pastorrudytlc

I was reading this morning from Exodus 32 in the Bible that tells of the troublesome tale of how God’s people so quickly abandoned Him in order to bow down at the first synagogue of the dairy cow!  Here was Moses up on the mountain meeting with Jehovah God as the Lord was making a way for the gap to be closed so that it could become possible for Him to dwell and be amidst His flock.  The Ten Commandments were literally hand carved in stone by the finger of the Almighty.  This was no computer generated form letter!  It was God’s heart and holiness being revealed in bold script before His own!  But because God was apparently not into speed writing, the people on the other side of Sinai grew impatient and began to draw their own conclusions and their misleading lead to an all-out orgy masked under the guise of a worship service.  How could they reduce the One who had opened the Red Sea and rained manna miraculously down from above into nothing more than a moo cow still astounds me every time I read it.

But then before I become nauseously locked into a holier than thou mode, I begin to realize that maybe I am not much different than those who demanded refunds because they got so destroyed from their participation in the Cow Aid Concert in the wilderness!  Maybe I too rather than being sold out for my Lord have way too easily sold out my faith in the Lord once too often along the pilgrimage of Christianity!  Why do I live like I am the center of this story?  Why do I act like God’s sole purpose in the universe is to tender His care to me and render His power to meet my every whim?

When I don’t get what I want- and more often than not, I don’t- my first reaction to God way too often, is that of accusation rather than childlike trust!  I pout rather than place my broken plans and dreams into His sovereign providence.  I subconsciously behave like I know better than He does about me and that results in  my story becoming way too much about what God can do for me rather than what God wants to be in me!  Why are we so misguided and so easily prone to fashion idols with our own hands and then proceed to throw a party so that we can bow down to these golden calves that do nothing more than give us some kind of perverted permission to let all hell break loose within our souls?  We all know when it is happening within us.  It is like we tie up and gag the Spirit within us and lock Him in a closet so that we can go out and do whatever it is that feeds the insatiable hunger for an anything goes mentality that rises without warning within our ego!

And the temple that we should be becomes reduced to nothing more than a circus tent for our sin!  And rather than singing the songs that rise up to bless the Creator- we start chanting melodies that elevate the creation to a place that it should never be given and deep down inside we know that none of this is how it was divinely designed to be.  And if repentance doesn’t follow quickly enough to wake us up from this free for all- we are in grave danger of forfeiting our soul in an attempt to win a pot at the poker game of all evil!

I have wasted way too much time on the way because I think I have been striving in the wrong direction!  Is my desire to walk with God based upon a true and sincere heart that longs to love Him and wants to be part of His story? Or is it more about rather than being with God for His honor- I actually spend more time negotiating with Him so that I can have my own way in the direction that I think my legacy should go. Is it a relationship or a business venture that I sincerely long for? 

Thanks be to God, it is never too late to stop this crazy merry go round of a ride that I have wandered aimlessly upon!  I have come to know that even in my mess- the Lord’s message is still “I will complete the good work that I began in you!”  It just makes me very sober of how quickly all of us could throw an eternal privilege all away because of an internal second of pleasure!  When you bow down and pray today- and all of us do whether we realize it or not- is the one you are making your petitions to really the One who can carry this whole thing through?  I thank God for the cows that provide milk and burgers- but I am not that off track that I will be thanking the cows as god for god!  Neither will I look to sports or prestige or pleasure or position or possessions to substitute for the Lord who reigns even when it rains on you and me!

It is not about me feeling entitled but God being obeyed!!!  He has showed us the way to go and we must not long for a short cut that will result in death. We cannot take the clear details of what the Lord has laid out for us and personally paraphrase them and edit them for our own ease! In settling for our own version we have committed a perversion when it comes to all that matters most! God, I need to live on this earth always falling back and leaning on Your everlasting arms and not looking to trust my own strength! I want to discover joy only in the circle of God’s sovereignty, holiness and unfailing love!!