During December, when speaking at a church service in Scotland, I contrasted the way that two Bible characters asked God the question, "How?"
In Luke chapter one, an old man named Zechariah and a young girl named Mary both received a visit from an angel, who gave them a message about a baby boy to be born. In both cases, such a birth seemed impossible - in Zechariah's case because his wife was too old to have children, and in Mary's case because she was a virgin who had never been with a man. In response, both seemed to ask the angel the same question, but a closer look at the Greek text reveals a subtle and important difference. Zechariah's, "How can this be?" was the how of unbelief, while Mary's, "How will this be?" was the how of willing partnership.
This week, in the Old Testament book of Genesis, I read a story that seems surprisingly similar. In Genesis 15, God speaks to an old man called Abraham and promises him a great reward. Abraham must have understood the reward to mean material blessings, because he replies sadly that he has no son and heir, so will have to leave all his earthly possessions to one of his servants. God then announces a miracle: You will have a son of your own, and your descendants will be as many as the stars in the sky. Abraham and his wife were already advanced in years and had never been able to have children, so their situation is very similar to Zechariah's in the New Testament. Verse 6 tells us that Abraham believed what God said, no matter how impossible it sounded, and so God considered him to be a righteous man.
But then something interesting happens. God asks Abraham to look around him at the land of Canaan, and tells him, not for the first time, that he and his descendants are going to take possession of it. And this is where Abraham raises the how question: "Oh Sovereign Lord, how can I know that I will take possession of it?" Did it seem more impossible to overcome heathen tribes and occupy a whole country than it did to have a biological chid in your old age? The Hebrew word for "know" is the verb yada: Abraham was asking, how can I know for certain, know in my own experience, that I'll inherit this land? Was his question the how of unbelief like Zechariah or was it the how of willing partnership, like Mary?
It seems that this time it was the good kind of how. God wasn't the least bit offended by his question, and went on to give Abraham further clarification: by the end of the prophetic word, Abraham knows that he won't inherit the land in his own lifetime, but that his descendants will take possession of Canaan more than four hundred years later. The promise now has a time frame attached to it, and Abraham feels no compulsion to try to make it happen.
But the first part of the promise didn't have such a clear time frame attached, and this opened the way for one of the most tragic mistakes in world history. Read on in the post below for more about the test of God's timing.
I've often felt that Genesis chapter sixteen recounts some of the saddest and most devastating events in the Bible. Abraham and Sarah had received a promise from God: even though they were old in years, they were going to have a miracle baby who would be their son and heir. I don't know how much time passed between chapter fifteen and chapter sixteen, but it was possibly a number of years, as Abraham had already been living in Canaan for a whole decade by then. Perhaps the old couple were beginning to feel that time was running out, and so they decided to take matters into their own hands. They did something that might seem shocking to us today, but was actually very common in the time and culture that they lived in. Abraham slept with his wife's servant, an Egyptian woman, so that she could be the surrogate mother for the son that God had promised them. How tragic it is when we know the will of God for our lives, but we try to make it happen in our own way and our own timing. Many thousands of years later, when we look at Israel and the Middle East, we realise that our world is still seeing the consequences of Abraham's decision to father Ishmael, instead of waiting for the miracle child that God had promised.
When we pick up the story again in Genesis chapter 17, thirteen long years have passed and Ishmael is already a young teenager. Abraham himself is 99 years old when God comes to him to renew the promise and tell him that his wife Sarah is going to bear a son. Abraham seems shocked. Had he known throughout those thirteen years that Ishmael was not the son God had promised? Or was he believing that his choice to "give God a helping hand" had somehow worked out, despite the many tensions it had caused within his household?
Back in chapter fifteen, we read that Abraham believed God when he heard the promise of a son. But now, some fourteen to twenty years later, Abraham's reaction is quite different: he laughs in disbelief, only too aware that he is nearly a century old, and his wife Sarah is ninety. Was he incredulous because of how he had previously messed up with the whole Hagar and Ishmael situation? Or was it simply the test of time, and he found it hard to believe because he had already waited many years to see this particular promise fulfilled?
How well do you, or I, do with the test of time? Does our faith waver and die when a promise isn't fulfilled as quickly as we thought it might be? Are we tempted to try to make things happen in our own strength? Or are we willing to trust in God's timing, as well as trusting that He is able to fulfil every detail of His word to us?
Perhaps kingdoms were a lot smaller in those times than they are today, but the first two verses of Genesis chapter 14 certainly make it sound as if this was a major conflict. Four kings on one side faced up against five kings on the other side. The victors carried off loads of plunder, as well as many captives, and so it happened that Abraham's nephew Lot, together with his family and possessions, were taken away by the army that had invaded Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham mobilises several hundred men and, if you've read the rest of the story, you'll know that he sets out in pursuit of the invading army and is able to bring Lot, his household and his possessions safely back home again.
I wonder if you've ever had anything stolen from you, and whether you put in much effort to get that item back again. Sometimes we might just count our losses when material possessions are taken from us - like when burglars break into our home and take away a TV set. But there's a different kind of urgency if a family member has been kidnapped; we become desperate to get them back and know no rest until that precious individual is safely back with us again.
As believers, we can sometimes be a bit passive when the enemy is robbing us of peace, joy or answers to prayer. We often allow him to get away with it, instead of making a focused effort to take back the things that God says are rightfully ours. But are we equally passive when he's holding some of our precious family members in his grasp? Or will we, like Abraham, pursue the enemy to get back our family members and see them brought into the Kingdom? Let's be people of prayer this year, and be willing to do warfare for any loved ones that the enemy is still holding captive.
Read on, in the post below, for further thoughts on this subject.
An anonymous hero in this whole episode of multi-kingdom conflict is the man known only as "one of Lot's men" in Genesis 14 verse 13. Not only did this man manage to escape from the enemy army, but then, instead of simply running away and saving his own skin, he made his way to where Abraham lived, so that a rescue could be mounted. Perhaps the reason he was willing to get involved in the battle again was because his wife and children were among those who were still held captive by the enemy troops.
This attitude of this heroic, unnamed man made me think again about our attitude as believers towards our unsaved family and friends. As people who have already escaped from the clutches of the enemy, will we simply focus now on our own wellbeing, or will we do whatever it takes to rescue those who are still held prisoner by the enemy.
More of an anti-hero in the whole account is Bera, the king of Sodom. Knowing all that we read later about Sodom, it's hard for me to imagine that this man was a particularly good king. Yet look what happens in verse 21 of Genesis 14. The king of Sodom comes to Abraham and offers to let him keep absolutely everything - all the spoils of war that have been recovered from the enemy. "Just give me back my people, and you can keep all the goods for yourself," he says. Even this wicked king had understood the simple principle that, people are more important than things, and that we should be reluctant to lose them or let them go.
If our friends and family are precious to us, how willing are we to fight for them, as Abraham was willing to do, or pay a price for them, as the King of Sodom was willing to do? what price are we willing to pay to rescue our loved ones from the enemy's hands in 2016?
One of the things that always stands out to me in Genesis chapter 13 is Abraham’s generous spirit towards his nephew, Lot. For reasons external to themselves, the time had come for the two men and their groups of workers to part ways. As they looked out at the expanse of land before them, Abraham generously and sacrificially gave Lot first choice.
I don’t know if Lot chose the “best land,” but we’re told in vs 10 - 11 that Lot chose the well watered, fertile plains of the Jordan valley. Did Lot already know at that time of making this choice that the people of that area, in the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, were known for their sin and wickedness? If so, it’s a warning to all of us that sometimes our choices for material prosperity can put us in a place where our souls and spirits are in jeopardy. But perhaps neither Lot nor Abraham knew this at the time.
In allowing Lot to have first choice, Abraham seemlngly lost the best territory, but look what happened immediately afterwards. God spoke to him and basically said, “You can have it all.: God told him to look as far as the eye could see and told Abraham that he was giving him all of the land as an inheritance - even the part that would temporarily belong to Lot, although Abraham didn’t know or understand that yet.
When we choose to be unselfish, when we willingly place our destiny in God’s hands, it’s amazing to see how He can take our sacrifice and turn it into abundance.
When choosing my journals for this year, I decided on two notebooks with the same design of passport stamps. It seemed an appropriate motif for this year when I'll be away from home more than usual. It's not that I'm travelling more often than normal; in fact I'll probably be doing fewer ministry trips, but I'll be staying longer in each destination when I get there.
After a bit of drama this week, when an airline website seemed to be taking my card payment but not confirming my flight, I finally managed to finalise my tickets for my first trip, which will be in March this year. 2016 is the fortieth anniversary of King's Kids International, and so we're holding our KKI international leadership team meetings this year in Kona, Hawaii, the location where the ministry first began, 40 years ago. In order to get the best airfares, I decided to fly out at the end of February, which will allow me to have a couple of days' break before our meetings start at the beginning of March.
My next trip after that, and my longest trip this year, will be to West Africa during July and August. That will be for a two month period, embracing a KKI leadership workshop, our Planting Together outreaches, and an international leadership assembly of staff and leaders from around the world. I'll probably end up spending six weeks in the Ivory Coast and two weeks in Senegal. I'm encouraged that I've been able to find several different house sitters who'll come from Scotland to have a holiday and look after my cats while I'm away.
Meanwhile, back in my passport-stamped journal, my plan this year is to read the Bible book by book and character by character. So far, I've reached Genesis chapter 14, and I've considered insights from the lives of Adam, Eve, Noah, Abraham and Lot. Watch this space over the coming months for further reflections on lessons learned from the lives of different Bible characters.
We had fun this morning, and prizes galore, with the children's talk at church. For the second week running, willing volunteers tried their luck with "las doce uvas" - the Spanish tradition of eating twelve grapes, one for each chime of midnight as the new year begins. Allegedly this will bring you good luck and prosperity in the new year.
Also for the second week running, we considered the fact that living our lives successfully in the new year doesn't depend on twelve grapes, but is more closely linked to understanding ten commands. I was impressed to hear how well the children had remembered the five commandments that they learned last Sunday, and they did a great job of learning the remaining five commandments today.
