March 13--Faith Fails Can't Disconnect You From God, and Here's Why

The connection I have to God-through-Jesus is sturdy enough to last through my fears and doubts, bad attitudes and complaints, the reproach of my enemies, and even sinning sprees. It's hard to believe, but these passages inform me:  Numbers 19-20, Luke 1:1-25, Psalm 57, Proverbs 11:8-9.

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Transcript

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March thirteenth. Faith fails can't disconnect you from God, and here's why. I won't be reading the scripture references for those. Please check the written post. Roan finished reading the book I gave him for Christmas and has earned a reading reward. This means we'll head to the store after school and he'll pick out something to buy with my money. I'll have his brothers with me too, so they've been told to bring their money so they aren't left out of buying something. Their mama just texted to tell me that Hawk has no money. Before reading these passages and writing about them today, I would have thought it good real life preparation for him to be disappointed for not saving. But really, he's seven. I don't want to teach any sad real life lessons to grandkids that I don't have to teach. After reading today, the even real life lesson I do want to teach is that while you get rewarded when you keep your part of the deal, sometimes you get rewarded even when you don't, because the best part of being their grandmother is getting to love on them every chance I get, not sticking it to them. This is just what God does, and the news never stops surprising me. The Old

Numbers 19-20

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Testament chapters are Numbers nineteen to twenty. Ever since the Israelites left the promised land, they've been acting like every other child on a long road trip, grouchy and grumbly. How long before we get there? But God's made it clear, not until everybody aged twenty and over dies who failed to believe him to take over the promised land their first try, which would be in forty years. Only then will their children be allowed to go back and try again. In the meantime, Israel is camping out in tents, following God's presence in the pillar of cloud and fire, going only God knows where. The play by play of this journey isn't pretty. The people mainly complain about who's in charge, about the food and water, about why they ever left Egypt in the first place. The feeling has been that Moses took the lead due to his high handedness and that Aaron is only high priest because of the good old boy network between them. Never mind that God himself put Moses in charge and said that Aaron alone is high priest with his sons inheriting the priesthood after him. What God says apparently doesn't go. Not really, at least not with these folks. Commentators say that by this time the older generation is mostly all gone and the next generation has grown up. Even though these children have had front row seats watching their parents needlessly wandering in the wilderness forty years because they refused to take the promised land, their kids aren't much different. They're the ones complaining now, and in only three chapters after Aaron's staff budded, blossomed, and fruited, which had presumably ended the grumbling. This time there's no water where they're camping, and they ganged up on Moses and Aaron, saying they wish they died when their parents did. What's more they want to know why Moses hauled everybody into the desert if he was just going to let them die when they got there. And even more to the point, why did they ever leave Egypt in the first place? Because there's no grain, no fruit, and now not even any water. Egypt is like a siren that keeps calling its lies across the miles. Life here was magical. You had everything you ever wanted. You lived exactly as you pleased. Oh really? Because the truth about Egypt for Israel included slave wages and cruel conditions, back breaking, brickmaking labor daily by all men, women and children, with no days off, no end in sight. Memory tends to be sentimental, not real, and whenever the going got tough, their parents pulled out there. We had the good life in Egypt stories, and their kids must have believed them. But the truth is no one put a gun to anybody's head and forced them out of Egypt. Everybody wanted to go. There were even some Egyptians who left with them. Many of these kids hadn't been born yet, and those who had likely don't remember much of it. They've likely only had the stories they've been told to go on. Moses and Aaron are understandably undone over the grumbling of this next generation, this generation of promise, the one they hoped would turn out differently from their parents, but they're just like them, rewriting history, taking their blessings for granted, asking stupid questions, romanticizing Egypt. And they leave this assembly of whiners and walk over to the tabernacle where they quote, throw themselves face down on the ground, end quote, and see God's glory. But seeing it doesn't seem to move them because later we find out they're still fuming. God tells him to take Aaron's almond laden staff, gather the community, and speak to the rock right in front of them, and it'll give water. But instead of doing what God says, Moses angrily blasts them, quote, listen, rebels, do we have to bring water out of this rock for you? And rather than speaking to the rock like God said, Moses hits it hard twice. Water gushes, but God tells him later that because he and Aaron didn't speak to the rock but hid it, when they finally get to the promised land, they won't get to go in. It's a bitter disappointment after all the years they've put in as leaders. But Moses represents who God is, and what Moses has shown them is a God who's angry. The truth is God's not angry in this passage. He's compassionate and patient, and he wants Moses to speak calmly to the rock, not hit it, so that his people see it, so they experience him as he is, lovingly and faithfully providing the water they complain to get. God wants them to know that even when they're desperate and losing it, he's holding it all together. He gives them what they need when they ask, even when they ask badly, even when they don't believe him, even when they've forgotten all the times he's brought help in the past. I can relate to that. And I wonder all over again at the mercy and goodness of God, who continues to put up with folks he could have given up on at Mount Sinai when they worship the golden calf right after they walk through the ocean. It's been one event after another like that, where they fail to do what God says and do their own thing instead, and even though they don't deserve it, they keep getting God with them, they keep getting fed, they keep finding water, they keep getting disciplined, they keep being forgiven. And I have to wonder why. Throughout the stories of Israel's faith fails, God keeps giving them direct communication about how to live in this love relationship he began with them. Interspersed among the complaining chapters and numbers are chapters with further instructions about making offerings, being forgiven, paying priests and being made ritually clean. If you'll notice, these are all ways God desvises to stay connected with his people. Commentators say that this rock represented Jesus, who God would strike once on the cross, and ever after because of Jesus' sacrifice, all we have to do is speak our word of need to him, and there he goes, gushing abundantly and giving his everything. It's because of Jesus that God's grace is as plentiful and miraculous as a rock gushing water. Jesus came and dealt with sin, so sin's no longer in charge of us. God's forgiveness has been bought and paid for. He doesn't let us in or keep us out based on our performance, because everyone who trusts in Jesus is always in. All we do to connect is to speak our word of need to him because Jesus' perfect record counts for us. Moses hit the rock twice in anger rather than spoke to it as God said. As a result, there were consequences. He only saw the promised land from a distance just before he died and never

Luke 1:1-25

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went in. But he and God were on good terms regardless because God's free flowing grace was what connected them and not Moses' performance. Your faith fails can't disconnect you from God because your connection is based on Jesus and not on you. The New Testament passage is Luke one to twenty five. An angel visits childless Zachariah, the priest while he's in the Holy of Holies offering incense. The angel tells him that his wife will finally have a son, the answer to their prayers, and they're to name him John. He'll quote achieve great stature with God, end quote, and will get the people ready. Zachariah can't believe his ears since he and Elizabeth are old as the hills. As a result he stopped speaking, but the miracle still comes just as Gabriel said, and right on schedule. God's promise wasn't dampened by Zachariah's unbelief because it was based on the God who delights to answer prayers and astonish us, even while he's exposing the ugly truth about us. We don't really trust him with the big things the same way Zachariah didn't. But no matter, our journey with God is designed to bring us into more and more delight as it simultaneously brings us into

Psalm 57, Prayer, Proverbs 11:8-9

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more and more awareness of our failure to deserve Him because this is the abundant grace giving God that God is. Your faith fails can't disconnect you from God because your connection is based on who God is and not on you. From Psalm fifty seven. David needs God's help and he gets it simply because he needs it. This is the sole qualification for God's timely intervention that a person needs rescuing. This is why God gives his wayward, whiny people water. It's why God sends Gabriel to speak to Zachariah. It's why God comes through for David every single time he calls him. David runs to God for dear life and hides quote under his wings until the storm is over. He calls out to God who holds him together, runs to, hides under, calls out. I don't see anything David does except turn to God because he needs help and he gets it. Is God the first call on your speed dial? Is he the crutch you lean on, the bedrock you stand on, the one who has your back when the bottom falls out? Good. This is exactly where David is and where God wants us to needy and expectant for what he will do. The end of this story is this. God sends out his rescue order lickety split, and David is delivered. So David writes a song and raises the roof singing it, quote, The deeper your love, the higher it goes. Every cloud is a flag to your faithfulness, end quote. Praise is the end of every prayer because God never fails. The faith fails of others only drive you closer to God because your connection is based solely on needing Him. Prayer. God, thank you for being the God I can't break up with, the one I can always turn to, the one no one can take me away from, the one I never have to deserve. In Jesus' name, so be it. From Proverbs 11, 8 to 9. What good is goodness? Just this. It saves you from a lot of trouble, while badness runs you straight into it. A big mouth makes a big mess while wisdom knows when to shut it. Passages in Numbers, Luke, Psalms, and Proverbs are selected for today in the yearly Bible. This is Eve de Bartleaban Robuck.