Today’s Scripture Reading (October
19, 2016): 2 Chronicles 16
A story is told of a young man who decides to go on a
walk in the country. It has been a good week. His new job is taking off. His girlfriend
has agreed to marry him. Everything in his world is utterly right. As he walks along the side of the road, it is these
good things that occupy his mind. The path he has taken turns into a forest and
then out along a cliff edge that reveals a grand vista of the countryside. But
the young man barely notices. It is the good
things in his life that occupy his mind.
Then it
happens. No one is sure if the young man simply walked too close to the edge or if maybe
he hit a loose patch of gravel that stole
his balance and started him spinning toward the edge, but the young man
finds himself going over the side of the cliff. On his way down, he grabs a bush
that has anchored itself into the cliff face. And there, he hangs.
His first
response to the situation is to yell for help, but the place is remote, and no one is close enough to hear him. The man begins to sweat, his hold on the
bush starts to slip. He has to get
himself out of this predicament. Finally, almost as a last resort, he begins to
pray.
“God, can
you help me get out of this?”
An unexpected
voice answers the young man’s query “Yes.”
The young
man looks around. “Who is that? Can you help me?”
Again the voice
speaks “Yes, just let go.”
The man is
confused. To let go would be to fall hundreds of feet into the valley below;
most definitely the fall would kill him. “Is this some kind of a joke?” the man asks.
“No joke,”
the voice returns. “You requested my help,
and I am here to help you. Now, let go.”
“Who is
this?” the man asks.
“God, let
go.”
“Are you
sure.”
“I am sure. I will catch you. Let go.”
“But that is
not the way that God works. He won’t catch me.”
“You barely
know what I would do and not do. If you need to
understand more about the logistics of
what is going to happen, there is a narrow ridge just below your feet. Yes, the
ledge is small, but I will keep you on
it. And from that ledge, you can climb
back up to the path that you were walking on. But it all begins with you letting
go. So let go."
The young
man considers the words of God. And then he looks up to heaven, “God?”
“Yes.”
“Is there
anyone else up there I can talk to?”
Sometimes the
logic of God is not apparent to us. Too often
we are the man on the ledge. Asa was a good king. But he didn’t always seem to
understand the plans of God. In his present situation, Asa was the man hanging
over the cliff face. And God was telling him to “let go.” But ‘letting go’ didn’t
make any sense to Asa. To Asa, it was entirely
obvious what the path was that needed to be
followed. And a treaty with the King of Aram was part of that path. It
would cost Asa money, but the result would be worth the investment. And so Asa
decides not to “let go.”
Hanani, the seer,
is tasked with the job of telling the King where he went wrong. But Asa still can’t
see it. The ledge beneath his feet was nothing more than a myth. In this case, he was sure that he was right and
God was wrong. And whenever we make that decision, we are the ones who stand in
error. Oh, and no, there is no one else up there that we can go to for a second
opinion.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: 2
Chronicles 17
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