Time for Change? Hope?

Finally, all the elders of Israel met at Ramah to discuss the matter with Samuel. “Look,” they told him, “you are now old, and your sons are not like you. Give us a king to judge us like all the other nations have.” Samuel was displeased with their request and went to the Lord for guidance. “Do everything they say to you,” the Lord replied, “for it is me they are rejecting, not you. They don’t want me to be their king any longer. Ever since I brought them from Egypt they have continually abandoned me and followed other gods. And now they are giving you the same treatment. Do as they ask, but solemnly warn them about the way a king will reign over them.”

So Samuel passed on the Lord’s warning to the people who were asking him for a king. “This is how a king will reign over you,” Samuel said. “The king will draft your sons and assign them to his chariots and his charioteers, making them run before his chariots. Some will be generals and captains in his army, some will be forced to plow in his fields and harvest his crops, and some will make his weapons and chariot equipment. The king will take your daughters from you and force them to cook and bake and make perfumes for him. He will take away the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his own officials. He will take a tenth of your grain and your grape harvest and distribute it among his officers and attendants. He will take your male and female slaves and demand the finest of your cattle and donkeys for his own use. He will demand a tenth of your flocks, and you will be his slaves. When that day comes, you will beg for relief from this king you are demanding, but then the Lord will not help you.” But the people refused to listen to Samuel’s warning. “Even so, we still want a king,” they said. “We want to be like the nations around us. Our king will judge us and lead us into battle.” So Samuel repeated to the Lord what the people had said, and the Lord replied, “Do as they say, and give them a king.” Then Samuel agreed and sent the people home.  ~1 Samuel 8:4-21

Somehow, we as humans forget to look at the past and learn from it.  We tend to do the same things over and over again and fall in the same holes.  We look to a man, a king, a president, someone tangible that can save us and fight for us.  We want a knight in shining armor, to run with the chariots and fight our battles for us.  We don't want to meet with God face to face, we want a Moses that will climb to the top of the mountain for a face to face meeting and then while he is away, we look for something new to replace him, we settle for golden calves and the glow of Moses instead of lacing up our hiking boots and climbing to the top of the mountain for our own "Come to Jesus" meeting.

The more I read the news lately the more I am ignited to share the gospel across the planet.  Haiti, Chile, landslides.  Do I have a heart for missions?  Maybe, I think that our everyday lives are mission trips.  I believe that God is calling all of us to lay down our comforts of home and to engage in the battle and quit waiting for someone else to do it for us.

"So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you." ~Romans 12:1-2 The Message

We are an apathetic people.  We focus on the small details and forget to look up and ask why we are here.  What do you have for me today.  Put me in coach I am ready to play.  We are content to sit in the stands and watch other people score touchdowns.  We are willing to watch a state of the union address and condemn and have opinions but we aren't willing to do anything to change it. We are willing to sit in the pew as the pastors tell stories of meeting with Jesus.

So where does our hope come from?  We lose hope in Jesus within us if all we do is look at our circumstances.  If all we do is look at our checkbooks, if all we do is watch the news, and never do anything to change it. I am so ready for hope and change.  I am realizing that it has to come from the Jesus within me.  It won't come in the form of a man, I have to pick up with sword and fight my own battles against the deceiver.  I have to be willing to make the hike, to take my own tools to make the sacrifice and have hope enough in God that He will meet me there and supply the sacrifice.  My own flesh is what he is asking for this today.  Am I willing to be a sacrifice? Am I willing to stand near the burning bush?  Am I willing to come face to face with the Pharaoh and demand freedom? Or am I just going to sit back and complain?

King Jesus is all I need.  Redeemer, Lover of my soul. Heal me so that I can go into battle, I know where to come for my next set of wounds.

Be blessed then be a blessing. Love always wins.


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