No-Step Boogie

And he said, The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground.  He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how.  The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear.  But when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.  – Mark 4:26-29

Last night I was reading in MOTT about the Tower of Destruction and the difference between growing and building.  When you build a house, you have an idea of what you want.  You take it, perhaps, to an architect who creates a blueprint.  You hire a builder who then raises the structure according to the plan.  The blueprint tells the plumber where to run his lines, the electrician where to put switches and outlets.  It tells you which way the doors should swing.  Everything is laid out.  It’s a system – as Bob has been talking about recently.

By contrast, to grow something, we put a seed in the ground.  And we wait.  If it isn’t raining much – not a problem around here so far this year, we can water, but there’s not much else that depends on our planning or intervention.  We can rest.  We don’t really know how growth takes place.  We can certainly cut things down too soon, but if we are patient, the harvest will come regardless of our designs and maneuvers.  Or it will not. 

I suppose we could argue that there is a design built into the seed, in the DNA, that is similar to our blueprint, but a living thing does not develop solely on the basis of its genetic inheritance.  In fact there is reason to think that environmental stresses and stimuli can, in effect, throw switches that turn on or turn off certain characteristics present on the gene. 

Thus another difference in growth as opposed to building is that growth includes adaptation.  The nature of the harvest is dependent, of course, on the seed sown, but also on the conditions.  The same grapes grown in a period of hot, dry weather will have a different flavor than those in a wetter, cooler season.  The fertility of the soil and the minerals present or absent cause adjustments in development and maturation. 

God does have a plan for us, for each of us. 

And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up [that is, "the perfecting of"] the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ … speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ,  from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love (Ephesians 4:11-16).

In general, ultimately, we know where we are all headed.  But how that happens -- especially on an individual basis, the processes involved, the time it takes, the conditions that cause this growth, we do not know.  We can nurture and be watchful at times, just as we pull weeds from our garden and water during extended dry spells, but the end, the harvest to which God aims is something largely beyond our control.   

It is God Himself who watches, who touches here and stirs there, who send the right message and the right messenger at just the right moment, who frightens when we need to alerted, saddens when we need to weep, delights when we need to laugh, and soothes when we need to be reassured.  

My brother and sister barleycorn, it is not just the field for which our Lord cares, but each stalk where it stands.  In this we rest and trust. 

 

Keeping the Hornets Out Front

And I sent the hornet before you, which drove them out before you, the two kings of the Amorites; it was not by your sword or by your bow.  I gave you a land on which you had not labored and cities that you had not built, and you dwell in them. You eat the fruit of vineyards and olive orchards that you did not plant. -- Joshua 24:12-13

(I'm trying to get back to every-week-day posting.  I'm not sure how it will go because I'm adjusting back to a regular work schedule, trying to figure out where I might be needed and where I can help out.  Anyway...)

This is one of those statements that you read and think is a little odd.  Hornets.  I think Mel Gibson stole this for a scene in Apocalypto.  Checking Strong's and some dictionaries, it's a stinging insect, tsir`ah, like our good old hornet, which, especially in hot weather, may prove dangerous, debilitating, or deadly to a person attacked by a swarm.  If you've ever literally "stirred up a hornets' nest" -- as I have, there is no fight; it's flight.  You can see the poetic side.  No one can stand if pursued by hornets, and no enemy could stand against God's army.

The root word from which this is derived, tsara`, means "to scourge" and spoke figuratively of being stricken with leprosy.  Thus those inhabitants of Canaan who had defiled the land by their abominations and evil were driven out by Israel as with a whip in God's hand.  I think immediately of how Jesus plaited a whip and violently drove the money-changers from the temple.  They, too, fled as though hornets were after them. 

When things are going well for me, I am apt to do what Joshua warned against.  I may start thinking that I have achieved and accomplished quite a bit.  A lot of us have worked hard, made sacrifices, delayed gratification, made good decisions, etc.  We have a measure, perhaps, of economic security because of our own efforts.   The Bible does not denigrate that.  The slothful are condemned.  Paul says that one who doesn't work hadn't ought to eat.  We need to do our part while remaining humble and grateful for God's grace, His guiding hand, His protection, and His gifts to us. 

What's true in the natural is even more vital in the spiritual.  What spiritual territory we hold, what we have gained and whatever progress we have made is that much more a function of God's gracious provision for us.  Here Christ gives us His righteousness and abundant life.  We are not the ones who lived a sinless life and conquered death; nonetheless, we are offered a share in His victory and the benefits of His labor. 

As an aside, something I think I picked up from MOTT has to do with getting the devil on our side.  Israel was supposed to clear Canaan of all its previous inhabitants.  They mistakenly made a covenant of mutual protection with Gibeonites who had deceived Israel into thinking they were not residents of the Promised Land.  When the deception was known, the Gibeonites were made "hewers of wood and drawerers of water" for the benefit of the children of Israel.  Some other tribes were subdued but not entirely eradicated, and these, too, were put into forced labor for their conquerors. 

If we can overcome our adversary and stand strong and unbending against temptation, that tempter must then serve us.  It's not that we want demons following us around or heralding us like the poor girl with a "spirit of divination" in Acts 16:16-18.  We must also be careful that we are not betrayed by it at a later time.  Saul of Tarsus was that early Church's greatest adversary and persecutor.  When he was overcome by Christ, Paul became a critical part of the foundation upon which the Church has been built.  A more secular example, and one I believe UF uses, is how Germany was defeated in WWI but not overcome until the end of WWII.  Germany and Japan were overcome and became active allies of those they had sought to destroy. 

We can either be "subject to" our temptations and weaknesses if we give in to them, or we may put them in subjection to us if we resist them fully.  All the things that trouble us now, if we will stand, will serve us.

Much better to have the hornets after the other guy.

Praying Always

Do not drag me off with the wicked, with the workers of evil, who speak peace with their neighbors while evil is in their hearts.  Give to them according to their work and according to the evil of their deeds; give to them according to the work of their hands; render them their due reward. – Psalm 28:3-4

What we do is heard by God as much or more than what we say.  As you may recall, Tomberg talks about the various forms of prayer, one of which is true work, which he defines as work done with one hundred percent effort.  Work may be intellectual in pursuit of truth, reflecting the phrase of the Lord’s Prayer which says, Hallowed by thy name, or creative, reflecting, Thy kingdom come, or yet our effort to provide for the supply of material needs as in, Give us this day our daily bread.  God bestows a benediction in keeping with the nature of this form of prayer.

Just so when the wicked pray by means of their wicked works, God pays them in their coin of choice.  God does not pay every Friday because He is loving and merciful and long-suffering, but when He does pay, it is in full.  For the wrongdoer will be paid back for the wrong he has done, and there is no partiality, as Paul says.

While we’re in Colossians 3, we might as well think about why full effort makes all our work spiritual.  It is because we are acknowledging the One for whom we are really working.  Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.  Our full effort presses us beyond our physical, mental and emotional limitations.  Like suffering, our exertion forces us to rely upon the spiritual component of our being and draws Christ more intimately into our lives.  Work, when done with the right perspective, is communion and identification with the Lord.  We can obey the admonition to pray without ceasing as we give ourselves wholly to God in whatever it is that we do.