Longing for Leeks

If you've lived long enough to know someone that grew up in church then you've probably heard it said at one time or another, "If the church doors were open, I was there."

That pretty much sums up my entire life.

I had the great blessing of growing up under parents who diligently served the Lord.  My father is a pastor and preacher, my mother taught Sunday School, sung in the choir, and planted many church ministries. The parsonage was where we slept, the church was where we lived.

I can remember, as a very young child growing up under the shadow of those Eastern Kentucky mountains, on weekdays I would slip unnoticed though the empty halls of the church building into the empty sanctuary.  I would slip in and out of the pews seen only by the occasional rays of sunshine streaming in through the stained glass windows.

On Sundays the sanctuary was bursting with excitement.  Music resounded, baptismal waters splashed, and sermons were preached with such conviction that I have, quite literally, seen grown men run down the aisle and fall prostrate on the altar.  Y

You did not have to be a biblical scholar to recognize the Spirit of the Lord moving.
On Sunday's God spoke.  He spoke in great claps of thunder and tidal waves and whirlwinds.

But on any typical weekday morning the Sanctuary was still.  The business of the church had moved into the offices and the hallways and the Sanctuary was still.  Even as a child I could recognize that the stillness of that room did not mean it was empty.  And while I did not know exactly what I was feeling I knew that what I found in that empty sanctuary was peaceful and beautiful and my heart longed for it.

As I grew, the sanctuaries grew.  No longer was I surrounded by the mountains of Eastern Kentucky but planted in the fertile pasturelands of North Carolina.  The fields were ripe and eager to be harvested.  I wasn't watching ministry from the sidelines anymore, God had called me to ministry of my own.

As the church grew, the noise got louder.  Sermons were preached, not once on Sunday mornings, but three, four, five times.  The piano and organ were now a full orchestra with over 300 people in the choir.  The baptism waters were never quiet.  Sunday school classes ran more in attendance than some churches.  God was choosing to pour out his Spirit and allowing us to have a small part in it.

And I found myself longing more for that empty sanctuary.  I would slip in on a Saturday afternoon and linger until the maintenance guys needed to lock the doors.  I would come early on Sunday afternoon to steal a few quiet moments before the evening service started.

Now I knew what it was that was drawing me there.  It was the same thing that caused Moses to take his eyes off of his flock and gaze into a burning bush.  It was the Spirit of the Lord.   In those holy moments that took place on holy ground I would converse with my Maker.  A creature before her Creator, drinking Living Water, tasting the Bread of Life and seeing that it was good.  Each time I walked out of the sanctuary I would find myself longing for our next meeting in the tabernacle.
But just like Moses learned in Horeb sometimes God asks us to put our shoes back on and take a walk. Though our hearts long to stay before that bush at Horeb God leads us out of Midian,  quick stop off in  Egypt and straight into the wilderness.

Maybe God gently called and you stepped out in faith and followed or maybe Pharaoh called you in by night and said, "Go."  Take your kids, take your flocks, take your friends, just be gone. (loose paraphrase of Genesis 12:31)  Either way you've found yourself in the wilderness far from your tabernacle and you find yourself longing for the leeks of Egypt.

Recently, and quite by accident I found myself back in the sanctuary that I grew up in.  It was quiet, not a creature was stirring.  I awkwardly slipped into a pew and sat in silence.  In the noise of my Exodus I had not allowed myself very many moments of silent reflection and I did not happen upon this moment, in as much as it happened upon me.  As I sat in that sanctuary I did the very thing that caused Lot's wife to turn from a healthy young woman into a dehydrated and bitter preservative--I looked back.

For a moment I remembered.  I looked ahead and saw the altar, not as it was now but how it exists in my memory.  Covered in souls weeping for the lost.  I remembered the baptistry where week in and week out souls were raised to walk in newness of life--not the least of which include my brother, my sister, my sons, and my precious nieces.   I remembered standing at the back of that sanctuary dressed in white looking peeping through the back door anxiously waiting for the organ to play, "Here Comes the Bride."  I remember the day my sons made the decision to walk the aisle and pass from an eternity of death into life with Christ.  The memories started to flood over me like the salty walls of that great Red Sea pouring down on the Egyptian army.

This is a most dangerous practice in your work for the Kingdom of God.  In Christ's work we can move in many directions but never backward.   The Bible is very clear that looking back is a dangerous practice.

After the Children of Israel left Egypt and had been traveling in the wilderness for some time they began to look back.  I want to point out that through plagues and with great miracles they had been delivered from slavery into the wilderness.  While in the wilderness God had given them food, water and protection around the clock.  But after some time they took their eyes off of "their daily bread" and they decided to look back.

Exodus 11:4 tells us that, "the rabble with them began to crave other food, and again the Israelites started wailing and said, "If only we had meat to eat!  We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost--also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic.  But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!"

It has been said that the reason people find it so hard to be happy is that they always see the past better than it was and the present worse than it is.

The Bible tells us that in Egypt the Hebrews were greatly oppressed.  They were slaves to the Egyptians who worked them ruthlessly.  They made their lives bitter with harsh labor.  And now they are sitting around waxing eloquent about how great the food was.

They were beaten.  Their hands were bloody from laying brick, their backs bent from gathering straw, their skin burnt from working the fields.  Their babies were born and thrown into the Nile river and we find them sitting around missing melons and longing for leeks.

It sounds ridiculous but how many times do we find ourselves on the same merry-go-round.  Every day spinning in circles afraid to move forward because we'd rather spend our time wailing about what once was.

You can not hold hands with your past and move forward.  Jesus said in Luke 9:62, "No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God."

Choosing to look back is, in effect, choosing to turn your back on your present.  That creates confusion.
Ecclesiastes 7:10 says, "Do not say, "Why were the former days better than these?"  For you do not inquire wisely concerning these things."

If you keep your eyes focused on the rear-view mirror you quickly lose site of what is in front of you.  In Philipians 3:13 Paul uses the image of a racer to drive home this message when he says,
 ". . .but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead,"

It is encouragement to look ahead and a warning to stop looking back.

Lot's wife stopped and looked back.  It was not a glance back but an intent look, a longing.  And "as she stood there gazing behind her, precious time was irrevocably lost.  The destruction that filled the air and consumed her city swept in and smothered her.  "Salt was crusted round that living core, and she perished, because she wasted in trembling retrospect the flying moments which rightly used, would have set her in safety."  (A. Maclaren)

Don't waste the moments God has given you.  Don't lose today because you are caught up in the storm of what once was.  Turn your back on the past, the what-if's, the what once was-es, the what could have beens.  You are standing at the starting line of the greatest race you will ever run--your life.  Just like the racer, for the child of God there is only one direction:  Relentless forward motion.

Isaiah 43:18-19  "Do not remember the former things, nor consider the things of old.  Behold I will do a new thing,  now it shall spring forth; shall you not know it?  I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert."

Samuel Langnome Clemens, better known by his pen name, Mark Twain,  summed it up so perfectly,

"Man is the only animal that blushes--or needs to."

A blush, a sudden, unexpected reddening of the face in response to embarrassment or shame.  It is an involuntary response caused by the same system in your body that triggers your "fight or flight" response but as far as I can tell it has no protective value.  In fact, it seems to offer only exposure, no protection.

At the beginning of Genesis 2 we find Jehovah , The Creator God, wrist deep in dirt.  Don't be tempted to read this and move on.  Every thing else God created with a word.  The most complex Universe was brought into being by the slightest utterance from the lips of the Almighty, but when it came to making humankind, God chose to get his hands dirty.  

"And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, 

and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life;

and man became a living soul." Genesis 2:7 ERV

Body of clay meets breath of God.

The breath of God that activated the lungs put life into motion.  And God put this newly created man and woman in paradise.  They had it all:  food, fresh water, uninterrupted fellowship with God.  They had everything.  Everything that is, except shame.  

One-hundred and eighty three words, seven verses, and one sin later they felt it.  

"At that moment their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. 

So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves."  Genesis 3:7 (NLT)

Their innocence had been stripped off.  

They had never needed a protective layer of clothing because they were not ashamed.

There was "nothing in them, or on them, or about them, that caused shame; nothing sinful, defective, scandalous or blameworthy; no sin in their nature, no guilt on their consciences, or wickedness in their hands or actions." (Gill's exposition of the Entire Bible) 

And now seven verses later the mortal body goes to war with the immortal soul.  The house is no longer worthy of that which indwells it and shame, and sin, and death enter the picture.  They had an immediate need to duck and cover.  They covered their nakedness.  Not because they were embarrassed by cellulite, love handles, or imperfect bodies but because they now were vulnerable.  They were no longer protected from heat and cold.  Now every rock, every blade of grass was a threat to their dying flesh.  They sought protection because now they were exposed.  Exposed to the elements, exposed to each other, exposed to God.  

And for the first time in history the "fight or flight" response kicked in.  There was no outside threat to fight against, and there was no where to run and hide, so their bodies did what their bodies were created to do:  they blushed.  And all of creation saw their shame.  

These are the things nightmares are made of.  Standing naked in front of your class, cheeks glowing as red as a stoplight.  What a relief it is to wake up and find that it was only a dream.  

But what about the dreams you can't wake up from?  The moments of humiliation that occur in real time.  What does God do in the moments of our shame?  When we are caught red handed taking the fruit from the serpent.  When our fig leaves are coming apart at the seams?  Where does God stand when we are exposed before our accusers?  He doesn't!  God doesn't stand for it at all!  In fact, He stoops.

Fast forward from Genesis to the Gospel of John, from the Garden of Eden to the City of David.  In the Garden it was Adam and Eve, crouched among the vegetation,  foolishly fancying that the bushes and trees could hide their sin from the eyes of God, yet keenly aware of their mortality and the well earned wages of their sin:  death.

In the temple court it is a nameless woman,  probably naked (the Bible says she was "caught in adultery, in the very act." John 8:4 NKJV) with noway to run and nowhere to hide.   The flesh-hungry vultures are circling, stones in hand.  The same flesh that she satisfied in the night was, in the light of the morning, her condemnation.  And death stood by awaiting his prize.

In that moment, this woman stood, quite literally between death, and LIFE.  The time for repentance was behind her.  The time for judgement was upon her.  And her next breath, her next heartbeat all hinged on this lowly Carpenter from Nazareth.

And once again, we find God with His hands in the dirt.  Elohim, God our Creator, stooped low to the Earth on the sixth day of creation.  Holy hands mingled with dusty Earth and brought forth life.  Flesh and Spirit, Heaven and Earth,  put together in the image of God.  Man, formed from dust and raised to life to bring honor and glory to God.

As Jesus knelt between that adulteress and the pious religious leaders with His hands in the dirt did He remember the unblemished image of that first man?  Did He think back to the beauty of innocence when our souls were satisfied in Him?  As His finger wrote in the sand did He look back through history and remember when his finger blazed the covenant law into the stone?  The same laws that the religious leaders were using to condemn this woman were inscribed by not by an angel, or some instrument or creature, but by the heart and the hand of God, the "man" stooping in the sand before them.  

Oh, how we have defaced His image.  Oh, how we have broken our covenant with Him.  We wallow in sin and think we can mask its stench with fig leaves.  Like Eve, in the garden, the serpent has convinced us that God is withholding something from us.  He has convinced us that God created the appetite of sin in us therefore, we should satisfy it.  And while the fruit tastes sweet in the mouth it is a parasite that will destroy the very fiber of our soul.

Like the adulteress woman you stand in the midst of your accusers, clothed in shame, starving, destitute, death drawing near.  The crowd is relentless in its condemnation.  Where does Christ stand in the midst of it?

He is bent low to the Earth.  In that moment did his mind go back to the times that He had bent low?  Did He remember the time He bent low enough to sleep in a manger, or work in a carpentry shop, or sail on a fishing boat?  Did He think of times He bent low enough to dine with thieves or touch a leper?  Did He look into the future and think of how low He would have to bend to spend a night shivering in a prison cell?  To be slapped, to be spat upon, and nailed to a cross?  Did He think of how low His body would have to bend to lay in a grave?

If we are ever able to stand blameless before God it is only because He was willing to stoop.  If we are ever able to be clean it is because God was willing to get His hands dirty.

When you think you are at your lowest, look down.  See the Carpenter bent low with His hands in the dirt.  And though you may be tempted to look away--keep your eyes on Him.  Because He's getting ready to stand up.  . .

"Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, 

Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, 

Christ on my right, Christ on my left, 

Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down, 

Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me, 

Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me, 

Christ in the eye that sees me, 

Christ in ear that hears me.

I arise today

Through the mighty strength

Of the Lord of creation."  (St. Patrick ca.  337)

Holiness: The Covering, The Call, and The Cost

Part One:  The Covering

It was a perfect autumn day.  The kind of day that just begs a boy to engage himself in all things mischievous.  With the armor of childhood surrounding him, and mom sufficiently occupied inside the house, my eldest son slipped into the backyard with a pocketknife hidden in his pocket.  He searched until he had found the perfect dull stick and he settled on a large rock under the sugar maple tree.  He had a plan.  He was going to whittle that dull stick into a very sharp stick.  His plans were top secret because he had been told many times not to play with the pocket knife, but warnings of danger only made his plan more enticing.  In his nine year old mind nothing could go wrong.  And as he started to shave the bark off of that old stick it seemed like his plan was yielding great results.  The tender white flesh of the stick was barely visible when a slip of his hand drove the blade of that knife deep into his index finger.  The knife, being new, was sharp and the incision precise so the pain did not come all at once.  Instead, the pain, like the blood, welled up from beneath the surface.  Seconds passed like hours until every blood vessel, every nerve ending began to sound the alert.  The pain was mixed with fear.  He was not supposed to be playing with that knife and he knew that he had been disobedient.  Somewhere in his third grade mind he reasoned that if he could just stop the bleeding he could hide the injury, and therefore, hide the crime.  He reached down to the only covering that nature offered and covered his wound with a handful of freshly fallen, golden, sugar maple leaves.  It may have worked temporarily but soon the leaves crumpled under the weight of his affliction and he realized he could not handle this on his own.

And such is the state of the human condition. Ever since Eve lopped off that first fig leaf and tied the branch around her waste, mankind has been trying to cover his sin.

We cleverly try to disguise the sinful deeds that have left us stained and scarred.
We wrap our iniquity in a robe of innocence.
We hide our sin behind a swathe of saintliness.
We cover our blemish with a mask of blessedness and to God's nostrils its like trying to cover the stench of week-old garbage with a spray of cheap cologne.

If the fig leaves of paradise were not sufficient to cover the shame of sin why do we think our efforts will stop the bleeding?  The covering is not just inept, to God it is insulting.

Isaiah 64:6 says, "All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away." (NIV)

We've replaced "clean-ups" with "cover-ups."  And, in doing so, we have allowed sin to infect every act of righteousness.  Our prayers and our praises are all spoiled with the putrid smell of sin.  We are shoving dirt and debris into an open wound and instead of stopping the bleeding we are exposing every fiber of our being to the filth of this world.  

That which you think protects you has imprisoned you.    

Your camouflage is now your confinement.  

This disguise has become your dungeon.  

The sin that you think you have so carefully controlled, now controls you.  

It is in the wilderness that we meet her.  An Egyptian slave-girl, pregnant and driven away as a misguided attempt by Abraham and Sarah to cover their faith failure. (Genesis 16:1-4)  She stands, back against the wall,  beside a spring, on the Road to Shur hoping to cross the wilderness and return to Egypt.  The road is a caravan route through the desert.  It is arid and rocky, inhabited only by wolves, thieves, and every other countless, nameless beasts of prey.  

Even with its unforetold dangers there was some safety in the wilderness.  She was far from the whispers and humiliation of those who knew her affliction.  

Nevertheless, she was at the last stop on a dead end road.  Going backward would cost her her freedom.  Going forward would cost her her life.  Standing on the bridge between a painful past and an ill-fated future she must have lingered a little longer than necessary at that spring taking it all in:  one last drink, one last second of surety, one last dream of deliverance.  And in that hopeless, helpless, silence, He whispers her name.  

Her name is Hagar but that isn't so important.  Her name could have just as easily been your name, my name, or any other unremarkable name.  

His message was simple, "I  see you.  I know you.  Turn around.  I will redeem you."  

And then this lowly servant girl who has never had a say in the events of her own life speaks words that will ring into eternity.  This nobody, from nowhere, that had for the most part been invisible in the scriptures up until this point, stands in the spot light and introduces us to El Roi, The God who continually sees me.  

To the world she was a means to an end.  She was disposable. She was so insignificant that no one even noticed she had run away.  But God had never taken His eyes off of her.  He had seen her every step and her every misstep.  It was not enough for His eyes just to watch her.  He made a point to let her know that He was near.  It is a message that speaks life into every wandering, dying soul,  "You are the God who sees me," for she said, "I have now seen the One who sees me."  (Genesis 16:13 NIV)

If not for her lonesome journey, we might never know the sweet secret that can only be found in the wilderness.  It is here that we learn there is no place, even the deepest, darkest, farthest-off-the-map spot in the badland, that is beyond the sight of God.

Gods eyes are continually on you.  He is not preoccupied in another room.  He is not weary of watching you.  His delight is in you and His eyes are on you.

"Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands."  Deuteronomy 8:2

Sometimes God allows things, people, situations in our lives that drive us to reveal what is in our heart. Not for His sake, He knows what is in your heart, but for your sake, to break down the barricades. 

God's eyes see beneath the manufactured coverings.  So you can put them away.  Recognize that you can not stop the bleeding.  You can't clean yourself up.  

God sees you now.  

He sees your future.  

He sees your past.  

He even saw you before you were knit together in your mother's womb.  

He saw you before the foundation of the world was laid. 

Your sin, and your pitiful attempts to cover them up have not caught Him off guard.

God has seen the darkest moments of your life.  But instead of going all "Sodom and Gemorrah" on you He is calling out your name.
"I can clean that wound if you'll let me."
With the piercing eyes of El Roi and the callused hands of a carpenter He begins the process of tearing down the walls and rebuilding your life.
"This might sting a little,"  he says as He removes the dirt and debris, "but only a little.  'Behold, I am making all things new.'"  Oh, the joy that is waiting on the other side of the wilderness.

Close your eyes.
Listen.
Linger here a little bit longer.
Listen.

I think I hear Him calling. . .

. . .calling your name.

The Call of the Wild--Part 2

Admat Kodesh

There is a legend among the Yiddish Hasidic Jews that at any time there are 36 righteous people living on Earth.  They are called the Lamed Vav Tzadikim (36 Righteous Ones) or Tzadikim Nistarim (the hidden righteous ones).  Legend has it that were it not for them, all of them, if even one were missing, the world would come to an end.  Tradition holds that their identities are unknown, even to themselves.

Yiddish folklore tells the story of a community that was in deep trouble.

"They were shrinking, they were impoverished, they couldn't get along. No one would step up to leadership and if they did they would be destroyed by those who criticized them. Clearly it was a community heading downhill.

This little town had some self awareness about their predicament so they invited a famous rabbi to come and speak with them. However after meeting with them, the rabbi did not have a solution, not to their shrinking population, not to their poverty, not to their dysfunctional communal structure. When he left the people were even more discouraged than before.  

Just as he was about to go, someone heard him say, that one of the 36 righteous, one of the lamedvavniks upon which the world depends, lived in this little town. Word began to spread and slowly things began to change. Instead of treating each other roughly, people became a little bit more courteous - after all you wouldn't want to be rude to a lamedvavnik. They began to listen to each other, they were more willing to give each other the benefit of the doubt- after all the motivations of a lamedvavnik would certainly be kindly. Slowly the town got cleaned up, people began supporting each other, the economy improved, and other people passing through found it a pleasant community and decided to settle there. Looking back the people wondered, the rabbi had done nothing and yet accomplished a great deal. 

All these changes because of an efshar, a hint to remember-that every spot on earth is holy ground."  Rabbi Jack Riemer

What would change if you lived your life remembering that every spot on earth has the potential to be holy ground?

Would we drive differently if our car was Holy Ground?  

Would we work differently if our office was Holy Ground?  

Would you speak to your children differently if their messy bedrooms were Holy Ground?  

Would you watch the same things on TV, or "google" the same things, if your family room were Holy Ground?  

What is Holy Ground?  

Holy Ground, or Admat Kodesh, is the place where the voice of God is heard. 

Holy Ground is the the place where the Spirit of God dwells.  

Whether it be the most ornate cathedral in Europe or the lowliest stable in Bethlehem, when the Spirit of God decides to rest there, it is Holy Ground.  The mundane physical space is transformed into a sacred sanctuary.  

The years of Moses' life are divided into forties.  He was forty years a prince in the Pharaoh's court.  He was forty years a shepherd in the wilderness, and forty years leading the sons of Israel to through the wilderness to the Promised Land.  Moses was born to be the deliverer of Israel yet not a word is said to him of it until he is eighty years old.  God did not appear to him when he was a prince in Pharaoh's court, where he had political and familial influence.  God appeared to him when he had absolutely nothing left to offer.  What a sharp contrast between Moses in the courts of Egypt surrounded by all the splendor of royalty, and Moses the humble hireling shepherd, leading his flocks over the rough places of the desert. (Notes Critical and Practical on the Book of Exodus by George Bush)

Holiness in the humdrum, Elohim stepping into the everyday, the Almighty choosing to reveal Himself in the average.  Seeing Christ in the commonplace, or Messiah in the monotonous, that's like seeing a king in a shepherd boy, or our Chosen Deliverer in a Nazarene Carpenter.

Exodus 3 could not paint Moses as any more ordinary.   

He was an ordinary man, with an ordinary job, making his ordinary commute, when he sees an ordinary thorn bush, consumed with a common brush fire.  

But in an instant, one eternal instant, Moses took his eyes off of the surrounding wilderness and fixed his gaze upon the sacred.  And God calls out to Moses:  

Shal Naalechah me'al raglecha, ki hamakom asher atah omed, admat kodesh hu. 

Take off your shoes from your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.

In the time it took Moses to "turn aside" his wilderness became a sanctuary and the ground under Moses' feet became HOLY ground.  A common bush, common grains of sand, common blades of grass became an altar because the pure and holy presence of God dwelt among them.  

How interesting that this first reference to consecrated ground in the Bible isn't in Jerusalem, or even the land of Israel.  It isn't in the temple courts or the Holy of Holies.  It is in the wilderness of Midian.  

I have seen worship in the wilderness.  I have seen patients lift their hands in praise while confined to a hospital bed.  I have seen parents who've lost children testify to God's goodness.  I've seen ministries develop from the most unfortunate circumstances.  I've heard the testimony of my mom, while battling cancer, laying on a radiation table singing: 

"Here I am to worship.

Here I am to bow down.

Here I am to say that You're my God."

Worship in the Wilderness.  

Praise from a prison cell.

When God spoke to Moses from the burning bush he actually said, "Ki hamakom asher atah omed, admat kodesh hu."   The place upon which you are standing, that is the exact situation in which you find yourself, is a holy place.  

The hospital room, the funeral home, the unemployment line, that empty house--these are all holy places.  Not because you are content with the circumstances.  But because God is there.  God has not only come into the wilderness, God defeated the wilderness.  Worshiping in the wilderness is the first step on your journey to the Promised Land.

Take off your shoes and pray

The ground you walk it's holy ground

Every spot on earth I trapse around

Every spot I walk it's holy ground

Every spot it's holy ground

Every little inch it's holy ground

Every grain of dirt it's holy ground

Every spot I walk it's holy ground

(Woody Guthrie, Holy Ground)

The Call of the Wild (Part 1)

"The Cop and the Anthem" is a story written in 1904 by United States author O. Henry.  In the story there is only one character given the name Soapy.  Although it is never said, it is clear that Soapy is homeless in New York City.  The short story is set in the late fall with a hint of frost in the air when Soapy's mind turns to the necessity of finding shelter for the winter.  He comes to the conclusion that the local jail is a suitable homeless shelter.  

As the plot unfolds we find Soapy committing a litany of petty crimes to be classified a criminal and sentenced to jail.  

Soapy's strategy includes ordering meals and not paying for them, vandalism, pretending to be publicly intoxicated, stealing a man's umbrella, and harassing a young woman.  

However, all these attempts prove to be failures.  

Night is falling and Soapy is still homeless with no hope of going to jail and he finds himself standing by a small church with a working organ and a practicing organist.  As Soapy listens to the anthem he remembers the man he once was and resolves to no longer be homeless.  He decides that the next day he will seek out a potential mentor and apply for honest employment.  

As Soapy stands there on the street corner basking in his new vision a policeman taps him on the shoulder and asks what he is doing.  When Soapy says, "Nothing" his fate is sealed.  He is arrested for loitering, convicted of a misdemeanor, and sentenced to three month in Riker's Island, New York City's jail.  

Do you ever feel like Soapy?  

You live your life committing petty sins that seem to be overlooked and just when you finally decide to turn it all around and act righteously, judgement falls.  

That must have been how Moses felt on the streets of Egypt.  For forty years he had stood idly by as the Hebrews were forced into slavery.  For forty years he had done nothing as they were being beaten and abused.  Then one day, one fateful day, he decides to act.  

He walks up on a scene where a Hebrew slave is being beaten by an Egyptian task-master.  It is in that moment that he decides to act on behalf of the son's of Israel.

Moses has been set apart from the moment of his birth.  He was spared from the Pharaoh's death sentence, he was raised by a princess, he was educated and trained in the highest Egyptian schools. 

"And Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was mighty in his words and deeds. Acts 7:22"

It has been said  "that, of the ten portions of wisdom which came into the world, the Egyptians had nine, and that all the inhabitants of the earth had only the remaining portion."  Moses was taught arithmetic, geometry, poetry, music, medicine, and the knowledge of hieroglyphics.  He was also mighty in speech. This means he had a command of language and flow of words.  He could speak properly and pertinently on any subject.   He was also mighty in deeds.  He was a man of great abilities in business, politics or in the field.

Moses was clothed in the robes of a King but had the heart of a Hebrew.  God called Moses to deliver his brothers from the bondage of slavery.  Moses has watched their suffering from afar for forty years. 

If ever there was a deliverer for Israel this was it.  Forty years of training with the best instructors Egypt had to offer had prepared him to deliver his brethren.  And this was the time to act.  

“When he was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brothers, the children of Israel. 

 And seeing one of them being wronged, he defended the oppressed man and avenged him by striking down the Egyptian."  Acts 7:23-24

Moses--the self appointed deliverer of the Hebrew nation.  He boldly killed an Egyptian and then what?  What did he expect?  That the multitudes would recognize him as their deliverer and take up arms against their captures and win their freedom?  The answer is YES!  That is what the Bible tells us he expected. . .or some version of that.  

"He supposed that his brothers would understand that God was giving them salvation by his hand, but they did not understand."  Acts 7:25

It would not happen the way Moses had planned because deliverance would not come by the hand of man but from the hand of God.  Not only was Israel not ready to leave their bondage, but Moses was not ready to lead them into the wilderness.  

Also, it is important to note that freedom never comes through sin.  The sin that you think will lead to freedom will only lead to more bondage.  The sin that Moses committed to free the Hebrews from Egypt only reduced the population of Egypt by two:  the murdered task master, and Moses who was forced to run into the wilderness to save his own life.

Moses was gone.  The legends of his miraculous birth, the stories of his preservation by the hand of Pharaoh's daughter, his impeccable education in the king's courts, his promise to deliver his people.  Here today, gone tomorrow, blown away like the Egyptian desert sands.

And the bondage continues, not for a day, or four days, or forty days, but for forty years.

God will send a deliverer, but be forewarned, while you may be inclined to look for freedom in the tall, dark, handsome, well educated, well spoken, Prince of Egypt who is slaying your captors your deliverance may come from a stuttering, shuffling, eighty year old sheep herder, standing bare foot staring into a burning bush.

If you are in a place of bondage take comfort in the fact that God hears your cries.  His eyes have never been taken off of you.  God will use this time as a part of your training.  He is preparing your heart and your mind for the task for which you will be called.  

"Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain."  1 Corinthians 15:58

Our Sin--God's Silence (Part 2)

God's Silence

Part 2

Exodus 1-2

In 1988 Christopher Ochoa was a 22-year old manager at a Pizza Hut in Austin, Texas.  In the summer of '88 this high school honor student and editor of his high school literary magazine faced a life full of hope and possibility.  Little did he know that by the end of that summer, the LIFE he was forced to face would be one of condemnation.  

One morning, as Chris Ochoa slept in, Nancy DePriest was raped and murdered in the wake of an early morning robbery at a neighboring Pizza Hut.  Because there was no forced entry police assumed the assailant had to have a master key and warned employees to be on high alert for anyone acting suspicious.  

Christopher Ochoa and Richard Danziger were roommates at the time.   They were observed by a Pizza Hut waitress eating and drinking beer in what she surmised to be a toast to the victim.   The two quickly became the main suspects in the murder.  

Chris was picked up for questioning.  

"Although there was no evidence linking him to the crime, police told him they knew he was guilty. They said his best friend, Richard Danzinger, was ready to implicate him. They said he would be put into a cell where he would be “fresh meat” for other inmates. They yelled, pounded the table, and threw a chair at him. They told him he would receive the death penalty unless he confessed. They showed him photographs of death row. They tapped him on the arm to show him where the needle would be inserted."  (Rob Warden, Center of Wrongful Convictions)

After 24-hours of interrogation Ochoa felt he was doomed in any event.  He had a choice, DEATH or LIFE.  And although it seemed hopeless, he chose the later.  

To avoid the death penalty he signed a confession contrived by the police and agreed to testify against his best friend Richard Danzinger, who clung to his assertion of innocence.  Both men were convicted and sentenced to LIFE in prison.  

""They placed me in a cell by myself and the doors clanged," Ochoa said. "I was so, so alone in the world … sometimes I still have nightmares about that night."

That was his first night in prison, in 1988." (ABC News)

Silence

Is there any sound more deafening than silence?  If you don't think so ask the mother whose baby didn't cry in the moments after birth.  Ask the wife whose husband has gone missing in action.  We equate noise with life.  As long as we're speaking and listening then life is normal.  It is in those moments of unexplained silence that our heart drops into our feet and we feel something is dreadfully wrong. 

When we open the book of Exodus there is a lot of noise.  

We hear the sounds of the sons of Israel filling the land.

We hear the sounds of the trumpet blasts as a new king takes the throne. 

We hear the sounds of whips and chains.  Hammers and plows.  

We hear midwives pleading with Pharaoh.  

We hear mothers shrieking, fathers weeping, soldiers screaming, babies crying and the waters of the Nile splashing. . . 

And then the worst sound of all.  .  .Silence.

At the end of Exodus chapter one it would seem that Pharaoh has spoken and God is silent.  

What a contrast.  

In Genesis 1 we see the power of God's word.  In Exodus 1 we see the power of God's silence. 

In Genesis 1 we see God speak into the darkness and create light.  In Exodus 1 we see God remain silent and darkness reigns.  

In Genesis 1 we see God speak into the waters and they "teem with life."  In Exodus 1 we see God remain silent and the waters of the nile reek with death.  

When the noise stops, when the prison door slams, the coffin is shut, the machine is turned off, the job is over, and all you are left with is silence - it appears God has turned His attention elsewhere and left you to muddle through life on your own.  

But don't miss the supernatural in the stillness.

Chris Ochoa had served eight years on his life sentence when a convict named Achim Josef Marino sent letters to Texas officials stating that two innocent men were in prison for the DePriest murder, which Marino proclaimed he alone had committed.  Letters were sent to police, the District Attorney, and then Governor, George W. Bush.  The letters described details about the crime scene that had not been in the public report.  The case was reopened and forensics experts were able to obtain and test the same DNA sample from the original trial. The DNA results proved the innocence of Ochoa and his roommate and identified the correct perpetrator. They were both exonerated in 2002. 

As Chris Ochoa sat in the silence of his prison cell for 11 1/2 years he could not have known that letters were being written.  As he endured the beatings and humiliation of his incarceration he could not have known that the eyes of law enforcement were upon him.  As he sat in captivity he could not have known that a governor's pen was being used to open a new investigation.  As the walls of hopelessness were closing in around him he did not know that the technology of DNA would soon set him free.  

It is the same in the first chapters of Exodus, while God may be silent, He is not still. 

He is moving.  

In their captivity it is possible that no one noticed a baby boy being born. As they endured the beatings and hardship of their labor they did not notice his mother picking up reeds and weaving together a basket.  As the walls of hopelessness were closing in around them they did not see a new mother setting her three month old baby boy afloat in the Nile River (interestingly enough following the decree of Pharaoh to throw her baby boy in the Nile.)  And no one proclaimed victory when the enemy's daughter drew that baby out of the Nile and had compassion on him.  

These are not the amazing miracles that would solidify the Exodus from Egypt.  They were simply ordinary, nameless people, moved by an extraordinary God to set in motion the gears that would liberate an entire country.  

Sometimes God's mouth is shut, but His eyes never are.  

Exodus 2:25 (ESV) "God saw the people of Israel--and God knew."

"His eyes are now fixed upon Israel, to show himself in their behalf. God is ever thus, a very present help in trouble. Take courage then, ye who, conscious of guilt and thraldom, are looking to Him for deliverance. God in Christ Jesus is also looking upon you."  Matthew Henry's Commentary

Has God trusted you with His silence?  Are you sitting in a prison cell, staring at the walls, doing time for a crime that you didn't commit?  Or maybe one that you did?  You are waiting for that shaking of the Earth that will cause the prison walls to fall down.  Maybe, just maybe, God is working behind the scenes to deliver you.  Sometimes he works through a persistent mother, a watchful sister, or your enemy's daughter.  

". . .regardless of how bleak the present/future might be, God is able to pull a reversal and bring salvation out of despair, life out of a tomb. Yet it began, not with great deeds and awesome wonders, but with ordinary people."  (The Voice, Steve Rodeheaver.)

I'm reminded of a song by Babbie Mason that was popular when I was younger:  

God is too wise to be mistaken

God is too good to be unkind

So when you don't understand

When you don't see His plan

When you can't trace His hand 

Trust His heart

Trust His heart.  He is already working on your behalf.  Trust His heart.

Our Sin-God's Silence (part 1)

Part 1

OUR SIN

I have a dog whose name is Zeus.  Despite his big name he is roughly 12 inches tall, 12 inches long, and at the time of this writing 12 years old.   Zeus is a Jack Russell Terrier.  A Jack Russell is a very tenacious breed of dog.  If he sees something he wants he is going to get it and not much can stop him.  Whether it is sock, a toy, or the neighbors cat, if he wants it, he's going to find a way to get it.

He's bred that way!

Jack Russells are bred for hunting and only a dog that is willing to chase, dig, and never give up can make a good hunter.  In fact, we were told that if a Jack Russell chases a rabbit and traps it inside it's burrow the Jack Russell will pursue the rabbit into that burrow for days, without food or water, until the Jack Russell perishes.

The Cajun and I bought Zeus the year we got married.  For the last 12 years we have battled his nature.  Zeus has proven to be quite the Houdini, able to escape every fence and boundary placed around him.  We provide him with a warm, loving home, plenty of food and fresh water.  But despite our efforts we have never been able to overcome his nature to yield to temptation.

One night we came home to find that Zeus was gone.  He had gotten out of the fence and was nowhere in sight.  We searched the neighborhood and called his name into the night.  The next morning a neighbor knocked on our front door.  When I opened the door I hardly recognized the mangled wad of fur in her arms.  It was Zeus.  He was soaking wet, bloody, clumps of fur were missing, and if he had not been shaking profusely I would have thought he was dead.

On her morning walk our neighbor had heard a commotion coming from a house that was under construction.  When she went inside she saw Zeus.  It seems that the night before Zeus had set his sights on a stray cat wandering through our yard.  One bad choice led to another and before he knew it Zeus had left the safety of his home and had given chase to that cat.  He chased the cat into an unfinished home where a battle ensued.

His salvation came when my neighbor was willing to put herself in the middle of that battle.  She stood between Zeus and his temptress, taking a few scratches from an angry cat, she scooped a battle weary dog into her arms and brought him to the one who could clean him up.

As I looked at this mangled creature I had to ask, did he ever think he had the upper hand.  The cat was fighting for survival.  Why was he fighting?  Because of his nature.  The cat was trapped by a dog but what kept Zeus trapped in that house?  His nature.  He was willing to give up his home, his family, his safety, even his life if it was required of him to satisfy his nature.
 
Isn't that just like sin?
 
We see something with our eyes, we desire it in our hearts, we pursue it with our minds, then we serve it with our bodies willing to forsake all to satisfy our nature.
You've heard the saying, "every liar is a thief and every thief a murderer."  Sin is not self contained, each sin does not exist in a vacuum.
That harmless flirtation, that little "white" lie, taking a few dollars that don't belong to you.  These innocuous acts tie your hands and guide your feet.  You are walking down a destructive path with a lie here and a lust there until you realize you have become so entangled that you are nothing more than a marionette being manipulated by your sin.
 
You have become a slave to that which you thought you owned.
Why are we talking about this?

Because the journey into the wilderness started with slavery (Exodus 1).  The land of Egypt had once been a salvation to the Hebrew nation but it had become a house of bondage.

Exodus 1:11 "So the Egyptians made the Israelites their slaves. They appointed brutal slave drivers over them, hoping to wear them down with crushing labor. They forced them to build the cities of Pithom and Rameses as supply centers for the king."  

John Wesley says, "They not only made them serve, which was sufficient for Pharaoh's profit, but they made them serve with rigour, so that their lives became bitter to them; intending hereby to break their spirits, and to rob them of every thing in them that was generous: to ruin their health, and shorten their days, and so diminish their numbers: to discourage them from marrying, since their children would be born to slavery; and to oblige them to desert the Hebrews, and incorporate with the Egyptians."

The Israelites were in complete bondage.  They had no hope of a better life.  They were slaves to the Egyptians.  Before God lead them into the wilderness He had to break the chain that bound them.
I think in order to appreciate your freedom you have to recognize your bondage.

Christ says in John 8:34, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin."  

But God would not leave the Israelites in their bondage.  Even in Chapter 1 He is waging a war on behalf of His children and the first weapon wielded in that war was a baby's cry.  A baby in a straw basket would win the heart and move the hand of a princess, and the man that would come forth would deliver a nation and fulfill a covenant. 

In the same way a baby, laying in the straw of a feeding trough cried into the darkness.  That cry was nothing less than a declaration of war upon hell itself.  The Son of God coming into our wilderness, standing between us and sin that traps us.  He takes the beating meant for us as He scoops us up into His arms and carries us to the foot of the throne of God.  

Run from sin!

Run to Jesus!

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.  Hebrews 12:1