Today’s Scripture Reading (November
18, 2015): Deuteronomy 32
A story is told that at the opening of Disney World in Florida, someone commented to Lillian Disney, Walt Disney’s widow, that she must have wished the Walt could
have seen this pinnacle of his imagination. According to the story, Lillian
Disney smiled and remarked that “Walt has seen it, and that is why it exists.” If
it was not for the dream of Walt Disney, so much of what we take for granted of
our childhoods would be missing. Walt Disney was renowned for his imagination
and vision, and all of the things that he could see that didn’t exist – at
least not yet.
There are a
number of people that have blest our generation with amazing feats of vision
for things that didn’t exist. Alongside Walt Disney stand many others – like
George Lucas (Star Wars) and Gene Roddenberry (Star Trek). They all had the
ability to see what didn’t yet exist – and because they saw it, we had the
privilege see what it was that they saw.
God hands
Moses his sentence. The People of Israel are about to enter into the Promised
Land, but Moses won’t enter. This is the consequences of his sin –a consequence
of his impatience and lack of trust in God. But God has arranged for him to see
the land that would become Israel – at least from a distance. But to be honest.
I am not sure that it was really necessary.
From what
the Bible tells us of Moses, he was another man of great vision. He had seen
the Promised Land from that first moment at the burning bush. Moses’ reluctance
to go to Egypt and demand that the Pharaoh “let my people go” had less to do
with a lack of vision than it had in an inability to see what he could bring
into that future. From Moses point of view, he was a failure. He had tried to
move Israel into a new reality when he was still a prince in Egypt. And he had
failed. But Moses had longed dreamed of the land, and when he closed his eyes for
the past forty year, that land was all that he saw.
In that
moment when the spies had returned to tell Moses of everything that they had
seen, it confirmed everything that Moses had believed about this new land. It
was a fertile place. It was a place where a people could grow. Over the forty
years of wandering, I think Moses had walked in the Promised Land every time
that he closed his eyes. Now, at the age of 120, Moses would finally see with
his eyes open in the distance exactly what it was that he had seen with his
eyes closed over the past forty years. He already knew the land, and that is
exactly why he was willing to dedicate the last third of his life in getting
his people to precisely this point - on the edge of the Promised Land.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading:
Deuteronomy 33
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