Blog

Then he told them what they could expect for themselves: “Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat-I am. Don’t run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I’ll show you how. (Luke 9:23 MSG)

Jesus tells us what to expect right up front. This is not a democracy, it’s a theocracy. This is not about comfort, but the Cross. This is not about self, it’s about suffering. This is not about clinging, but trusting His lead and letting go.
I woke up this morning feeling the burden of this week laying heavy upon my shoulders. I felt that I needed to just be quiet before God before jumping into my daily responsibilities. I drove down to Richmond Beach and heard His still small voice instruct me to observe all of the movement around me. The limbs of the trees were swaying in the gentle breeze. The wind was providing quite a ride for the parasailing man below on the sound as the waves rolled in onto the shore. People were jogging and walking on the trails above and below me. A commuter train was chugging along on the tracks that run along the beach park. A few seagulls soared in the sky and I was taking it all in. After observing all of this it was as if the Lord said to my hear, “This is not hard for me. I’m not even breaking a sweat. All of these things are going on all around and you aren’t responsible for any of them, but I am. The things that weigh heavy upon your shoulders are not too heavy for Me. In fact I have asked You to do these things so that we can do them together. After all, I am not your employer first, am Your Father”. This brought so much rest and peace to my soul I was able to enter into my day with a great sense of expectation and humility. The expectation that was up to something great and I was going to do it with Him. The humility that realizes I was never able, nor meant, to do any of this on my own n the first place. Then the test came on whether or not He was truly n the drivers seat or not. As I was studying at Starbucks a women came in who studies here a lot and mentioned she had a headache and didn’t know how much studying she would actually get done today. I had recounted an almost identical scenario yesterday in my Sunday sermon as an example of a time when I was not obedient and didn’t pray for the person on the spot when I knew I was meant to. She then mentioned it again a half hour later and asked me what she should do. Everything in me screamed to just suggest an aspirin, but my Fathers voice was driving me in a different direction. So, I said, “I can pray for you?”. She said, “That would be great.”. So, surprising her, the other folks around the table, and myself I prayed a prayer for her healing in Jesus’ name out loud, on the spot. I’m believing God is touching her even now as she has not left yet as she was planning to do.
Thank You Lord for leading me in this way. You are in control and You are going to show me how to do this life You have called me to!

Those people will cheer at the spectacle, shouting ‘Good riddance!’ and calling for a celebration, for these two prophets pricked the conscience of all the people on earth, made it impossible for them to enjoy their sins. “Then, after three and a half days, the Living Spirit of God will enter them-they’re on their feet!-and all those gloating spectators will be scared to death.” (Revelation 11:10, 11 MSG)

Now, that sounds pretty awful that so many will cheer at the death of the two witnesses in the last days. Why do they cheer? Well, these witnesses were shining a light on their dark behavior and calling the people of the world to account. No one likes that! They were pricking their conscience instead of scratching their itch: “For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.” (2 Tim 4:3). It has always been this way even with the prophets of old: “Speak unto us smooth things; prophesy deceits.” (Isaiah 30:10). The only thing more annoying then an itch you can’t scratch is a problem you don’t want to fix. G.K. Chesterton put it this way: “It isn’t that they can’t see the solution. It’s that they can’t see the problem”. I would add that the reason we can’t see the problem is because we don’t want to look. It’s not hard to ignore the truth, the pricking of our conscience, in this day and age. Every 60 seconds: Apple sells 925 iPhones, redbox rents 1400 movies and 2 million people watch online porn. With so many avenues for instant gratification and information saturation we don’t need to hear anything but that which supports our lifestyle and choices. Just like I can create a music channel on Pandora that only plays the style and type of music I want to hear, so too, truth is customizable, and we have created our own channels of truth. Anyone that comes in and makes us listen to something else we have not chosen will not be welcome. In this light, it’s not hard to understand how people could cheer at the death of the two witnesses. They were simply disconnecting a channel they did not enjoy.
The problem is still there though, even if we don’t want to recognize it. For example, my ABS (Anti-lock Braking System) light in my Jeep Grand Cherokee keeps lighting up on my dashboard intermittently. I know my breaks and pads are good because I just recently had them checked out by a mechanic, but he told me that I had to take it into the dealership in order to address the ABS light. I don’t want to. The dealership is always more expensive. I don’t have any extra cash or time. Besides, if my brakes and pads are fine, what’s the point? Its probably nothing. Then I decided to do a little google search on the ABS light and came across this statement: “If the ABS light is on it is indicating a problem with the ABS system, not the mechanical braking system. Your brakes will still operate but not the ABS. So basically you’d need to go back to the old fashioned way of pumping the brakes. You’ll probably need a new ABS sensor. I wouldn’t drive too long without getting it fixed because you may inadvertantly revert back to your familiarity and just stomp the brakes resulting in them locking up when you expect them to operate as normal”. Then as if that wasn’t enough to motivate me to action this next comment by a different source sent me over the edge: “Get it checked. ABS does not normally get used unless you are braking very heavily. ie == emergencies! So, you probably don’t actually know it’s not working. It’s only your family’s lives at stake……”. Ouch! Consider my conscience pricked! Now, I have been looking at that light for so many months now that I could just choose to ignore these words of wisdom and warning and change the channel. Over these past few months I have driven by the dealership that could help me solve my problem, but did I ever pull in? No. Why? It hasn’t been a major issue. I’ve been getting along just fine while totally ignoring the ABS light. When I actually think through the cost of addressing the problem versus the cost of not addressing it, I become thankful, rather then resentful of that little orange light. It could mean the difference between keeping my boys safe while driving them to school one morning and possibly losing the people most precious to me. So, as this old year passes and this new year approaches I choose to embrace the ABS light. Not only will I not ignore the words of truth around me, I will seek them out. I won’t resent the correction. I won’t live in the assumption of my own “rightness”. It is the path of humility that says, “These lights in my life are telling me something I need to hear even if I don’t want to”. This is the path of Christ.