The wicked man sees it and is angry. He gnashes his teeth and melts away. The desire of the wicked will perish. (Verse 10)
Such are the paths of all who forget God. The hope of the godless shall perish. His confidence is severed, his trust is a spider's house. He leans against his house, but it doesn't stand. He lays hold of it but it doesn't endure. Job (13-15)
The thing the wicked man sees is the righteous man's success. His steady heart. His trust in God that can't be moved. The ultimate victory of the one God loves over the adversary of our hearts. When I read this I got a horror story image in my mind of a person so angry that he grits his teeth as his face turns red. Fire comes from his ears and eyes and mouth and melts his face, first, then engulfs his entire body. It's pretty graphic. When the person who turns away from God looks on the simple faith of a child of God, it makes him or her want to implode! How can she believe that nonsense! She's so naïve! Why is he smiling when his world is falling apart? And more maddening still is the inability to dissuade this child of God from his unwavering faith in Christ. To add insult to injury, things pretty much turn out for those God watches over. Even death can't take away their lives.
Let me just say that I understand the skeptic's irritation at my faith. To her it doesn't seem rational. But here is what I've come to learn about my Father. He isn't easy to figure out. Sometimes His plan is indecipherable. I have come to expect God to accomplish His will in the midst of what seems to me to be an organized mess. Really! And, always in my life, at the very last possible minute. But always, my God performs--comes through for me. The ones who forget God don't have that assurance. He's not their Father. Because they rejected the idea of it. So, they are left to what they can understand and design for themselves. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't. Que sera, sera. Confident only in what he can build for himself, the man without God can only hope he's doing the right thing. Perhaps the house constructed with his earthly wisdom will stand--perhaps when he leans against it, it will collapse. We aren't built to make the decisions only God can, so eventually all will fail. Like the flimsy gossamer of a spider's web, not built to last.
The hope of the godless. Hmm. In what? I've heard, the universe. The vast spiritual force that is what is. Call on it and demand from it what is sovereignly due us. If you speak it out there to the whatever you want to call it, and say it enough, believe it enough, the universe will be obliged to give you millions of dollars, health, power. That's the secret. Hope in the goodness of mankind. I've heard that, also. It fails pretty quickly into cynicism. Beauty, prestige, eminence, intellect, wealth--all fade. None brings fulfillment to that place inherent in a woman or man that was created to believe in Someone bigger than ourselves. And forgetting God assumes you once knew Him. "Forget God!" I'll do what I darned well want to do without Him! Pretty scary stuff to trust only in myself for all I need to navigate this treacherous world. There's no One left to cry out to and no One left to thank. Only me, the universe and trouble. Interestingly, the one who leaves God behind often blames Him when things implode. When the tinselled twinings of her ill-conceived web are ripped by the breezes of adversity and she's left hanging by a thread from a mighty oak in a hurricane. And spider that she is, helpless and vulnerable, she screams in her tiny arachnid voice: "I hate You, God!" just before all hope is lost.
It doesn't have to end that way. Two men were crucified on either side of Jesus on Passover weekend. Both were criminals whose deeds were worthy of capital punishment. One of the men got tired of hearing Jesus and His meek musings..."Father, forgive them for they know not what they do!" This while He's hanging between the man and another sweating, cringing thief. King of the Jews! Some king! Jesus was bleeding profusely from the beatings, unrecognizable almost as a human. "If you're the Christ, save Yourself!" The thief screamed it. An accusation. "If you're the Christ, save us!" But, of course, the man was making light of Jesus. Just like the soldiers spitting on Him and cursing.
"Shut up! Don't you fear God? This man is innocent. We aren't!" shouted the criminal straining against the horrors of crucifixion on the other side of Jesus. Both saw the same Man. Both were in the same boat. But this man got it. "Remember me when You come into Your kingdom."
"Today you will be with me in paradise." Jesus, looking through the sweat and blood of His death, promising one who'd forgotten God salvation as he hung by a thread.
Such are the paths of all who forget God. The hope of the godless shall perish. His confidence is severed, his trust is a spider's house. He leans against his house, but it doesn't stand. He lays hold of it but it doesn't endure. Job (13-15)
The thing the wicked man sees is the righteous man's success. His steady heart. His trust in God that can't be moved. The ultimate victory of the one God loves over the adversary of our hearts. When I read this I got a horror story image in my mind of a person so angry that he grits his teeth as his face turns red. Fire comes from his ears and eyes and mouth and melts his face, first, then engulfs his entire body. It's pretty graphic. When the person who turns away from God looks on the simple faith of a child of God, it makes him or her want to implode! How can she believe that nonsense! She's so naïve! Why is he smiling when his world is falling apart? And more maddening still is the inability to dissuade this child of God from his unwavering faith in Christ. To add insult to injury, things pretty much turn out for those God watches over. Even death can't take away their lives.
Let me just say that I understand the skeptic's irritation at my faith. To her it doesn't seem rational. But here is what I've come to learn about my Father. He isn't easy to figure out. Sometimes His plan is indecipherable. I have come to expect God to accomplish His will in the midst of what seems to me to be an organized mess. Really! And, always in my life, at the very last possible minute. But always, my God performs--comes through for me. The ones who forget God don't have that assurance. He's not their Father. Because they rejected the idea of it. So, they are left to what they can understand and design for themselves. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't. Que sera, sera. Confident only in what he can build for himself, the man without God can only hope he's doing the right thing. Perhaps the house constructed with his earthly wisdom will stand--perhaps when he leans against it, it will collapse. We aren't built to make the decisions only God can, so eventually all will fail. Like the flimsy gossamer of a spider's web, not built to last.
The hope of the godless. Hmm. In what? I've heard, the universe. The vast spiritual force that is what is. Call on it and demand from it what is sovereignly due us. If you speak it out there to the whatever you want to call it, and say it enough, believe it enough, the universe will be obliged to give you millions of dollars, health, power. That's the secret. Hope in the goodness of mankind. I've heard that, also. It fails pretty quickly into cynicism. Beauty, prestige, eminence, intellect, wealth--all fade. None brings fulfillment to that place inherent in a woman or man that was created to believe in Someone bigger than ourselves. And forgetting God assumes you once knew Him. "Forget God!" I'll do what I darned well want to do without Him! Pretty scary stuff to trust only in myself for all I need to navigate this treacherous world. There's no One left to cry out to and no One left to thank. Only me, the universe and trouble. Interestingly, the one who leaves God behind often blames Him when things implode. When the tinselled twinings of her ill-conceived web are ripped by the breezes of adversity and she's left hanging by a thread from a mighty oak in a hurricane. And spider that she is, helpless and vulnerable, she screams in her tiny arachnid voice: "I hate You, God!" just before all hope is lost.
It doesn't have to end that way. Two men were crucified on either side of Jesus on Passover weekend. Both were criminals whose deeds were worthy of capital punishment. One of the men got tired of hearing Jesus and His meek musings..."Father, forgive them for they know not what they do!" This while He's hanging between the man and another sweating, cringing thief. King of the Jews! Some king! Jesus was bleeding profusely from the beatings, unrecognizable almost as a human. "If you're the Christ, save Yourself!" The thief screamed it. An accusation. "If you're the Christ, save us!" But, of course, the man was making light of Jesus. Just like the soldiers spitting on Him and cursing.
"Shut up! Don't you fear God? This man is innocent. We aren't!" shouted the criminal straining against the horrors of crucifixion on the other side of Jesus. Both saw the same Man. Both were in the same boat. But this man got it. "Remember me when You come into Your kingdom."
"Today you will be with me in paradise." Jesus, looking through the sweat and blood of His death, promising one who'd forgotten God salvation as he hung by a thread.
No comments:
Post a Comment