted in vivid words across time, through His servants the prophets, and eternally in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

Too many of us live among the ruins, desolate, cauterised, the nerve-endings of our emotions severed, never to dream again, never to feel again, never to open our hearts again.

Others live in tears that flow day and night; whether in remorse or in regret, or in rejection, hearts broken beyond mending, our sighs sinking empty into pillows each night.

Some of us live in loneliness among the desolate ruins. People stopped wanting us too long ago to remember what it felt like to have friends. People do what needs to be done for us to maintain our existence, but no more than that. We exist; we do not live.

A lot of us find it impossible to believe we are loved by God, because we are only too painfully aware of how sinful we are.

If we aren't any of these I just described, we're on our way into one of them.

If you are one of the fat, sleek ones who feel no lack of just about anything, I guess I am not writing this to you and you can stop reading it. There are some of us like that; indeed, many.

It is a cold age; an age of fierce individualism which treads over the weaker ones. The also-rans are not just left behind, but they are mowed down into the dust. The shrill strength of the individualist beats down the average Joe. Small beginnings, little dreams, tender steps.....are sitting ducks for the achievers. Come to think of it, it's always been this way with mankind - from the ages of kings and empires down to the reign of money in this age.

And among us, in this age, come the words of the Lord to Isaiah.

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It isn't over until The Lord says so

Tender, faltering steps. Fragile, slender courage. Barely learning to stand. Still feeling the pain of the past. Wisps of hope finer than the filaments of a spider's web. All but just about to give up.

Are you there today? Thinking it is over? If you are, I want you to meet a God for Whom it is never over. It is never too late. It is never too far gone that it cannot be redeemed. 

I want you to know what our destiny is, we who trust in God. Believe me, we need to know this, because it is precisely what our oppressor does not want us to ever find out.

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Hearts of stone

Isaiah 40 is a unique chapter in all of the Old Testament. It is one bubbling wellspring and a beacon of hope for all who read it and take it to heart. If you ever want to start reading Isaiah, you will be blessed if you begin at chapter 40.

Here God comforts His people.

Living as we do in this apathetic, indifferent, insensitive, chilly age, we have forgotten what it means to be comforted. Our wounds have scarred over and the scabs are set like granite. Our hearts are of stone (Ezekiel 11:19, 36:26). What does this mean?

It's not good news, I'm afraid. Tears are a sign of wellness, much as they are hard to bear; pain that is felt is a sign of life, much as it is hard to endure. But a heart that does not feel any emotion is a heart of stone; it is a heart cauterised, where the nerve endings to both physical feelings and emotions have been severed. In such a heart, wounds are not acknowledged, or bound up. A hard, bitter, pragmatic exterior scar hardens into a granite scab. We are "self-made", individualist, hardened mercenaries. The only way we know to live is for ourselves; we feel neither our own pain nor the pain of others.

Does this sound extreme? It actually is not. It is the way most of us in this age normally live, only no one has called our bluff so far. Many indeed are the rationalisations - "God helps those who helps themselves", "we need to be tough because no one will do it for us", and the list goes on.

Alas! How cold and hard is a wounded, crushed heart that does not know it needs to be comforted! 

Isaiah 40 is for hearts of flesh. Hearts that feel the wounds and come to God to be comforted and healed. Its everlasting words of hope and healing are for the tender-hearted. For the weaker ones.

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Tender God

The picture of a shepherd and his flock is a kind of logo, almost, all over the Bible. Now it won't make much sense until we understand the relationship between an Israelite shepherd and his flock.

We must learn to compare ourselves to sheep, first of all. God uses the most perfect analogy when He speaks to us likening us to sheep. Sheep are interesting creatures, so like human beings in their behaviour and temperament that the comparison is uncomfortably close and scary.

To start with, sheep are easily led. In fact, without leading, they go astray and run riot. If you want an orderly flock, you need a shepherd.

Curiously, sheep are also highly individualistic. The stronger ones tend to keep butting the weaker ones out of their way. They keep trying to get the best for themselves.

Even closer to human territory, sheep instinctively know where the good things are, and importantly, they trust a shepherd to lead them to the good things. In fact, sheep know when the shepherd calls them. They know the shepherd's voice. In one sense, they know authority and respect it; they can tell the voice of the hireling from the voice of the shepherd, like Jesus said in John 10:1-6.

Sheep are also highly dependent on the shepherd. They need the shepherd to do part of their thinking, and will trust without reservation. These are the good side of being easily led.

Sheep cannot resist danger and temptation too much. We do know the famous picture of a shepherd reaching out for his lost sheep that has wandered off the top of the cliff.

The relationship between a shepherd and his flock is far more intimate than we understand in this age, inured as we are to anti-establishment and individualistic leanings.

The shepherd knows his sheep individually. He is aware of the minutest wound; he knows who the strays are and how to woo them back; he knows the ones who struggle; the fat, sleek and overfed ones; the rejected ones. He knows where to lead the sheep, where the grass is sweet, where danger is minimal and where water is abundant. He knows how to protect his flock from danger.

Does this sound merely "symbolic"? I was in fact speaking of a real shepherd and his flock; not really of the symbolic picture of an Israelite shepherd and his flock as it is used innumerable times in the Bible. The analogy is from the actual to the symbolic; not the other way round. The Biblical passages about shepherds and sheep must be understood from the REAL point of view first before they can be understood as symbolic of the relationship between the Lord, our Shepherd, and us His flock.

Isaiah 40:11 is a grand, intricate piece of art which tempts us to believe how real it is and how close at hand it is. It is an end-time prophecy and must be understood as such. How can an end-time prophecy comfort us? We may not even live to see the end times. So must we wait till after we're dead and gone to know our God the way Isaiah 40:11 paints Him?

Yes and no. In one sense, for the present, it is immensely comforting to know that Someone is indeed keeping track of our lack of nourishment, our child-like dependence and our difficulties. And it is eternally comforting to know that this Someone Who knows us so minutely is indeed our Lord! Are you living among the ruins today and scraping your wounds with a shattered piece of glass like Job did? God knows it. Have you given up? God knows it, and He does not give up. Wherever we are today, let's know that God's love reaches us there.

In eternity, Isaiah 40:11 will still be true, in fact, more true than it is today, at least in perception if not in reality. How often we lose out on the promised future restoration! It is not one of Christianity's pipe dreams; it is not pie in the sky; and not merely a "ticket to heaven".

Isaiah 40:11 is the REALITY of eternity. Because we have hearts of stone, we may not perceive that our deepest human longings are eternal both in scope and fulfillment. Our deepest HUMANITY is eternal. We will not, indeed CANNOT, be comforted except our God Himself comfort us. And Isaiah 40:11 is the promise of our God that He understands and has made provision not just now but in eternity, in REALITY, for our deep longings. No temporal human agency or comfort will be a balm to us like Isaiah 40:11.

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We know the God of Isaiah. We know the God Who spoke Isaiah 40:11.

Isaiah 40:11 must be read from the King James Bible, which rightly speaks it in FUTURE TENSE, because it is primarily a FUTURE promise, just like the rest of Isaiah 40 and the remainder of the book of Isaiah.

Today, we must take this grand verse to heart. If indeed the Holy Spirit in our hearts is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance, we must rejoice, for what is Isaiah 40:11 but a glimpse of our inheritance in Christ Jesus? The Lord will indeed feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arm and carry them close to his heart; and those with young he will lead gently. Are you a special sheep with special needs? Are you a little lamb, perhaps the littlest? Or do you feel like just one of the flock, an ordinary one? Whoever you are, He will feed you; envelop you in His arm and carry you close to His heart, and will gently lead you.

When Isaiah 40:11 is fulfilled, we will be there to see it; if not, prophecy has no meaning. What is it that you long for the Lord to do today? Wait a little; be patient. Since you wanted it, He has taken it to heart; and when He fulfills you, you will know He has fulfilled it; and you will know HE and no other has fulfilled it. Whether it is in this life or in eternity, YOU will know that to hope in the Lord is not to hope in vain; He will do that which He has purposed for you, and your heart will be comforted never to grieve again.

We tend to take restoration a little glibly, underestimating how deeply we need it and how impoverished we are without it. All effects of having hearts of stone. We must think about how fulfilling The Lord's fulfillment will be. He has taken note of our suffering, beloved; He has seen our hearts. Now let us look to Him for His comforting, whenever it comes.

I hope I have been able to convey how deeply Isaiah 40:11 has blessed me; but I suspect strongly that my deepest heart, where this prophecy touched me, has not been revealed. Never mind; I only meant to provide a glimpse of how deep, how wide, how long, how high, and yet how tender, sensitive and gentle God's love is, painted across the ages for us.

We know the same God Isaiah did, beloved. And He has not changed towards us in 2013!

May God's grace be lavished on each of us abundantly.

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Resources

Other important pictures in the Bible of shepherds and sheep that you can study to understand how God speaks to us using this theme:

• I Samuel 17, specifically v. 33-37
• Psalm 23
• Ezekiel 34
• Zechariah 10:1-5; 11:4-17
• John 10
• Numerous others

He came...He saw...He SURRENDERED ALL....

He came, He saw, He surrendered all......
- Michael Card, "The Nazarene"

During the Holocaust, there were times when some brave Jews chose to die for their fellowmen. They willingly chose to give up their lives so that others would be saved. In Roman times, during Nero's reign, Christians did the same when thrown to the lions - some willingly laid down their lives for others. In Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities, Sydney Carton chose to die for his friend Charles Darnay. There are numerous times when human beings have chosen to lay down their lives for ones they loved, sometimes even for strangers - like in the Holocaust.

Jesus Christ claims to have laid down His life for us all. What makes His supreme sacrifice different? Is it different at all?

Many times, people do choose to die for others who were in some sense and in their perception, "worth it". That is, the ones who sacrificed their lives really thought that the worth of the person they were dying for, was more than their own worth. "It's probably better for me to die rather than him; he can give the world so much, I cannot give that much. If he can live only if I die, so be it." In one sense, that was the thinking. It is possible that for someone 'good', a few people could be found who are willing to die.

The point is, we as human beings value life very highly. When it comes to death, we value each life equally, even though in life, we might possibly discriminate about the value we place on some lives compared to others. We view the death of a human being as a serious thing. We would all like to avoid or prevent having to die; we might ultimately resign ourselves to it when we have no other option left. But to willingly forfeit our lives for someone else? The cause that makes us choose such a course must be a very, very noble one indeed - an almost sacred, divine thing. And we value the one for whom we might choose to die as precious beyond our own lives, should it come to that.

Would we choose to die in place of a serial killer? Would we choose to die, say, for someone who intoxicates himself with alcohol mixed with the blood of snakes, and then sodomises a 11-month old child? Do we consider it worth dying for so that such a one could be saved? (Saved for exactly what? To do more of the same?)

Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Jesus Christ laid down His life not only for the philanthropist who lives only so that others may be empowered to lead better lives; He laid down His life for the serial rapist, the suicide bomber, for Otto Globocnik, Adolf Eichmann, Heinrich Himmler, Josef Stalin and for Nero.

That is, Jesus placed no premium on the 'worth' (in human perception) of a life. He thought I was precious enough for HIM to die, even if I was a serial rapist or a sadistic paedophile.

Why?

Why would He do that? What could have been gained, for example, if Pol Pot would have been justified and someone died in his place?

Let's look at this from a different point of view. In December 2006, India gave the world something all the serial killers would probably have blushed at. In a lonely bungalow in Noida, a man raped, killed and then cannibalised many young women, over a number of years. Let's suppose I was willing to die so that this man might live. Now the judge said 'you cannot die for this man, you are innocent. Besides, there are others for whom you might possibly have to die who are far more deserving, for whom your dying would be your bounden duty - your immediate family.'

Let's now suppose that this man showed no remorse, and remained unaffected at my offer to die for him. Let's say he was only thinking how many more women he could mutilate, once he was free.

What would I be risking in dying for such a man? The very real danger that he might never change; and due to that, the number of other innocent lives I would be putting at risk, not to mention my immediate family, who need me as a bread-winner if nothing else. Would I risk ALL OF THIS, hoping he may see the error of his ways, swayed by my sacrifice? What would be the odds? Would it, in human perception, be 'worth it'?

Now let's suppose that I risked everything. Willingly, without counting the cost. Let's even suppose I sought this man out specially so I could die for him. Let's go even further to suppose my sacrifice still went in vain. This man walked free, never looked back, and increased his body count.

Would I consider all of this before I actually lay down my life? It's a rhetorical, stupid question. Of course I would! No human being would make that supreme sacrifice for such a man.

The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life - only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.

Sometimes we miss the fact that Jesus had everything to surrender in laying down His life - all of His heavenly Glory. If I was God, would I die for that man in Noida? Would I even care? Would I risk all of heaven for that man?

I think of our carefully considered, cautious, measured, calculated charity. So much for my needs, and so much for yours. Our vigilant, fully alert preponderances over our giving. We even want to check if our giving is indeed paying off.

Jesus never counted that cost - He wasn't thinking of guarantees, assurances, stamp duty, legalities, when He surrendered Himself on the Cross. He did it with no conditions and no guarantee. And He never checks up to see if His sacrifice was 'worth it'.

I also think of our obsessions with careers. What am I going to do with my life? And the answers we want are always in terms of ourselves - our degrees, our accomplishments, our philanthropy, our, our, our. I'm not exactly saying we should risk our careers and lives without counting the cost. I'm just saying that the career and the life of the One who laid down His life for us, was that He should lay down His life unconditionally and with no guarantee. He came into this world prepared to die; we enter the world prepared to live, and prepared to do whatever it takes to preserve our lives. Do we appreciate that that's how we are when we think about our lives? That's all I am saying.

Jesus died - for you, for me, for us all. Whether we knew it or not. Whether we cared or not. Even though we might never ever know. He died no matter how I lived - for others or for myself. He died for me simply because He loved me.

In fact He really doesn't ask anything from me - He doesn't even ask whether I believe Him, whether I consider His sacrifice or not. He only waits for me to think through it......and do what I would have to do, having thought about it.

Maybe I will decide He was a fool to die - He was God, and yet He did it for a worthless person like me. Maybe I will be overcome for the rest of my life when it fully hits me and my life will be irrevocably changed. Maybe I will never ever care and just never think about it.

What do you think?

The Nazarene had come to live the life of every man
And He felt the fascination of the stars
And as He wandered through this weary world
He wondered and He wept
For there were so few who'd listen to His call

He came, He saw, He surrendered all
So that we might be born again
And the fact of His humanity was there for all to see
For He was unlike any other man
And yet so much like me

The Nazarene could hunger
And the Nazarene could cry
And He could laugh with all the fullness of His heart
And those who hardly knew Him
And those who knew Him well
Could feel the contradiction from the start

He came, He saw, He surrendered all
So that we might be born again
And the fact of His humanity was there for all to see
For He was unlike any other man
And yet so much like me

- Michael Card, "The Nazarene"

A safe place

A shadow of a mighty rock within a weary land,
A home within the wilderness, a rest upon the way, 
from the burning of the noontide heat, 
and the burden of the day.
- Elizabeth C Clephane
Indeed, the world we live in is all of those things - a weary land, a wilderness, just a way, the sapping, burning shimmer of noontide heat, a burden every day.
The Cross of Jesus is also indeed all of those things - the shadow of a mighty rock, a home, a rest. The most grisly scene on earth, is still all of those things. It's probably like that, because the Cross of Jesus is the ultimate answer to intimidation, brute power, cosmic violence, unbridled tide of red evil, the hot breath of hatred, and the purposes of the pit of hell itself. Imagine all of these spent over one frail human body. And one human life - mute, resigned, resolute. No talking back, no comebacks, no defense, no rationalising, no duplicity, no making it palatable. Nothing. Just mute resignation.
It amazes me that there were no words from heaven, or from earth, on that fateful day. There was no voice of validation, confirmation, victory or assurance from heaven; there were no words from down here as well. It was mute.
Wordlessness.
That comforts me, because the victory is obtained in silence. In solitude. In loneliness. In one single life fighting alone. No one can really come there with you. Only God can. And in those silent times, God impresses victory. There may never be words. Victory actually needs no words. Neither do joy, or hope, or love, or freedom. Their very power to give life is in wordlessness.
And in wordlessness I come to the cross. It is not the part of me that says things, that comes to the cross. The heart actually is wordless. And it is the heart which comes. And there, what I see shuts out words. Shuts out voices. Shuts out sound. I can imagine what Stephen felt in those last moments. Wordlessness. Soundlessness.
And then, a strange, almost eerie, unreal calm. With a refreshing cool breeze which has the power to soothe and rest. To rejuvenate, refresh, percolate breath and life back into choked veins, and hearts, and minds.
The Cross of Jesus calms me. No earthquake can touch it. Because all the horrors the world can concoct, were met, and neutered, on the Cross. There was no enemy left standing, however loud, however brute, however powerful, however inexorable. No one was left. And this was done wordlessly, soundlessly. In the dead calm of pin-drop silence.
Permanence. Purpose. Resolute resilience. For all time. No marauder or invader would render the Cross a ruin. It can never become just a sign; it will stand for all time no matter who or what came against it. The battle would rage all around it but he who came to its foot would not be molested.
The ultimate, ultimate safe place. The one fortress in this world no one can conquer. Its sanctuary is eternal; its protection irrevocable. No one who enters will ever be taken to his doom by force. The ultimate unstormable citadel.
Come away to the foot of the Cross of Jesus. Let the battle rage around you. Let the heat of the day burn unquenched. Let the burden bear down. None of these will touch you. Because you are in the safest place you will ever find.

"Out of my stony griefs....Bethel I'll raise"

Among all the patriarchs, Jacob intrigues me most.

He seems to have had a strange initiation into faith. Of course, the strangeness was of his own making; he literally (almost) had to be carried across the Jordan and into faith, kicking and screaming for quite a while before the assurance of faith brought peace and contentment.

Still, his story of faith is very instructive and very comforting, because though many of us would disagree, faith is actually one of the hardest things to come into!!

I think Jacob was a silent, introspective, morose man, though he was absolutely practical about life - he found no reason to go after fancy, whimsy and philosophy. If the power to obtain something was in his hand, so be it; if not, he wanted none of it. He seems to have been the kind of man who laid his plans deliberately and with great care, to the point of scheming and out-thinking anyone who came in his way.

And God definitely had to show him, through the experiences of his life, 'you can't double-guess Me! Whether you like it or not, I exist. What's more, I have a plan. I have purposes you cannot fathom. And you will obey Me, no matter how long it takes Me to get you to. The history of the whole world depends on you! And you will do My will.'

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God exists. He has plans and purposes. Did you think you got your life all planned out? You might want to re-think that and hold that thought - God has plans and purposes for you. He also knows how to get you where He can bless you and take His plans forward.

Jacob thought, if I could get hold of what's really important - the rights of the first-born -  I got it made for life. God said, think again. Jacob HAD to re-think what he thought he had all worked out. After gaining the rights of the first-born by subterfuge and deception, he found himself running for his life - and all his resourcefulness would not be of any use this time. Esau was out not just to regain his rights - Esau was out to make sure there would be no question of Jacob's ever regaining ANYTHING - he would ensure Jacob didn't exist anymore. And Jacob fled for his life (Genesis 35:1)

And here, in his hour of darkness and gloom (literally, 'because the sun had set', Genesis 28:11), he had nothing but a price on his head and a stone for a pillow (Genesis 28:11); an uncertain future in a faraway land, far from home and family, a life on the run. And here....in this hour, The Lord finally gathered up the pieces of Jacob's life, in a place Jacob would later lovingly call Bethel, translated 'the house of God'.

At Bethel, The Lord recommissioned him; nothing was said about the sordidness of the past, the deceptions, the lies, theft....only a new day was promised. Holy anointing was given. The prophetic promise given to Jacob at Bethel is still in force today; The Lord's purposes would stand no matter how weak human beings were and how obstinately they withstood Him. Hear this:

"And behold, the Lord stood over and beside him and said, I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father [forefather] and the God of Isaac; I will give to you and to your descendants the land on which you are lying.

And your offspring shall be as [countless as] the dust or sand of the ground, and you shall spread abroad to the west and the east and the north and the south; and by you and your Offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed and bless themselves.
 
And behold, I am with you and will keep (watch over you with care, take notice of) you wherever you may go, and I will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done all of which I have told you."
 - Genesis 28:13-15
 
Jacob now had an unforgettable shot of heavenly medicine, as it were; he was just beginning to understand what it meant to rely not on his own scheming, but on Someone who never had to scheme because He was always in control!
 
But much more than that, there was something Jacob had never thought about in his wildest dreams - an anointing, a swearing-in ceremony - his own (totally against his own inclinations at that point), as the one through whom God would bless the whole world! Acutely aware of his own guilt, this must have come as an inexplicable shock to Jacob - how could the God of the whole world, the God of his fathers, lay aside his scheming and guilt, and what's more, commission him with all the rights of the first-born? And hey!!!!!! IS THIS WHAT I WAS AFTER WHEN I ROBBED ESAU????? Gosh, I could never have dreamed! And now I'm so scared I'm not sure I want this! I had just thought of having it made for life - a little plot of land, a pleasant life, blessing, quietness, peace all round....I certainly didn't think about the whole world!
 
The whole idea seemed to Jacob so outlandish, that the severely practical Jacob immediately came to the rescue. He thought, tremblingly, okay.....never mind the whole world. That's God's business. For now, let me just have God in my life, for all the things I need to do for myself. See what he asked God:
 
'Then Jacob made a vow, saying, If God will be with me and will keep me in this way that I go and will give me food to eat and clothing to wear,
 
So that I may come again to my father's house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God;
 
And this stone which I have set up as a pillar (monument) shall be God's house [a sacred place to me], and of all [the increase of possessions] that You give me I will give the tenth to You.'
 - Genesis 28:20-22
 
This was tentative faith, if ever! God says, I will bless the world through you, and Jacob says back to God, for now, just give me food to eat and clothes to wear, and take me back to my family in peace. THEN, and only THEN, You will be my God.
 
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I love the fact that Jacob STRUGGLED to believe, because it shows me that my own struggles to believe are not at all freak events. At every turn, Jacob's trust in God was for practical things; for things he could see, touch, feel and which existed before his eyes. Isn't that how we all are? It's so hard for us to see past our present struggles at God's big picture and God's Great Big Plan; at the same time, we are incredulous that God just credits our measly faith and looks past our horrendous record of sins. We find this so incredible that we have constant trouble believing it. We go back into the past, digging out new evidence; sometimes, like Jacob, we just give in in exhaustion, saying, God, I don't want anything, just food to eat, clothes to wear and a family.
 
And yet, God creates BETHEL for us.
 
There is a great big picture, a great big plan......our little lives are nowhere NEAR being the kind of amphitheatre God wants them to be, a great big arena where He can do things the world only dreams of. While we are busy cleaning our porch and our inner rooms, He is busy transforming our little hovels into a great big wide mansion where he can triumphantly display what He wants to achieve in us.
 
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Let's take heart from Jacob's "step-by-step" approach to God. At Bethel, all that Jacob would say was, okay.....let me trust just a little bit. I've relied on myself long enough; I don't even know whether I will live to see tomorrow. Let me just trust God, and let Him provide for me.
 
Small as it seems, even this step eludes many of us. But Jacob took it; and he never forgot Bethel. He came back to it whenever he needed assurance all over again.
 
Sometimes all we have may be just a little faith, exhaustion and no strength to see the big picture. Our pillows may turn to stone. Our pasts may haunt us, threatening to cast an evil shadow on an uncertain future.....and may be our sun has set like it did for Jacob at Bethel.
 
Then, THEN, let us sleep the blessed sleep of Jacob......and God will come to us to recommission us, to reassure us, to promise to provide forever our needs....to untangle our pasts. For now, let us just trust for the day-to-day....and He will soon take us to where He can show us what His big picture for us means.
 
Bethel, to you and me, is any place where we come to the end of our own stubborn strength, our own fierce self-independence, and our constant digging in our pasts, looking for evidence to condemn us. Bethel is where trust is born, maybe as a wobbly toddler, on spindly legs, but who will ever grow into full adulthood!  Bethel is where God tells us, do not be afraid. Your future is in My hands, and it is a glorious one. TRUST ME.

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I want to bring into focus, before I close, a wonderful hymn by Sarah F. Adams, which wonderfully puts Jacob's possible thoughts at Bethel into words:

Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee!
E'en though it be a cross that raiseth me;
Still all my song shall be nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee!

Though like the wanderer, the sun gone down,
Darkness be over me, my rest a stone;
Yet in my dreams I'd be nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee!

There let the way appear steps unto heav'n;
All that Thou sendest me in mercy giv'n;
Angels to beckon me nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee!

Then with my waking thoughts bright with Thy praise,
Out of my stony griefs Bethel I'll raise;
So by my woes to be nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee!

Or if on joyful wing, cleaving the sky,
Sun, moon, and stars forgot, upwards I fly,
Still all my song shall be, nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee!
 
The song wonderfully expresses all the deathly darkness of Jacob's condition, his utter physical and emotional exhaustion with his condition, and his inability to even come into the little faith that he needed. I hope and pray that, as many of us that identify with the struggles of Jacob at Bethel, we will take heart, knowing God has not left us destitute, but is fully able and willing to bridge the gap that our little wobbly faith leaves unfilled, and to bring us into the light of His blessed promise for us!

The "great trees of Mamre"

The feeling of "home" is not a simple one.

Where do you feel "at home"?

When we really think about it, it has many levels. It has to do with immediate surroundings. It has also to do with neighbours and neighbourhoods. It is God who certainly keeps us no matter where we live, of course, and there's no denying that. In that sense, it really SHOULDN'T matter where we live.

Of course, most of us don't even have the luxury of thinking about where we'd like to live, on this earth. Where our temporary "home on earth" is or will be isn't something we always get to choose. Often, most of us don't even think about where we live. We just live where we live.

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 "the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground."

"And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country - a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them."

Sometimes life on earth is merely just that - life on mere old earth. The temporal, impermanent, itinerant, transient feel of it permeates everything.  The feeling of it being just a passage into something beyond cannot be shaken.

Abraham had been called out of his ancestral home without much preamble. He actually was a man who lived in tents all his life, never putting down roots. God had actually said to him, "Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you." 

If Abraham had liked, he might have just said, "Oh well, it's all mine anyway. So let me put down roots, build myself something nice, peacefully grow a family, take my ease." It is very instructive that he never ever thought this to himself. He lived in tents all through. He, strangely, felt, even though the land was his, that he was an alien and a stranger on earth, no matter where he lived. He was looking for some place that would never change, some place where he could actually live forever. In fact, when we look inside ourselves, we look for the same qualities in a place we would call "home". And Abraham knew there could never be "home" on earth.

And the writer of Hebrews was absolutely right to say what he said about people like Abraham:

"And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country - a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them."

We spend most of our time here on earth putting down roots. That's because we have closed our eyes to looking beyond earth. Everything about earth screams out to us, "TEMPORAL!!!" But we still refuse to look up beyond the horizon.....to the land beyond. Abraham was a man who lived entirely for the land beyond earth.

I'm not saying we must not build homes and houses, or grow families. I'm just saying it shouldn't be the only thing we do.

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For a time, Abraham did live for a long time in one single place. In fact, he got so attached to it that he even came back and bought land there, to bury his wife Sarah there. The Bible introduces this wonderful place for us for the first time in Genesis 13:18:

"So Abram moved his tents and went to live near the great trees of Mamre at Hebron, where he built an altar to the LORD."

The King James Version calls this place the "plain of Mamre".

Abraham felt at home at this place much more than in any other place he lived in. In Genesis 18, The LORD appeared to Abraham at Mamre as he "sat in the tent door in the heat of the day" (Genesis 18:1); and this was the first time The LORD spoke to him about the birth of Isaac, the son of the Promise.

Mamre, traditionally, was a place between the Bethel and Ai of those days; Abraham did not feel at home with the Canaanites who lived in these cities, and he just wanted to stay apart. Besides, I do feel he wanted a place which afforded gentle shade, with the only trees around for miles and miles in a very hot plain. The trees at Mamre are legendary; there is still a gnarled old oak that the Israelis call "Abraham's oak", very near where Mamre was supposed to have been. The trees were said to be the terebinth and the oak.

The picture of the "great trees" is refreshing when one thinks of the phrase in Genesis 18:1, "the heat of the day". The "cool of the day" refreshing of Genesis 3:8 had now come full circle - the wages of the fall - to "the heat of the day".

Abraham appears to have felt the loneliness and the isolation of being an alien and stranger, both literally and figuratively, in his wanderings. Loneliness and isolation have far deeper moorings in us when we keenly feel the effect of being strangers on earth, where we can call no one friend and no place home. Even while we look ahead to the heavenly city, the weariness of wandering and frugal living, and the terror of not being secure shatter our peace and take away our repose.

For Abraham, on temporal earth, there still was a safe place he could go to, to find refreshing and life-green, where The LORD ministered to him - and this was Mamre.

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I find that throughout our lives (and I can testify in my own case), God provides refreshing little oases on the way. It might be a place, or a person, or even just portions of the Word, sometimes even a song. Whatever it is, it becomes Mamre to us. That's what safe places are meant to do - provide the temporary refuge with all the comforts of being near The LORD, fully able to tap into His infinite resources for our needs. God somehow knows we need these safe places.
 
Let us come aside to our retreat day after day, within the garden where He comes to meet us....or stand at the entrance to the tent, "in the heat of the day", as Abraham did. And our God will come and refresh us.

Have a question? ASK IT!

As Christians, we often accept many Bible stories and Christian truths that are told us, without asking questions. We have Jesus saying (in what is probably a different context) -"I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it." (Mark 10:15) Contrary to what we expect these words of Jesus to imply, children are not necessarily generally unquestioning in their acceptance of things (though they sometimes can be); their questions, if any, usually concern the impact of the said matter upon their immediate daily routines, and information-seeking towards that end.

Even so, when children do have questions, they always seem to think adults know better; which, to me, seems to have been the framework of what Jesus was saying in Mark 10:15 - we ought to trust God, thinking that God knows better (which children generally do when dealing with adults), but within that framework, we are still allowed (even encouraged) in all innocence, like a child, to seek information and enlightenment, and go as far as possible to try probing the matter right down to its roots.

Jesus does seem to immensely enjoy and even encourage the innocent, incorrigible and sometimes insatiable curiosity of a child; indeed, the questioning young mind, is one of His special joys. For children, it is imperative they find out as much as they think affects them; and so their questions, though seemingly inadvertent, are actually far more incisive, intelligent and effective in seeking out a matter. This is what, to me, Jesus seems to encourage in Mark 10:15. If we think that blind, unquestioning, indifferent acceptance of Jesus' teaching is going to help us, Jesus says, THINK AGAIN. Be like a child - at least ask questions to find out in what way this affects you (if not how it affects someone else), trusting all through that God knows better.

But why do we as adults not question things as much as children? It seems to me that in us adults, the questioning mind is stilled forever, for many reasons - one, our sense of wonder at life is diminishes rapidly as we grow and get to know more; life's cares leave us little room for wonder; but probably one of the biggest detriments to the questioning mind is what led Eve to her fatal act - the failure to trust and her suspicions of God. Have you ever wondered why it is easy for children to ask a teacher they trust many questions freely and without any fear? On the contrary, a teacher they do not trust does not get asked many questions. It's the same with us adults - the less we trust, the fewer questions we ask.

One of the other reasons why we fail to ask questions is the mind-controlling nature of information that is repeated to us over time - it kind of works its way into our subconscious minds, a kind of indoctrination, not a liberating life-giving truth. Simply put, we have heard Bible stories and truths for TOO LONG without questioning, so why start now? For children, on the other hand, most things are new, and the truly child-like mind naturally responds with incisive, often brilliant questions.

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In my experience, Bible stories and Christian truths come alive and begin to work their way into our hearts much more when we receive them like children - not entirely unquestioning, but eager to ask, always trusting in God. Till we question, the Bible just sits there - impervious to us and we impervious to it.

This seems to apply universally to all matters biblical and Christian - great and small. Do you want to know if Balaam's donkey really spoke to him? ASK THE QUESTION! What kind of fruit did Eve eat? ASK THE QUESTION! Maybe your concerns are a little more weighty, and you want to know if Jesus meant a literal thousand-year reign on earth in Revelation 20 - even then, ASK!

I'm not saying I get an answer each time I ask; but asking helps me learn every single time - as long as I ask trusting Jesus. Sometimes I get answers; sometimes I just learn more which changes my perspective. It is a stellar way to grow.

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For a long time, I accepted stories and truths without questioning. I never asked WHY the Bible told a story or explained a truth thus. When I did begin asking questions, however, I found that I was able to understand the WHYs of the Christian faith much better; sometimes because of the answers that Jesus furnished so lovingly, but, more thrillingly, because the search for answers incidentally brought so much important, vital information to light about Jesus, about the Bible, about Christianity, that left me enriched, fulfilled and revitalised beyond my wildest dreams. I'd never have known the riches of it all, had I just blindly and unquestioningly accepted everything.

We take a lot of vital, pivotal, life-changing events and truths for granted when we fail to ask questions. It leaves us with a 'faith' that is in many ways not very unlike a dogma, a creed, a 'mantra', so to speak. This kind of a 'faith' is certainly not the faith the Bible talks about, and such a 'faith' certainly has no power over us - it is certainly the kind of 'faith without works' that James exposes in his little New Testament letter.

For instance, take the pivotal, all-important event of history - the Cross of Christ. We seem to take for granted that it needed to happen, and we fail to ask why. It may seem a tedious question; because with the Cross it is always a case of "deeper still" - there are levels within levels and so on. It remains a mystery; but searching it out only leaves us hungering, thirsting and absolutely breathless for more and more of God's unfathomable love. It completely transforms our thinking! But had we never asked why - we are indeed only going to think of it as dead fact - a view that negates any intrinsic benefit of our knowledge of the Cross. If we aren't even willing to ask WHY, we certainly are no better for just knowing ABOUT the Cross.

Some of the questions I did ask, which Jesus answered spectacularly, in ways that left me breathless and stunned out of my wits, expectant for more, are:

• Why did we have to wait 2000 years for the Cross? What did God mean when He said through Paul that the Cross event happened "in the fullness of time"?
• Exactly what kind of an 'experiment' was God's dealing with Israel? And did the New Testament Church supplant God's 'experiment' with Israel? Was (or is) Israel's story now over?

One of the questions I have asked, which has not been answered in full, but I really don't mind as long as I am led to new frontiers of experience with The Lord, is this:

• Why does the Bible not state things plainly? Why are we always told in part and not in entirety?

I am privileged to have to say to us all, we have a God who answers questions! We don't have a God that wants us to just blindly accept things out of fear and servile 'submission'. He wants us to trust and love Him enough to ASK our questions, and He longs to lovingly respond to us. We should not take the view that 'child-like-ness' means unquestioning, blind acceptance. It means insatiable curiosity, lovingly looking into His eyes and asking Him, TELL ME MORE ABOUT YOU!!

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What of those of us who truly believe unlike Thomas, "without seeing"? I am talking about those of us whose implicit faith in our Lord is so paramount, so ingrained, so hallowed, so deep that questioning Him is not something we even think of? In extolling the questioning mind, let me not imply that such unquestioning love, trust and faith are in any way inferior!!!! Far be it.

Such faith usually does not come without the utter abandonment of oneself in never-ending intimacy with The Lord. Questions and answers are indeed too frivolous for such of us - and may The Lord be praised for raising such persons up. Would that we all lived in such intimacy with our Lord - the world would indeed be transformed; and indeed, all through history, such men and women have walked the earth and the world has never forgotten them - they are the sung, and many unsung, heroes of Hebrews 11. This distinguished list also includes all of us who live with a simple faith, such implicit trust and love that questioning is simply out of the question!

Till we truly come to belong to such august company, let us ask our questions, learn, grow, trust and love.

Owning up

I wonder at the ones who, SEEMINGLY, were neither principals in the scene that awful Friday or central to its events. The so-called 'spectators' - people like you and me. I really, really wonder whether it was possible to be there that day only as a spectator.

"And the people stood beholding...." Luke 23:35

"And all the people that came together to that sight, beholding the things which were done, smote their breasts, and returned." - Luke 23:48

"And sitting down they watched him there;" - Matthew 27:36

These days we talk glibly about the ones who more obviously killed the Son of Man. Judas, the chief priests, teachers of the law, elders, Pharisees, the Roman soldiers, Pilate and Herod, and the crowd which preyed upon Jesus' life that day. We somehow draw consolation from not having picked up a cry for His death, at not having hurled insults, at not having picked up any of those nails, that whip. We think, perhaps, that our passivity, in one sense, vindicates us (we agree it is a small and cheap vindication but we clutch at it because the events that day were far too horrible for us to comprehend). That is, we think ourselves better than that list of hatemongers. Our only crime, we suppose, was that we did not speak up for Jesus or try to save Him from them.

But that misses the point entirely and cosmically.

Do you feel free of blame because you never did any of these things to the Son of Man?

• Plotted to kill Him (Matthew 26:4; Mark 14:1, 10-11; Luke 22:2-7; John 11:47-53, 57)
• Betrayed Him (Mark 14:10-11, 44-45, Matthew 26:47-49, Luke 22: 47-48; John 18:5)
• Forsook Him and fled (Mark 14:50, Matthew 26:56)
• Accused Him falsely (Mark 14:55, 15:3, Matthew 26:65-66; Luke 23:2, 5, 10)
• Bore false witness against Him (Mark 14:55-59, Matthew 26:59-62; Luke 22:65)
• Condemned Him guilty of death (Mark 14:64; Matthew 27:1)
• Delivered Him unto Pilate out of pure envy (Matthew 21:18)
• Persuaded others to ask for Barabbas and have Him killed (Matthew 27:20; Mark 15;11; Luke 23:18; John 18:40)
• Cried out, "Crucify Him!" (Mark 15:13 -14; Matthew 27:22; Luke 23:21, 23; John 19:15)
• Cried out to have His blood on "us, and on our children" (Matthew 27:25)
• Hurled insults (Mark 15:29-32, 35; Matthew 27: 39-44, 49; Luke 23:35-39)
• Mocked Him (Mark 14:65, 15:17-20; Matthew 26:67 - 68, 27:28-31; Luke 22:63-64, 23:11; John 19:2-3)
• Spit on Him (Mark 14:65, 15:19; Matthew 26:67, 27:28-31; Luke 22:63-64)
• Slapped Him (Mark 14:65; Matthew 27:28-31; Luke 22:63-64; John 18:22)
• Beat Him on the head (Mark 14:65; Matthew 27:28-31; Luke 22:63-64; John 19:3)
• Had Him flogged (Mark 15:15; Matthew 27:26; John 19:1)
• Sentenced Him to be crucified (Mark 15:15; Matthew 27:26; Luke 23:24; John 19:16)
• Disowned Him after following Him the best three years of your life (Mark 14:66-72; Matthew 26:69-75; Luke 22:55-62; John 18:15-17, 25-27)
• Crucified Him (Mark 15:24; Matthew 27:35; Luke 23:33; John 19:18)
• Divided up His only remaining possessions - His clothes (Mark 15:24; Matthew 27:35, Luke 23:34; John 19:23-24)

Maybe you were "innocent". But now you know what happened on that day. You know who He claimed He was. You saw the things He did. You were told of His love for you.

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On that stark, harsh hill, many stand around. Some confident, jeering. Some keeping watch and just doing one's duty. Some silently and openly weeping. Some filled with rage. Some absolutely broken in spirit and crushed. You assume that you were not there that day, because you think of the historical day.

All through the ages, you have never turned up on that stark hill. Some days you just passed by, a seeming "spectator". Some days you denied. Some days, you ran. Some days you just didn't care. Some days, rare ones, you thought about it for a moment or two. Perhaps for 3 hours on a Friday, sitting warm and ensconced in plush chairs, in church. You filled your mind with irrelevant details of the story. Dozed a bit. Felt a little sorry, some superficial sadness.

Never once did you blame yourself, though. Never once did you stand on that stark hill, of your own accord. Never once did you ...... own up.

That scene on that stark hill always misses ONE of its principals - YOU.

Because every time you push the story away, you are pushing away your one chance to stand with the truth. Every time you ignore it and deny it, you are saying that no one can care for you that much - to die for you. You're shaking your fist at God, saying, You are unfair. You don't care. You have no right to tell me what to do. You have no right to call my bluff.

You actually did not mock, insult, spit, beat, flog, betray, accuse, crucify, condemn or bay for the blood of the Son of Man. But your loyalties are clear - this story is not true, you say. And in so saying, you stand with the ones who said nothing, just stood around watching while the most heinous crime in the universe was committed. Whose side do you think these "spectators" were on that Friday? Have no illusions. They were allied with the hordes from the pit of hell and its king.

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Do you think "being 'good', living well and not harming others" makes up for your silence and complicity in the most heinous crime in this universe? The ONE TIME your vote mattered on the cosmic question of right and wrong, you kept mum and voted, by your silence, on the wrong side. Do you imagine your puny 'goodness' is going to make up for it?

On that hill, that Friday, the only innocent man in the world was executed little by little, publicly, with full murderous intent, in unspeakable and grisly agony, over a period of nine hours. He was murdered, with full intent and purpose, physically, emotionally and in every possible way, because He had the courage to say He cared about us and loved us enough to tell us the truth about ourselves. AND THE WORLD STANDS BY (present tense) WATCHING. Our silence indicts us all; it is our approval of His murder.

Over the years, there are many reactions to the death of the Son of Man; no one I've ever met disagrees that Jesus was entirely innocent. Which makes the hate, the murder, the indifference, even more inexplicable and tragic. The only explanation that rings true is this - His life indicted us, and we did not like it. So, we killed Him.

Come and take your place on that harsh hill like a man; either bear your guilt or stand with the hordes of hell forever. And look into the eyes of the Son of Man, hanging there half-dead, for you.

"Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do."
- Luke 23:34 (first part)