Film, Pharisees, and Frustration

I’m back!

It’s fall. I’m employed. I’m still broke. I’m kind of a senior.

These (except for being broke) are all new things that apply to me since the last time the I posted. That was way back there in April, back when I still believed that UGA’s football team had a prayer in 2010. Here’s to high hopes that didn’t pan out.

Regardless, back to the employment thing. I have a job now! It’s an odd job, but a job nonetheless. I take pictures of newspapers these days. When I’m not taking pictures of newspapers, I’m looking at microfilm of pictures of newspapers. It’s monotonous, but I don’t really mind it because I have lots of time with my iPod, so I can catch up on podcasts and audiobooks as I go. It’s been great, but two days ago I was floored by some scripture I heard in a sermon. The text was from John 5:

“So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed.” But he answered them, “The man who healed me, that man said to me, ‘Take up your bed, and walk.” They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take up your bed and walk?’ Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, as there was a crowd in the place. Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, ‘See, you are well! Sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you.’ The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him. And this was why the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because he was doing these things on the Sabbath. But Jesus answered them, ‘My Father is working until now, and I am working.’”

John 5:10-17

In verses fifteen and sixteen the Jews persecute Jesus because He heals on the Sabbath.

Stop and think about that for a second. What exactly did He do on the Sabbath?

He healed somebody.

Who heals people? God.

Would I be out of line if I said that these Pharisees were mad at God for being God? I mean, think about it. This man has lay by this pool at Bethesda for 38 years. He’s been a patient man. He’s been a frustrated man. Every day when the pool would stir, he’d try his hardest to get there, to have just a little bit of hope that that would be the day his miracle would arrive. But he kept failing. And the people kept walking by.

They would see him every day and come to accept his position as normal, as the status quo. He’s crippled, sure, but that’s just who he is. It’s who he was, it’s who he is, and it’s who he’s going to be. Throw him a dollar every now and then but don’t worry about it. And when the pool would stir, he would have no one to help him into it. He wanted healing so badly that he’d struggle to try and get over, but he just wasn’t fast enough. First come first serve on the miracles, son. Work for it if you want it. That’s the way it is.

And then comes Jesus. Throws a monkey wrench into everything.

“Do you want to be healed?”

Jesus tells him to take up his bed and walk. On the Sabbath. This man knew just like everyone else that he wasn’t supposed to work on the Sabbath, but he also knew that this Man who had just healed him had some kind of authority and power. If He could heal a 38-year invalid, He could tell him to walk on the Sabbath.

This man honored God by obedience. He enjoyed the gift that Jesus gave him, the gift of mobility. And what did the Pharisees do? Rejoice? Far from it. Rather than enjoying seeing the power of God at work in Christ, they resented it and were furious that this Man, who was claiming equality with God, didn’t fit inside the box that they’d built for God to fit in.

Let’s get legal.

Six days work shall be done, but on the seventh day you shall have a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the LORD. Whoever does any work on it shall be put to death. You shall kindle no fire in all your dwelling places on the Sabbath day.

Exodus 35:2-3

I’m so confused as to where they’re finding that he can’t take the bed that he’s been lying on for 38 years home. If I had been lying on the same mat for 38 years because I couldn’t walk, it would not feel like work at all to pick that trash up, take it away, and go find somewhere to dance. That’s not work. That’s liberation. But the Pharisees didn’t see that. They had made rules for themselves. They were righteous because their pedometers said so. “If you take one more step than me, you deserve to be stoned! How dare you break the Torah?!” Except that it’s not in there. The Pharisees weren’t mad because Jesus broke God’s Torah. They were mad because He broke THEIR torah.

How do you rebuke a man for a miracle on the Sabbath? Isn’t God in control of miracles? Isn’t God in control of the Sabbath? So if there’s a miracle on the Sabbath, don’t you kind of have to think that God gave it the OK?

I was really quick to rebuke the Pharisees in my brain until I started thinking about it.

I do the exact same thing.

God has unstoppable power and immutable authority. Psalm 115 says that God does whatever He wishes. He can rock miracles on the Sabbath because He made the Sabbath. He wrote the law. As Jesus He kept the law. He fulfilled the law on the cross. And what do I do? Exactly what the Pharisees did. I make rules based on my self righteous morals that, in my mind, govern how God should act. If He doesn’t act by my rules, on my timetable, according to my requests, how often do I call foul? I’m quick to cry for justice and fairness, but I really shouldn’t be. The Gospel isn’t fair. Fair is God killing me and sentencing me to the conscious eternal torment in Hell right now, because that’s what the filth of my sin deserves. That’s fair. That’s justice.

So here I am, in my filth but for the atoning blood of Christ, and somehow I’ve come to the arrogant position of thinking I can tell God how He should treat me because “I deserve this” or “it’s not fair for You not to do this.”

Maybe it’s the fact that I live in a microwave, eHarmony, iTunes-already-on-my-iPod culture. I get to live in a world where everything is simple and all the work is taken out of it. Everything is available right in front of me (disclaimer: I DO NOT HAVE AN eHARMONY PROFILE). I can pop food in a microwave and it’s ready in 3 minutes. I can tell a computer I’m single and it’ll say, “Hey, meet her because she matches the checklist you filled out!” If I hear a song on the radio I want, I can buy it right then. I pick those three examples because they NAIL three cultural failings that have leaked into my life: Impatience, self-idolization, and impulsivity. I want something quickly and painlessly, exactly how I ordered it, just because I decided that I should have it. That is DISGUSTING.

I know God loves me and that He has a plan for me. His works are forever, His plans are forever, and He has plans for my hope and for my future. But that’s the key: they’re His plans. Not mine. His ways are above my ways. His thoughts are above my thoughts. When I see the power of God at work in others, I should rejoice in it. I should be happy because God is showing Himself generous and glorious in them. When something hasn’t quite arrived in my life yet, I need to just keep living and keep devoting myself to Jesus and His Gospel. If God wants something to happen, it’ll happen regardless of what is done to stop it. If He doesn’t want something to happen, no matter my amount of hard work, dedication, and tenacity, IT WON’T HAPPEN. I have to submit not just parts of my life, but all of it.

It’s not right for me to demand things be done by my timetable to my preferences. It’s idolatrous, and by my actions it’s saying that I should be God because I know how to do things better than He does.

I’m not God. I don’t want to be.

But I don’t want to be mad at God for being God either.

On God's Timetable

The Screwtape Letters, Ch. 13 (C.S. Lewis)

"And now for your blunders. On your awn showing you first of all allowed the patient to read a book he really enjoyed, because he enjoyed it and not in order to make clever remarks about it to his new friends. In the second place, you allowed him to walk down to the old mill and have tea there –a walk through country he really likes, and taken alone. In other words you allowed him two real positive Pleasures. Were you so ignorant as not to see the danger of this? The characteristic of Pains and Pleasures is that they are unmistakably real, and therefore, as far as they go, give the man who feels them a touchstone of reality. Thus if you had been trying to damn your man by the Romantic method –by making him a kind of Childe Harold or Werther submerged in self-pity for imaginary distresses –you would try to protect him at all costs from any real pain; because, of course, five minutes' genuine toothache would reveal the romantic sorrows for the nonsense they were and unmask your whole stratagem."

I started this blog intending to write about enduring and being patient. God had other plans. He wanted me to realize not the severity of my test, but the extent to which I had blown up the “troubles” that I have been “enduring.” This isn't so much testing as it is a greedy child, the prodigal son, wanting his entire inheritance at once. How much of my struggle is created by my own greed and impatience? How much of this “test of endurance” is really just me not being willing to slow down?

Long story short, I find myself in a season of life in which I have a lot of decisions to make. I have lots of choices in front of me. But even as I was sitting there whining and thinking about how I could write it down and make it come across like it's a really big deal, I'm guessing God kind of raised the eyebrow at me.

Let's examine my situation.

I'm living in the United States of America, where I have the right to believe whatever the heck I want to believe. If I were to hang a sign on my front door that said “I'm a Christian and I'm proud of it,” then the police wouldn't come and take me out of my house. On the contrary, if they did, I could sue them.

The last time I was hungry, I walked over to the dining hall and grabbed two slices of pizza and two glasses of Powerade. I didn't grab a cookie for dessert, but I could have if I wanted to. I listened to my iPod while I was walking down the sidewalk on what is (periodically) a sunny day.

My vision isn't exactly perfect, so I have a pair of glasses on my face right now that are covered by insurance. I have a vehicle of my own and there is gas in my tank.

Let's be real. I am a person defining trial right now who gets impatient when his soba noodles aren't cooked by the microwave fast enough. Whether or not God acts by my timetable isn't really His concern. He loves me. He's my dad. But He's also the sovereign God of the universe who isn't really as urgent about me getting some things as I am. He'll do all that He wishes to do through me...in HIS time. Not necessarily mine.

I was thinking about this and the story of Abraham came to mind. Not the usual way I go though, because normally I would be thinking about how he did his own thing with Hagar and ended up with Ishmael. I was thinking more about when he went over into Egypt.

Genesis 12:10-20

“Now there was a famine in the land. So Abram went down to Egypt to sojourn there, for the famine was severe in the land. When he was about to enter Egypt, he said to Sarai his wife, “I know that you are a woman beautiful in appearance, and when the Egyptians see you, they will say, 'This is his wife.' Then they will kill me, but they will let you live. Say you are my sister, that it may go well with me because of you, and that my life may be spared for your sake.” When Abram Entered Egypt, the Egyptians saw that the woman was very beautiful. And when the princes of Pharaoh saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh. And the woman was taken into Pharaoh's house. And for her sake he dealt well with Abram; and he had sheep, oxen, male donkeys, male servants, female servants, female donkeys, and camels.” But the LORD afflicted Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai, Abram's wife. SO Pharaoh called Abram and said, 'What is this you have done to me? Why did you not tell me that she was your wife? Why did you say, 'She is my sister,' so that I took her for my wife? Now then, here is your wife; take her, and go.' And Pharaoh gave men orders concerning him, and they sent him away with his wife and all that he had.”

What to notice here is that God had already promised Abraham (Abram at the time) that He was going to be a father of many nations. He'd already given him the promise of how things were going to be for him. But Abram got scared when he heard there was a famine and so he ran to Egypt. He found the closest thing that was the answer for his problem and went running to it instead of to God. Our existence is to bring glory to God. Now I'm not saying be unwise, but how awesome would it have been if everywhere was in famine except where Abram sat down? I mean yeah, he left with a lot of stuff from Pharaoh, but how much stuff would he have gotten if he was the only agricultural game in town? And his response when people asked him why his crops weren't dying would be? “My God is good and has promised good things for me.” He didn't take that opportunity to trust God though.

Even in his poor decision making though, God was still with him and still took care of him. Abraham basically had to pick between two blessings. The closer, immediately tangible blessing of Egypt or the promised provision and protection of God. He chose what he could get his hands on at the time.

I feel like I have that problem, too. I don't really want to condemn Abram and talk about how stupid a move that was and how obvious it was that God was giving him the chance to experience something amazing because I do this same thing every day. I decide that what is most immediately available must be what God wants for me, and so I jump. I'm impatient. And quickly God lets me know that I've done so. And shortly after He shows me that, He hits me with the same trial again. He is relentless in conforming me to the image of Christ, and if that means He has to hit me with the same stuff over and over again, He's got all the time in the world (haha, literally) to do it with. Some of the guys in my small group came up with this combination of scripture:

Ecclesiastes 3:14-15

"I perceived that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. God has done it, so that people fear before him. That which is, already has been; that which is to be, already has been; and God seeks what has been driven away."

Plus

Jeremiah 29:10-14

“For thus says the LORD: When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares the LORD and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, declares the LORD, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.”

They just used 29:11 in Jeremiah, but I'm going to add the other verses in with it. God has an eternal plan for everything that cannot and will not be stopped. That includes our lives. It's arrogant to think that somehow we could do something that would dislodge or derail the plan of an all knowing, all powerful, ever-present, and eternal God. That plan that He has includes the plans that He has for us, plans for a future and a hope. Those plans cannot and will not be dislodged or derailed. Now does that mean that everything will run smoothly? Nope. Notice that before God tells them that He has a plan for them, He also tells them that they're going to have to wait until their time in Babylon is up. He is the one who drove them there. He is the one that has made them wait.

My gut reaction when I realized this was to say “that's not fair,” but then I remembered that fair would be me burning in hell for the sins I've committed, so I decided against arguing in favor of fairness.

God works tirelessly to conform us to the image of His son Jesus, like Romans 8 says. If I got everything I wanted when I wanted it, I wouldn't be being conformed to the image of Jesus. I would be conforming myself to the image of...well, myself.

1 Peter 1:6-9

"In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls."

I need to remember that my trials are minimal here, my blessings are many, and my impatience is great. God is a very good God who does send trial every once in a while in order to strengthen our faith, and He is faithful not to put more on me than I can bear. But if God loads me down with what I can bear and I generate more trials for myself through my own greed, indecision, and impatience, then I carry no guarantee that I will be able to bear those. My faith is to be constantly tested and I'm constantly being conformed to the image of Christ, but that is done on God's timetable—not mine.