We’ve Been Working! 09/13, 14, 15/19

Gifford Pinchot State Park, Lewisberry, Pennsylvania

A quick-tempered man does foolish things, and a crafty man is hated.  ~ Proverbs 14:17

We interrupt this (semi) regularly scheduled program . . . . .

To work.

Working on getting the blog updated and working on next year’s trip out West. For those of you who haven’t heard, we’ll be leaving Ohio the end of this October and not returning until September 2020. No May visit next year. ☹

We did however, find a church family to worship with on Sunday morning!

The 16-year-old Lighthouse Baptist Church in nearby Dover, where Dr. Sterling E. Walsh, Jr. provided a one-man show.  Not that that’s necessarily a bad thing, it’s just surprising.  He began with a welcome, directed the 30-member choir plus a small orchestra, led the worship music, interrupted the greeting time to get back to the service, led the prayer times, then gave the message, the altar call, and the dismissal.  Everything except a couple of announcements!  We thought he was the music director at first, but he was much more than that.  😊

This congregation has an average attendance of around 300, and they’re very chatty . . . . with each other.  A couple of people said “Hi” to us and/or shook our hands, but no one really talked to us.  And yet, the place was a-buzz with the voices of the congregation; both before church and during the allotted greeting time (which went on for well over five minutes!)

And although they are a little behind the times as far as technology, they’re a very engaged congregation with plenty of activities and seem to be a growing church.  They’re in need of additional nursery help because there’s been an influx of newborns.  Oh!  And they’re having a real, honest-to-goodness revival meeting October 6-10!  And many men (including all the choir/orchestra members) wear suits and ties.

Now to the important part.  The message.  The Pastor chose I Samuel 15 for today.  Not John.  However, we had to grin when we discovered that he’s doing a series on John on Sunday nights. 😊  Is there some grand schedule for Pastors that makes suggestions for sermon topics??  Hmmmm . . . .

The lesson in First Samuel today was about Saul’s disobedience.  Saul was the first king of Israel, chosen and appointed by God because the people demanded a king “like all the other nations”.  So in essence, God said, fine.  You can have your king (instead of Me), but it won’t ever be as wonderful as you think.  There’s gonna be problems and you’ll pay the consequences.  And then He chose Saul because He knew the people would like the looks of him. ….Saul, an impressive young man without equal among the Israelites – a head taller than any of the others.  ~ I Samuel 9:2.

He began well, but over time he let his position go to his head and began taking liberties with obeying God’s Word.  In fact, it got so bad that God decided enough was enough and God removed His Spirit from Saul and eventually had Samuel anoint David instead.

Today’s lesson comes from the last straw.

God wanted Saul and his men to punish the Amalekites for what they’d done to Israel.  God’s Word was for Saul to go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy everything that belongs to them.  Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.  Now, I’m not going to get into why God would demand that, and neither did the Pastor, except to say that in that time and in that culture, that’s how things were done.  And besides.  God demanded it, and who are we to question Him?

So anyway, Saul and his men went out and did exactly as God said.  Sort of.  And herein lies the problem.  Saul made the mistake of believing that he knew better than God.  That it was okay to question God’s direct command and thought he could improve upon it.

They did exactly as God said, except they spared King Agag, the best of the sheep and cattle, the fat calves and lambs – everything that was good.

And Saul even did one better than that.  He set up a monument in his own honor.  Now, don’t we kinda do the same thing when we set out to pat ourselves on the back for what we believe is a job well done?  It’s called pride.  And it’s a sin.  It’s okay to take pride in your accomplishments (meaning to do them to the best of your ability), as long as you do it humbly and recognize where your ability came from – God and those who helped you.  It’s not okay to harbor the kind of pride that’s littered with “I”.  You may say to yourself, “My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.”  But remember the LORD your God, for it is He Who gives you the ability to produce wealth. ~ Deuteronomy 8:17-18a

Back to the story.

The prophet Samuel, heard from God what Saul had done – and not done – and He (and Samuel) was not happy, and so Samuel went to Saul to confront him.  Saul spoke first.  The LORD bless you!  I have carried out the LORD’s instructions.  And Samuel basically said, then why do I hear a bunch of animals making noise? 

I think Saul started second guessing his decision right then, because he immediately laid at least part of the blame on his men “The soldiers did it!”  they spared the best of the sheep and cattle to sacrifice to the LORD your God but we totally destroyed the rest. (emphasis mine) (I don’t like using bold print for this, but discovered that for some unknown reason, this post won’t accept my underlines when I copy and paste. Weird!)

Samuel goes on to relate to Saul what God shared with him the previous night.  A reminder of what God had done with and through Saul.  And a repeat of God’s command for the Amalekites, ending with the question, Why did you not obey the LORD?

Now here’s the funny (and sad) part of Saul’s reply and again, emphasis mine, But I did obey the LORD!  I went on the mission the LORD assigned me.  I completely destroyed the Amalekites and brought back Agag their king (what???).  The soldiers took sheep and cattle from the plunder, the best of what was devoted to God, in order to sacrifice them to the LORD your God.

But Samuel was quick to point out that from God’s perspective, obeying is better than sacrifice.  For rebellion is like the sin of divination (witchcraft or the occult in some translations), and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.  Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, He has rejected you as king.

Saul apologized, admitted his sin, but was still making excuses, blaming his soldiers.

So how does this impact our lives?  The Pastor told us that it teaches us that we are to serve God on His terms, not ours.  We sometimes act like we did God this big favor by showing up on Sunday morning, or doing works for the kingdom.  Kinda like when we go to Mom’s or Grandma’s for a family dinner, and we adopt the attitude that “I’m here so you can take care of me!”  She may very well be thrilled to take care of you, but where’s your gratitude?  Would she be so thrilled if you came in and started telling her how to do things?  Or doing things differently because you think your way is better?

We are to serve the Lord with all our hearts – – not just move in the general direction of a way that makes us feel better.  We can be so OCD about doing things sometimes, but yet nonchalant about doing things God’s way.  Half-hearted is not whole-hearted, almost is not all, close enough is not close enough.

And we can’t expect God to bless us if we’re not wholly obedient.  If My people, who are called by My name, will humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.  ~ II Chronicles 7:14

Saul began as a man anointed of God and given a task to do – – just like when we become Christians.  But he chose to do that task according to his terms, not God’s.  How do we do that?  One example is, God says tithe (and with a cheerful heart, no less).  We look at our budget and determine, do I pay God?  Or bills?  Are you a good steward of God’s money?  Do you say, I can’t give You anything (or less than I feel I should), God . . . . . while you stand there with a Starbucks coffee, or a new shirt that you don’t really need, in your hands?

We don’t begin our spiritual lives by saying, “I don’t care what God wants, I’m doing what I want.”  It’s never our intent to disobey.  We begin by thinking we don’t have to be obedient “He didn’t really mean that” (sound like the serpent to Eve?) or we insist, “I’m obeying! Only better!”  It begins with the attitude that “My ideas are better” and rejecting God’s Word. (The first thing I thought of was our collective attitude about homosexuality today, and next, sexual immorality and gluttony) And from that attitude, we begin to justify our beliefs with our own thoughts, and add accusations and blaming others. 

God demands total obedience – in thought, word and deed.  He doesn’t remove the Holy Spirit from us as He did in Saul’s day (i.e. you can’t lose your salvation), but anything except total obedience, hinders His blessing for us.

Trust and obey, for there’s no other way, to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.  ~ hymn “Trust and obey”

In the next three days, we took a total of five pictures.  That should tell you what life has been like.  We’ve mostly been sitting inside chained to our laptops with a few forays into the park to bike or walk, but only to get off our duffs for a few moments.  Ugh!!

We haven’t even had satellite for weeks, so we usually watch a movie every night.

One night we watched a couple of previously recorded episodes of “The Men Who Built America” and came to the stunning realization that WWI was only 50 years after our Civil War!  Wow!  Not only because it was so close in time, but also the radical changes in military weapons.

Going from this . . . . .

To all this . . . .  in only fifty years!

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

One afternoon, we went on a bike ride.  It began as a nice ride on a mostly level, gravel trail.  It became a very difficult mountain bike trail where we sometimes had to push our bikes!  And it was full of rocks and roots. We kept thinking it’d get better, but it didn’t.  Definitely not my favorite ride!  Ouch!!