Please...Say That Again

Monday, April 24, 2023

The Lord appeared again to Abraham near the oak grove belonging to Mamre. One day Abraham was sitting at the entrance to his tent during the hottest part of the day.  He looked up and noticed three men standing nearby.  When he saw them, he ran to meet them and welcomed them, bowing low to the ground.  “My lord,” he said, “if it pleases you, stop here for a while.  Rest in the shade of this tree while water is brought to wash your feet.  And since you’ve honored your servant with this visit, let me prepare some food to refresh you before you continue on your journey.”  “All right,” they said. “Do as you have said.”  So Abraham ran back to the tent and said to Sarah, “Hurry! Get three large measures of your best flour, knead it into dough, and bake some bread.”  Then Abraham ran out to the herd and chose a tender calf and gave it to his servant, who quickly prepared it.  When the food was ready, Abraham took some yogurt and milk and the roasted meat, and he served it to the men.  As they ate, Abraham waited on them in the shade of the trees.  “Where is Sarah, your wife?” the visitors asked.  “She’s inside the tent,” Abraham replied.  Then one of them said, “I will return to you about this time next year, and your wife, Sarah, will have a son!”  Sarah was listening to this conversation from the tent.  Abraham and Sarah were both very old by this time, and Sarah was long past the age of having children.  So she laughed silently to herself and said, “How could a worn-out woman like me enjoy such pleasure, especially when my master—my husband—is also so old?”  Then the Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh?  Why did she say, ‘Can an old woman like me have a baby?’  Is anything too hard for the Lord?  I will return about this time next year, and Sarah will have a son.”  Genesis 18:1-13

Abraham had no problem understanding what was happening, and how important his three visitors were.  This was not his first rodeo; many years prior God had appeared to him and invited Abraham to uproot and become a follower.  On that journey he’d seen the hand of God move in miraculous provision, protection, and promise-fulfillment.  Abraham’s scurrying to get a meal and resting place ready for this triune theophany visit wasn’t just hospitality, this was an unannounced blessing of the presence of the eternal, almighty God, Jehovah; you pay attention, and listen like it’s the most important conversation ever!

If Abraham was busy thrusting every bit of attention to the Lord’s visit, Sarah simply eavesdropped.  God knew where she was, but the series of questions was asked out loud for Abraham’s benefit (and Sarah’s instruction).  Where is she?  Why did she laugh?  Why did she question my announcement of her pregnancy?  Leading questions are followed by the interrogative that ends excuse-making, and makes your head spin:  Is anything too hard for the LORD?  In the face of laughing at a promise God makes, you can always expect a challenge of faith.  And once God asks you to declare your faith with a “yes” or “no” the debate is over!

For You Today 

If you’ve been on Abraham’s journey with God for a good while, you certainly know what it’s like to pant, out-of-breath, just trying to keep-up.  And you’re also aware you don’t question the direction, you just cooperate!  You learn that lesson when you laugh like Sarah, and a brief time later the evidence of how right He was, and how foolish you were, is getting large in your belly cementing the lesson forever in your mind.  So, the next time God points you in a direction you hadn’t seen coming, whether it looks possible…good, or bad…or just too good to be real…try not to laugh.  God’s biggest and best blessings tend to happen in the unplanned and unimaginable!

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!

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There are about 2,500 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions library.  To dig deeper explore some of these:   Seriously?  and  Living Into the Seed of Promise   

Title Image:  via Pixabay.com   Images without citation are in public domain.

Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©   

Listen Closely

 

Tuesday, March 1, 2022

On July 31 of my thirtieth year, while I was with the Judean exiles beside the Kebar River in Babylon, the heavens were opened and I saw visions of God….  “Stand up, son of man,” said the voice. “I want to speak with you.” 

Ezekiel 1:1, 2:1

Ezekiel was thirty years old and he heard the voice telling him to snap to attention; he was about to hear something important.  In my mind’s-eye I can see Ezekiel jumping to his feet to listen closely, as if his father had just called him by his full name. 

I know that voice; it sounds just like my mother when she used my full name:  Russell Jay Brownworth, pay attention!  My Mom never took me to the woodshed (we didn’t have one, but you know what that means). 

There were times to push the envelope in seeing how much extra time you could get playing outside – and there were times to stand up and be quiet, or, as we liked to call it, listen or die!  This was one of those times for Ezekiel.  When the voice of an angel speaks, humans need to snap-to-attention. 

Angels are messengers (that is the strictest sense of what the name implies, God’s messengers).  They have no message of their own, they are a delivery system to convey God’s message to humanity.  And this angel’s message to Ezekiel was God’s Word, prepared for a very stubborn-minded group of people.  Ezekiel was to be faithful in delivering it, and even if they disobeyed, this message would stand as evidence to their stubbornness.

I’ve always had a bit of stubborn in me.  That may be why I developed a little deafness when it came the use of my full name.  It’s not that I didn’t pay a price.  As I said, Mom never took me to the woodshed for correction, but she knew my father’s full name, and he didn’t hesitate to make sure I understood the importance of listening closely to what Mom had to say.  It’s no wonder I always thought of my Dad as something of God’s messenger in our house!

For You Today

Evidence of God’s messages is all around us, in every part of creation, and in every relationship, and thought.  Sometimes you just have to stand up and listen closely!

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!  

[1] Title image:  Pixabay.com  Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©