A Good Lasting Impression

Yesterday a concrete footpath was poured by contractors near our house, and I was left shaking my head when I went to inspect the work.  Someone decided they would be the first to walk on the finished concrete before it was dry and left permanent impressions of their footsteps.  I wondered if the person who walked on the concrete realised it was still wet, and intentionally marring the finish was a twisted way to have fun.  Possibly the person was clueless about the concrete underfoot because of enjoyment of a funny podcast, an engaging conversation or the shock of hearing bad news.  As long as that concrete remains, the wandering footprints will always provoke questions about what that person was thinking--or if he or she was thinking at all.

I noticed other, more predictable markings on the fresh concrete:  names scrawled in the surface with the date.  I suspect these are the names of the neighbourhood kids who were hanging around the area after the work was finished.  There is no doubt in my mind those names were etched intentionally, for no one writes letters and numbers in the corner of wet concrete accidentally.  As I surveyed the labour of pouring the footpath outside my door, there are three distinct groups that made their own distinct impressions:  the workers who finished the concrete, the aimless wanderer, and the graffiti artists.  Intentionally or not, all these people made a permanent impression on the concrete that will last the lifetime of the concrete.

This observation led me to consider the impact the lives of human beings can have on one another, whether at work, play or just walking along.  Our brains indiscriminately remember things people said or did that impacted us.  We may have had one conversation with people or we might have not ever learned their names, but they managed to impact our life in some way.  Think of the fantastic and sobering opportunity God has given everyone to make a permanent impression on others for good, to make a lasting, positive mark on others as we live to glorify Jesus Christ.  Showing kindness, being generous, and continuing to love others as we pass through this life is a great blessing God has granted to His children.  At the same time, it is confronting the damage we can do without even knowing it.  We have passed by others with a carefree spring in our step and didn't realise we wounded them, and we would regret our actions if we only knew.

I don't want to have an "Oh well!" attitude about accidently trampling the hard work of others, caring only about what I'm doing or going.  I want my words and actions to be a stamp of grace and love that guides others to know Jesus Christ as Saviour.  Jesus is the enduring legacy of every Christian, and our lives are an opportunity for Him to make a positive, lasting impact on others.  It is a small thing for me to be famous or be remembered well, but how great it is that through our brief, obscure lives that the name of Jesus should be known and proclaimed.  We have a message of love and salvation that will outlive our lives on earth, and may the LORD Jesus use us to make a good lasting impression on others for His glory as we are passing through.

Thanks and Praise

"I thank You and praise You, O God of my fathers; You have given me wisdom and might, and have now made known to me what we asked of You, for You have made known to us the king's demand."

Daniel 2:23

Daniel and his fellow wise men were in dire need of divine revelation concerning king Nebuchadnezzar's dream, for their lives were on the line.  He and his Hebrew brethren sought God on the matter, and the LORD was merciful to reveal Nebuchadnezzar's dream and the interpretation to Daniel in a vision.  It is no wonder Daniel thanked and praised God for giving Him wisdom about the king's secret and thus spared his life and others who served king Nebuchadnezzar.  God's people ought always to thank and praise Him for answered prayer, yet genuine faith shines brighter when we experience pain, suffering, loss and still praise and bless our good God.

When the children of Israel languished in a time of war and trouble, Jeremiah recognised it was only by the mercy of the good God of Israel He preserved them at all.  God had caused grief and loss, yet God had compassion on them according to the riches of His mercy.  We see this same God fearing outlook in Job after he suffered the loss of his wealth and the death of his 10 children in a day.  Job 1:21-22 tells us,  "And he said: "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return there. The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD." ²² In all this Job did not sin nor charge God with wrong."  Faith in God does not mean we avoid trials and troubles in this world:  it is the means God has provided for us to endure and experience joy, peace and rest in Him.

The prophet Isaiah spoke of the Messiah as a Man of sorrows, acquainted with grief.  From the moment sin entered the world, humankind has experienced grief and sorrow beyond human comprehension:  people God created in His own image were cut off from God and drowned in grief without knowledge of Him, the remedy for their ills, forgiveness of sin, or the sure hope of heaven in His presence.  We cannot fathom such grief and pain that the all-powerful, all-knowing and all-loving God should see His creation struggle and die whilst rejecting Him.  The death of a loved one deeply impacts a relatively small circle of family and friends who heard of a tragic passing, yet God knows intimately the full depth of everyone's suffering like He personally experienced Himself.

God is so awesome and good His suffering Servant Jesus offers fullness of peace and joy, for while He is a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief He has not been overcome by them:  Jesus accomplished the ultimate victory over sin, death and sorrow by His death and resurrection He freely gives to all who trust in Him.  Born-again believers in the midst of pain can praise God from the heart, and this praise that springs from faith in Him is precious in His sight.  It is one thing to praise God when He has answered your prayer in the way you wanted, but genuine faith delights to praise our good God when He has remained silent or said "No."  In our troubles may we never charge God with wrong, for He remains good and glorious regardless how we feel.  In Him we have a living hope, and our future is bright with joy and peace.  With Daniel we can thank and praise God for giving us Jesus (Who is wisdom for us) and might made perfect in our weakness.

Called, Chosen and Faithful

"These will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings; and those who are with Him are called, chosen, and faithful."

Revelation 17:14

Jesus is described as one day returning to earth with His saints in judgment over Satan, the antichrist and the world.  God's people, born again by faith in Jesus and given eternal life by Him, are "called, chosen and faithful."  It is good for us to realise this is not some sort of divine fate at work, but everyone who follows Jesus faithfully has been called and chosen by Him.  We love Him because He first loved us.

Judas Iscariot gives us great insight into this matter, for he was called by Jesus to follow Him.  Of the many disciples Jesus had, Judas was chosen to be one of His 12 apostles Jesus sent out.  We know Judas had responsibilities among the apostles to responsibly handle the money of the group, yet sadly he was a thief.  He was called and chosen but not faithful to Jesus, for he bargained with the chief priests to betray Jesus into their hand when he had opportunity for 30 pieces of silver.  His hypocrisy was shown in the Garden of Gethsemane by identifying Jesus with a kiss of greeting.

Judas teaches us that being called and chosen does not guarantee we will choose to be numbered among God's faithful servants.  He later regretted and lamented Jesus being arrested and sentenced to death, yet he did not sorrow in a godly manner that leads to repentance:  he sorrowed as the world does which leads to death (2 Cor. 7:9-11).  Judas died a violent death at his own hand, choosing to murder himself rather than humble himself in contrite repentance before God.  He was called and chosen, but he was not faithful.  Jesus said because of his sinful, unrepentant choices, it would be better for him to never have been born (Matt. 26:24, Mark 14:21).

The Strong's Concordance defines the Greek word translated "faithful" as "faithful, reliable, believing."  Genuine faith in God is practically expressed and demonstrated by obedience to God.  Jesus told His followers that if they loved Him they would do as He said.  This fits perfectly with loving God with all our heart, all our soul and all our mind.  Jesus is God made flesh, and having been called and chosen we are to be faithful.  1 John 5:11-13 says, "And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. ¹² He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. ¹³ These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God."

By believing in Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God, we have life because He is our life.  Christians can know we are called and chosen because we are faithful to believe in Him and continue to do so.  We have the assurance of salvation and future judgment by the resurrection of Jesus.  Our confidence is not in ourselves or efforts to obey, but because of Who Jesus is and the new life He has provided through the Gospel.  Confidence in our calling and election is misplaced when God requires us to be faithful by His grace.

Still Blaming or Broken?

"So it was that the ark remained in Kirjath Jearim a long time; it was there twenty years. And all the house of Israel lamented after the LORD."

1 Samuel 7:2

After the Ark of the Covenant was taken by the Philistines to their country, it remained there for seven months.  Whilst the Ark was passed from city to city, God plagued the Philistines with great destruction.  The situation became so dire the Philistines decided the only remedy was to return the Ark to Israel with a trespass offering, and the five lords of the Philistines each providing a golden image of a rat that plagued the land and their tumours that caused them to suffer greatly.

The Israelites were harvesting wheat in Beth Shemesh when they saw the Ark of God on a new wooden cart amble into their land.  The people rejoiced exceedingly the Ark had been returned to them, and they promptly used the cart for firewood and sacrificed the oxen to the LORD as a burnt offering.  However, the joyous celebration ended in sorrow, for tens of thousands of men of Beth Shemesh died before the LORD when they transgressed by looking into the Ark contrary to the Law of Moses.  They wondered, "Who can stand before this great God?" They sent a message to the people of Kirjath Jearim and asked them to retrieve the Ark--which they did.  A man named Eleazar was sanctified as a caretaker of the Ark, and it remained in the home of his father Abinadab for 20 years.

While the Ark remained in Kirjath Jearim, all Israel lamented after the LORD for decades.  The prophet Samuel provided a path to restoration before God in 1 Samuel 7:3-4:  "Then Samuel spoke to all the house of Israel, saying, "If you return to the LORD with all your hearts, then put away the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths from among you, and prepare your hearts for the LORD, and serve Him only; and He will deliver you from the hand of the Philistines." ⁴ So the children of Israel put away the Baals and the Ashtoreths, and served the LORD only."  Brothers and sisters, recognise this:  grief, lamentation and sorrow over decades provided no penance for the people.  Their humiliation at the hand of their enemies or God was no substitute for humbling themselves before Him.  Regret was not repentance.  Samuel urged the people to return to the LORD by destroying their idols and preparing their hearts to seek and serve the LORD only.  The promise of deliverance from the Philistines God gave would be fulfilled in short order later in the chapter when God thundered against the Philistines who drew near to attack His people.

The Bible does not record the conversations the people of Israel had together over those 20 years of lamentation after the LORD, but I strongly suspect there was blame for their situation being thrown around without addressing their own idolatry.  There were likely people who blamed Hophni and Phinehas for bringing the Ark of the Covenant to the battle, and other blamed Eli who allowed them to continue "serving" in the priesthood.  Some blamed the Philistines for their brutality and oppression, and others blamed the men of Beth Shemesh for their own demise by looking into the Ark.  In a land and world full of sinners, there was plenty of blame to go around.  As long as they continued to blame others or even themselves without repentance, it revealed they were not yet broken for their sin.  It was after they accepted the blame for their own sin and repented of it they were restored to fellowship with God.  The Philistines remained idolatrous; the corrupt within Israel remained as corrupt as ever.  However, there was a sure hope of salvation for those who lamented after the LORD and prepared their hearts to seek and serve Him.

Today this pattern remains true as ever for God's people.  When we hear of tragedies and problems in the world, one of our first reactions can be to cast blame at the feet of a person, a political party, organisation or nation.  Lately the news has been inundated with reports of a "failed" referendum in Australia, a full-fledged war in Israel, a murder at a school in Sydney, and a mass shooting in the United States--and this only scratches the surface of the pain and suffering that overwhelms us.  Hear this:  as long as we are blaming we are not yet broken, and that is the place God desires to bring us to even if it takes decades!  In light of this, consider the value of brokenness before the LORD as it is written in Psalm 34:18:  "The LORD is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves such as have a contrite spirit."  Psalm 51:16-17 also says:  "For You do not desire sacrifice, or else I would give it; You do not delight in burnt offering. ¹⁷ The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart--these, O God, You will not despise."  Rather than lashing out at others for their wrongs, let us be crushed and broken before the LORD, repent of our sin, prepare our hearts before the LORD and serve Him only.