God Doesn't LIke Shortcuts!

 

                                 God Doesn't Like Shortcuts!

I'm reading Exodus 13 this morning. Moses has won his challenge to Pharaoh, the plagues are over, the first Passover has been celebrated and God Is leading His people home -- to the land He determined to be their homeland and had promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Then in verse 17 we read: God did not lead them through the land of the Philistines, although that was the most direct route from Egypt to the promised land. Instead, God led them along a route through the Red Sea wilderness.

Why not take the short, direct route? For one reason, He didn't feel the people were ready to do battle with the powerful Philistines. But God could have easily solved that issue.

The bigger reason was that He wanted to show His people something very important at the Red Sea. The way He directed them led them to a fearful, no-way-out corner that trapped them between the mountains on one side  and the Red Sea on the other. And they could watch the Egyptian army chasing after them with their chariots and horses, intent on bringing them back to Egypt! Where could they run?

But God had a way out - a miraculous event that changed their history forever!

And they were eye-witnesses!

He told Moses to raise his staff - and the Red Sea parted and let the people safely pass over. And they could even watch the Egyptian army being destroyed!

If they had taken the shorter, direct route, look at what they would have missed!

Obvious lessons in how He could then, and always, care for them in miraculous ways!

Our lives are like that. Often God doesn't lead us the quickest, most direct route to our spiritual destinations because He is showing us His power and teaching us about His ways as we go along........ lessons we need to learn...and that takes, in my case, a lot of time! 

And He doesn't take short cuts for that!

Another Prayer from Daniel

 

                               Another Prayer from Daniel

Another notable prayer in the Book of Daniel is in chapter 9.

He begins, as in the prayer in chapter 2, with a song of praise and adoration: "O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant of love with all those who love Him and obey His commands..."

And then he confesses the great sins of his countrymen..."We have sinned and done wrong. We have been wicked and rebelled,, We have turned away from your commandments and laws. We have not listened to our servants, the prophets."

He doesn't make excuses or blame their circumstances for their faithlessness to their ever-faithful God.

He just admits their sin.

And his conclusion to his prayer?

Maybe the most audacious request in Scripture: "We do not make our request of You because we are righteous, but because of Your great mercy.  Lord, listen; O Lord, forgive; O Lord, do not delay."

Remember the gospel song -- 'Grace that is Greater than all our Sin' --? 

And the contemporary song, 'His Mercy is More' -- "Our sins they are many, but His mercy is more"!

That's what Daniel is counting on! And so am I!

Without His mercy there would be no forgiveness. Without His Grace there would be no hope.

Jesus' Best Day!

Jesus' Resurrection and appearance to His followers removed all doubt that He was truly the Messiah they had long-awaited! He only stayed around 40 days before ascending to His Father, always apparently appearing to believers -- not to Pilate (the governor of Judea who sentenced Jesus) --  not to Herod (the Roman ruler of Palestine) -- not to Emperor Tiberius -- but only to those who already believed in Him.

The period between the Resurrection and the Ascension was just an interlude....

From Philip Yancy's book "The Jesus I Never Knew" --

"If Easter Sunday was the most exciting day of the disciples' lives, for Jesus it was probably the Day of Ascension.

He, the Creator, who had descended so far and given up so much, was now heading home.

Like a soldier returning across the ocean from a long and bloody war... Like an astronaut, shedding his spacesuit to gulp the familiar atmosphere of earth... Home at last!

Jesus' prayer at the Last Supper reveals what He was feeling: 'I have brought You glory on earth by completing the work You gave Me to do. And now, Father, glorify Me in Your presence with the glory I had with You before the world began.'

Before the world began!

Like an old man reminiscing -- no, like an ageless God reminiscing -- Jesus let His mind wonder back to a time  before the Milky Way and Andromeda.

On an earthly night dark with fear and menace, Jesus was making preparation to return home, to assume again the glory He had set aside."

                              His best, most exciting day!

Overlooking Offenses

  

                              Overlooking  Offenses

"A man's wisdom gives him patience. It is his glory to overlook an offense" (Proverbs 19:11).

I read once that the art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.

To overlook someone's offenses allows us to drop our defenses (in my case usually arrogant and self-righteous) and just humbly drop the burden and move on.

And we can choose to do that!

It gives us such luxurious freedom!

Remember 1 Corinthians 13: "(Love) is not easily angered; it keeps no record of wrongs..."

And "love covers a multitude of sins..."

Keep the big picture in mind -- small, petty offenses to us have nothing to do with the big picture! They are meaningless. Overlook them!

Prayer for today: "As You have been to me, loving Father, help me be to others today."

The Thief's Last Choice

Think about the thief on the cross who mocked Christ. Then think about the one who repented. We don't know much about him. He obviously made some bad choices, wrong friends, wrong behavior, listened to the wrong crowd. But was his life a waste? Is he spending eternity suffering for all his bad choices?

Words from Max Lucado....

"No, just the opposite. He is enjoying the fruit of the one good choice he did make. In the end, all his bad choices were redeemed by a solitary good one.

You've made some bad choices in life, haven't you? You look back over your life and say, 'If only...if only I could make up for those bad choices...' 

You can.  One good choice for eternity offsets a thousand bad ones on earth.

The choice is yours.

How can two men see the same Jesus and one choose to mock Him and the other chooses to pray to Him?

I don't know, But they did. And when one prayed Jesus loved him enough to save him. And when the other mocked, Jesus loved him enough to let him. He allowed him the choice.

He does the same for you."

[Sometimes life seems unfair. We are too short, too fat, handicapped in some way, too poor to buy the popular clothes, born into a dysfunctional family...but the same scales of life were forever tipped on the side of fairness when God panted a tree in the Garden of Eden.

All complaints were silenced when Adam and his descendants were given free will, the freedom to make our eternal choice. Whatever injustice might appear in this life, it is offset by our ability to choose our destiny in the next. You wouldn't want it the other way around would you? I mean, if you could pick your hair color, your size, your family, and not get to pick your eternal destiny, wouldn't that be terrible? I like the way God did it!]

From "He Chose the Nails," by Max Lucado.