Kyle and I have walked through Colossians 3 with Keegan & Josie for the past two weeks.  It’s the scriptural focus of the message series, Road Trip, they’re watching in LifeKIDS each weekend.  I love the fact that our family is focused on this one chapter in scripture.  The time spent just reading together has been refreshing.

Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience... Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony.  Col 12 & 14

I wish I could say this has been my demeanor the past few weeks.  Yet I’m amazed at how difficult it has been to live this out.  Ministry has been challenging, to put it lightly.  It seems that the simplest of processes in kids ministry aren’t so simple right now.  The level of patience, gentleness, and humility I’ve shown is less than I care to confess.

Why is it when I ask God to increase my patience, gentleness and humility… He likes to show me all the areas where it lacks the most?

Innovation at it’s best. No doubt the next big thing on Matt McKee’s & John Saddington’s technology wish list. Or you could just log onto YouVersion.com. Guess it depends on how much you want to spend.

I’m a ministry ‘rookie’.  Less than 10 years.

And there are certain things I don’t understand about church.

We don’t always like to deal with problems.

As Christ-followers, it seems we expect the challenges of life to wrap themselves up and resolve as quickly as the 30-minute sitcoms we grew up watching.  When someone reveals a problem we fire a combination of scripture hoping to vanquish it like the foe in a video game.  We’re not always comfortable with process when someone deals with life’s twists and turns.

Genesis 32 reveals a story of Jacob wrestling with God.  For years I read that story and figured Jacob got what he deserved.  You wrestle with God and you’ll walk away with a limp!

Don’t wrestle with God!!

I’m rethinking that now.

God blessed Jacob.  Made him the father of nations.  Why is that?  I don’t know.  I have no doubt commentators have written on this for years.  I have no new revelations here.  But today I look at the wrestle differently.

Jacob never let go of God.

He fought to hang on.  It had to be an ugly fight.  Not the pansy, stand-back-and-slap-a-little, kind of fight.  If he was relentless enough that the angel realized he wouldn’t overpower Jacob… I’d say Jacob was fighting to hang on to God no matter the cost.

I think when God is weeding out deeply rooted stuff there is going to be a wrestle and church needs to be a safe place for that wrestle to happen.  What does that mean?

It means messy things like broken marriages, sexual addictions, the loss of a loved one, disease, disability…  some will wrestle with God for years as they learn to give their pain/their sin/their will over to Him.

I think the point of blessing came because Jacob never gave up.  In fact, that was the moment God renamed him Israel (God-wrestler).

i have to stay on top of a bible reading plan or i simply don’t stay in God’s word.  but i’ve found some to be more aggressive than others.  i use to balk at a reading plan that took more than a year.  that’s for wusses.

i’m half-way through a 3-month reading plan.  i love it.  but now that i’m half-way through i’ve got my eyes set on a chronological reading plan that could take me two years.  why?

reading the bible through in 90 days has given me a better glimpse of how things link together.  it’s easier to recall the things that happened in 2 Samuel and how they relate to 1 Kings when there is only a matter of days between the two.

but now that i’ve made those connections, i want a plan that allows me time to really soak it up.  if you don’t have a plan in place, check out this one.

2 Kings 13:20-21

Ever wonder what that would have been like?  I’m not sure if I’d be more freaked out by a group of robbers or a dead guy walking out of a tomb.

1 Kings 14 tells the story of a mom who learns that her son will die the moment she returns home.

What do you suppose that walk was like?

Would I race home in hopes to ‘beat the clock’?  Or would I walk slowly in effort to give him more time?

Interesting that I’m reading through the early chapters of Judges right now. Gideon’s story was on the agenda today. Why is that interesting?

Because we’re a few days away from the biggest attended weekend of the year. Easter.

We’ve got an amazing team of volunteers that serve on a weekly basis in LifeKIDS. But family plans can take them away on a holiday weekend. Though God always provides and everything always works out in the end… there is no lack of ‘nail-biting’ moments.

Reading through Gideon’s story , the thing that stuck out to me was not that God pared down Gideon’s army so dramatically… but how He did it. Now, for those of you that already knew this… bear with me. I’m slow on the take.

First, God tells Gideon to let any of those that were afraid to fight go home. That offer cut Gideon’s army by 22,000 men. That’s significant. But there’s the question I’d never asked before. Why were they afraid to fight? Why would 22,000 men abandon the battle? Man up, right?

It may be that the Israelites didn’t have weapons. All they had were pot shards, torches and trumpets. So, I guess 22,000 men bailing out an a battle against guys with actual swords makes a little more sense.

But, it’s the second pare down process that really intrigued me.

God looks at the 10,000 men remaining and thinks that’s still too many. So, He has Gideon lead the men to a stream where he’s instructed to observe the men that cup their hands to drink the water vs. those that bend down and drink. Why the diff?

I’m curious. If it has anything to do with the Jewish customs that the Israelites adhered to so vehemently, then using your hand to drink water is no sign of godliness. The Israelites were highly concerned about all things that entered their bodies. So, washing hands was a regular part of their daily routine. Not so much b/c they knew anything about germs. But they believed anything entering their body had to be pure. Dirty hands aren’t pure. And any food or drink that touches your dirty hands is not pure. Get the picture?

So, why would God choose the men that used their hands to drink, rather than the more pious men that did not?

God made it clear to Gideon that He wanted to make sure the Israelites did not take credit for the victory God was handing them. Not only would He lead the Israelites to attack an army 10x it’s size with no weapons… but He did it using the less than religious of the bunch. So, the victory clearly could not be attributed to the devout Israelites. The victory could only be ascribed to a miraculous movement of God.

So, that gives me hope for Easter weekend.

Why?

Because the army is small, our weapons are few… and I’m not very pious.

I used to think the Israelites of the Bible were idiots.

I mean… come on! He created a dry passageway through the middle of a sea so you could get across. He dropped food from the sky so you could eat. He led you with a pillar of fire and cloud.

I look at those miracles and think, “How in the world would you not trust a God that does things like that?”.

And then I take a closer look…

How many times has God asked you to do something that seems absurd? Contradictory to common sense?

For the first time, I recognize some of the absurd steps God led the Israelites through when they entered the Promised Land.

1. He immobilized them! God’s first commanded to Joshua when they crossed the Jordan is to circumcise all Israelite men. Given that the greatest task before the Israelites was to conquer Canaan, I doubt that taking your entire fighting force and performing such delicate surgery on them made any sense at all. Yet Joshua did it. Can you imagine how exposed the Israelites felt? I mean, most men I know that have ‘man surgery’ are in no position to wield anything more than the remote for a few days. Much less a sword should someone attack.
2. They threw a party! Though there is much to celebrate, they were still an unwelcome people in a foreign land. Though Canaan belonged to the Israelites, the people living their didn’t necessarily agree. Though the Amorite and Canaanite kings were afraid of the Israelites, that doesn’t mean they were not capable of inflicting some pain if the opportunity arises. Yet God had them celebrate the Passover.

If I were an Israelite, I’d think God was crazy.

Guess I’m an idiot, too.

It’s not unusual for birthdays, Thanksgiving or Christmas celebrations to span a full week. When you factor in the various visits to extended family, immediate family, friends, second cousin-twice-removed… the multiple events easily adds up to a full week of celebration.

I’ve always thought that was a little excessive. When I was a kid, we celebrated my birthday ON my birthday. One time. We celebrated Christmas one time. Thanksgiving… one time.

I worried my kids would be spoiled thinking that their birthday should be a week long event, receiving gifts every other day… birthday cakes, cupcakes, snack cakes, etc.

But reading through Deuteronomy 16, I’m reminded that God knows how to throw a party. In fact, He encourages it!

He commanded the Israelites to celebrate the Passover, the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the Festival of the Harvest, the Festival of Shelters, etc, etc, etc.

And these weren’t one-day events. These were long parties! An entire week, to be exact.

So, I guess our week long birthday celebrations are not so unusual after all.

In fact, they’re biblical.

Sweet.

…in a way I’d never seen it before. Don’t you love when that happens?

Reading through Psalm 1.

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers.

Not so the wicked! They are like chaff that the wind blows away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. For the LORD watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.

I’ve always settled in the first half of the scripture. I love it. I want to be that tree.

But it’s the second half that breaks my heart today. I’ve read it time and again… but now I see it for the first time.

The ‘wicked will not stand in the judgment’ never made sense to me before. Of course they’ll stand in judgment… they’re wicked… and they’ll be judged for that.

But will they?

I mean, there is a judgment they will face, but I don’t think it is the one to which this scripture refers. I think this scripture refers to the judgment followers of Christ will face when we present our life’s work to God.

The ‘wicked’ will not be at that judgment. Jesus will have already looked at them and said, “Depart from me, for I never knew you.”

The terrible thing is when I think of the ‘wicked’, I think of a guy with a twisted mustache, shifty eyes and menacing smile. But that’s not always the physical description. Most of the time, it’s just the guy next door.

The ‘wicked’ is my neighbor that doesn’t know Jesus. My friend that does not claim Jesus as her Lord and Savior. That’s the ‘wicked’. No shifty eyes. No menacing smile. No twisted mustache. Just a person that is lost in a world of false realities.

So, the non-believer that abandons a lucrative career to bring books to 3rd world schools; the agnostic that spends years caring for the marginalized; the atheist that does more to love their neighbor than most professed Christians… they will not present their life’s work before God.

That’s heartbreaking.

Do you interpret this differently? Please discuss.