Judges

I started reading Judges this afternoon. An interesting cycle is shown by the nation of Isreal - apostasy, oppression, distress, then deliverance. Over and over again. I find the similarity to my own life startling. Right after God initiates a big change in my life, I so easily begin to forget what I have learned. I go back to my old self, even though it is not what I truly desire. I forget the truths about Christ that I have Known. Not only that, I even turn my back on them purposefully. I think I can do things on my own. That I can fulfill my own desires.

Then step two sets in. I find the things I ty to rule as master only master me. Because of my own voluntary enslavement, I lose some of my own choice. The more I let my sin rule me, the more oppressed I become.

Praise God for distress. Praise God that He created us not to have true peace outside of Him. Even when I don't directly recognize it, the gnawing uncomfort keeps at me. I Know I am missing something.

And I think this is the point at which I am most receptive to Christ. The distress causes me to look for Something. Something to change my situation. Something to change me.

It is in the middle of my distress to believe that deliverance is possible. My old ways of coping try to take over. God can and does choose to comfort me directly at times, but I think most often He works through other people in my life. It becomes vitally important for me to hear again and again about the grace of Christ, no matter how many times I have heard it, even Understood it, in the past.

Deliverance is inherantly a messy process. Things get cut off and pruned. Shaken up. Placed back upright where they belong, not on their heads where I like to keep them.

At some point in the middle of this last step in the process, dawn breaks. A glimpse of a sunrise has just shown over the hill, and I see hope. Music sounds deeper and food tastes better right now, and I mean that with no exaggeration.

Judges is an interesting book.

Entry posted by byscuits on August 31, 2004 12:36 PM

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