In this edition of the “Pasture’s Podcast” we’ll be contemplating the question ‘which side of the Truth will you find yourself on when all is said and done?’ or, perhaps more graphically, where will you be when the dam breaks?
Galatians 3:2-5, NKJV This only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?
Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh?
Have you suffered so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain?
Therefore He who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does He do it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?
We’re continuing the new podcast series, “Spiritual Realities” and, once again, my dear friend John Brown is keeping me company at the mic as we discuss how we – who profess Jesus as our Savior – might break free from the malady of (as one friend calls it) “stinking thinking” and embrace Life as we’ve been called to experience it – as Jesus showed us in the gospels –from an ‘amen, Lord’ heart.
In this segment, we’ll discuss how it appears more common than uncommon for the western expression of the church to listen and respond more readily with her head (our own understanding, Proverbs 3:5) than with her heart; saying ‘amen’ to biblical ideas and preaching points, but not sincerely walking them out.
There’s much truth swirling about, but has it caught the church’s sails?
Does the contemporary church resemble less a shining ‘army with banners’ (Song of Songs 6:4,10) and more a flea market of weekend bargain hunters?
My friend John tells us, “the heart is the hearer,” and offers a vivid illustration at the end of how disastrous life can be if we insist on living from old patterns of thinking and reasoning and do not develop a hearing (and responsive) heart…and more so as we enter into an era of greater deception than we’ve yet known.
Thank you for listening along to these episodes. Feel free to email me any questions you might have and, time permitting, we’ll address them in a future podcast.
Joseph named his older son Manasseh, for he said, “God has made me forget all my troubles and everyone in my father’s family.” Joseph named his second son Ephraim, for he said, “God has made me fruitful in this land of my grief.”
First off, let’s recognize the great white whale in the room.
Life is unfairly hard.
{Agreed.}
Yet God is deliberately good and kind.
There’s a well-known story in the Written Word that goes like this: a younger son is lost in a far country and father dutifully waits for his return. At long last when the day of reunion comes, father falls on his long-lost son’s neck and weeps for joy after which a grand family party ensues.
You know the tune.
Or at least you think you do.
This particular plot is found in the Old Testament not the New. It’s about Joseph, who, by character and demeanor, is a far cry from that other young son who actually chose the far country.
Let’s briefly recap Joseph’s story in the light of that famous chestnut ‘bad things happen to good people’ as it easily applies here.
Young Joseph has a quality his sibling brothers do not share and their father recognizes it and dresses him in a special robe. The Hebrew doesn’t have to mean multi-colored, it can mean long-sleeved. At any rate, it was fit for a prince among tribesmen, and the brothers hated him for it; that, and those self-serving made-up dreams.
They concoct a scheme to kill him off, but Judah steps in and, ostensibly out of some measure of mercy for the lad, edits the storyline to look like a killing when, in actuality, they sell off their brother to a migratory tribe. The final nail involved dipping the blasted coat in animal blood and – Oscar-worthily – presenting it most forlornly to their inconsolable father.
Meanwhile, Joseph, after being sold yet again, lands on his feet by the sheer grace of God. He gets a gig managing the household of the head-dude of Pharaoh’s security detail!
Now, if I’m writing the story, I’m going to exact poetic justice right away. I’m going to have Joseph quickly rising through the ranks and becoming da man in Egypt. His brothers would be sorry, especially when Emperor Joe sent an insertion team into Canaan-land to extract his siblings and throw them at the foot of his throne of justice.
But that’s just me.
We know that God holds the pen, however, and He’s got some things to redeem out of Joseph before He can move on with His ultimate plan.
God doesn’t want Joseph to even toy with the ideas of retribution and payback. He can’t have His man gloating or dismissive. He needs him to be His savior even to the very ones who despised him!
That’s how God writes it.
Joseph’s very cush world gets upended when the boss’s wife cries “rape!” after her repeated (re: daily) attempts to seduce the teenage boy go unrequited, and he suddenly becomes the target of the adage hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.
Hello hell-hole prison.
Forthirteen long, dark, harrowing years.
Forsaken? Forgotten? For what?
▶️ The good son.
▶️ The trusted employee.
▶️ The innocent charge.
You’d think he’d emerge from prison poisoned by bitterness with bloodlustful payback on his mind. Or, at the very least, go to his grave with unyielding unforgiveness brewing his tempest in a teapot. And you’d guess wrong.
Case in point (and I’m skipping over a lot of really cool poetic justice here): Joseph, sentence miraculously commuted, settles into life, settles down with a beautiful bride, and starts a family. Life’s good.
He is given two sons, and the very naming of them speaks volumes of his understanding how life is supposed to work when trust trumps blame and compliance bests complaint.
Joseph insists his firstborn be called “folly forgotten” and his second, “fruitful hardship”. Imagine! James M. Boice points out the order had to be thus for
“no one can really be fruitful until the past is forgotten in the proper sense. If we are living in the past, whether that is the past of unconfessed sin, hurts, suffering, or even old blessings, we will never be completely fruitful in the present. We must let the past be the past, forgetting it, and go on with God.”
It’s the name of the second-born (Ephraim) I’d like to comment on because it’s so my own story.
In each decade since my early 20’s I’ve faced death in one way or another. Some decades brought me to the brink more than once.
Most recently I was spirited from my home in the middle of the night by EMT’s who couldn’t find vital signs. I was septic, dehydrated, losing vision, and barely responsive. Later I’d be told I got to the ER in barely enough time or we’d be looking at a far different outcome. I didn’t ask what that meant but I have a good idea.
I’m in my mid-fifties and this is the third time in this half-decade God’s miraculously preserved my life, I can only presume, for more ‘preservation of life.’1 There are still some assignments ahead for me.
As a 21-year old I prayed, “Lord, put me in a fire and don’t ever let up.” As such, suffering has been the mark of my life – AND I WOULDNT CHANGE A THING. Through many dangers, toils, and snares, I’ve found a depth of intimacy with Christ I wouldn’t have found otherwise.
Like Joseph, I want the product of my life to tell the story that I’m doubly blessed and fruitful from all my afflictions, and God has been doubly kind to allow me the privilege of suffering for His glory and name.
This is my story, this is my song, praising my Savior all my life long:
Praise God for loss.
Praise God for the fire.
Praise God for heart-brokenness.
Praise God for weakness.
Praise God for humility.
Praise God for the tough times.
Praise God for the sweetness of the fruit that grows from the soil of hardship.
If any of this sounds weird, it’s only because I’m trying to live up to my name. You can call me Ephraim.
The sun is warming up the day, and my boy sits next to me in our aging van. He’s chattering away like a child on Christmas morning as we bounce along Sweetwater Road. He keeps looking at the piece of paper he holds on his lap, almost reverently, then smiles out the window. I can see the reflection of his delight in the glass. Then I feel him looking at me, studying me. His smile fades.
I’ve been sullen as he’s jibbered away, unresponsive, except for a forced smile here and there along the way. He knows it’s fake. My child reads me like a book.
“Why can’t you just be happy for me, Dad?” he challenges.
He’s now fairly crumpled the paper in his unstrained fist and waving it in my face, but not disrespectfully. He doesn’t want a fight, not today of all days, heavens, and Lord knows neither do I.
“You want to know, Graham, why I’m not thrilled with this news?” I reply. “Truly?”
He doesn’t respond because he already knows.
The folded sheet in his hand is the news our son’s been waiting for. It’s an official letter from his probation office telling him he’s been cleared to move out of Georgia, that he’s to report to his new probation officer in Minnesota by such-and-such a day. Such-and-such a day was too close for my heart to accept, and so, as we took our backway home, I simply couldn’t rejoice with him. His take was I was peeing on his parade.
Perhaps I was.
“Graham,” I continued, attempting to avoid any tone of argumentativeness, “your Mom and I are sad because we may never see you again –“
He stopped me right there.
“But I’ll come back!” he offered. “Birthday, Christmas, whatever…it’s not forever, Dad.”
I pressed in a bit more.
“Son, I’m just not sure it’s necessary for you to move away for you to be safe from drugs. You know as well as I do, they’ll find you wherever you go…”
He sat back and fixed a frustrated glare straight ahead and was silent for a couple ticks. He knew he wouldn’t change my mind. When he looked back at me, there were tears.
“Dad, you just don’t know how bad it is! I can’t stay here, don’t you see? If I don’t get out of Atlanta I’ll die!”
I didn’t know it at the time but this would be one of our final face-to-face, father-son conversations. As we approached the stop sign to turn left onto Lee Road, I told him whatever happens we loved him, and I ended our painful discussion by telling Graham, “We won’t stand in your way, son; and we won’t make this hard for you. If this is what you feel you have to do, we support you.”
I pushed down on the turn signal to go into the turn.
Ironically, a half-mile back, on Graham’s side of the van, we had just passed the very cemetery we’d lay his body to rest – nine months hence – in a cold, driving rainstorm, two days before Christmas.
▪️ ▪️ ▪️ ▪️
Fall, 2015
Today Graham Scott would be 26, making it his second birthday in heaven.
🎉🎈🎂Happy birthday in heaven, son! 🎉🎈🎂
It’s not been a good day down here, however. I don’t think it’s about our son’s passing or not being here, necessarily. It seems it’s just life stuff. Bad days are rare for me. I mean ra-are. But I have them. Today seems to be one. I was outside earlier where and when I meet with the Lord each day, but I wasn’t feeling it.
Being in nature, listening to its distinctive rhythms, watching it unfold and spread its beauty usually does it for me. But today, silence. Birds weren’t showing themselves. Butterflies were too neurotic and preoccupied to light. Gnats and mosquitos wouldn’t stop pestering, and flies were trying to drown in my coffee. My prayers, often so easy and fluid, were limply waving at glory and getting no response.
And the Word. Why, the sure-fire solution to what ails me, kind of plopped like soggy corn flakes on my soul.
What gives, God?
My daily reading told me to read John 1 and 2, and I do what I’m told for the most part. Now, those two chapters are dynamite on steroids any other time. I mean, Jesus coming with grace and truth, grace following grace, taking away the sin of the world? C’mon. That’s the sweet spot for sure.
But today, nothing. Soggy corn flakes.
Then it happened.
Look again, Scott.
I do what I’m told, remember?
Instinctively, I knew where to look. No, not in the scriptures I just read, but to my daily reading schedule. Horror of horrors, I misread my assignment!
It didn’t say,
Jhn 1,2
It said,
Jnh 1,2
I switched the H!
I was supposed to let Father speak to me from Jonah! Not John! (No offense, John)
Okay, I thought, now we’re getting somewhere. I pretty much hurried through chapter one, excitement slowly mounting. It began to ebb a trifle when I finished, untouched yet, but I still had one more chapter to read. It wasn’t a long chapter, however.
God, please say what You’re gonna say in these 10 verses, or today’s gonna have to be chalked off. Please. Speak.
And, boy howdy, did He ever.
You know Jonah. His rebellion, his long run, his far fall. You also know chapter 2 becomes autobiographical; it’s not background or third-party perspective. We’re hearing from the man himself, and he’s describing for us what might very well be his last moments on earth, in the depths of the ocean, in the stomach of a great fish.
Now, may I insert here that I’m completely convinced and at peace – no doubting – that our Gra-Gra is with Jesus. Except for a dream of Graham screaming from the pit of hell a couple days after his death (quickly shaken off; God doesn’t use fear tactics on His broken-hearted children), I’ve swum in the grace-ocean of peace that he’s with His Savior in glory. Sandy too. This is an entirely settled matter for us.
Having said that, it sure was awesome to have God give me a first-hand glimpse into what might have been Graham’s dying moments on earth. Read these words and see if they might not also apply to someone at death’s door, swallowed in the foul waters of overdose, receiving the mercies of Jesus to cry out,
REMEMBER ME, LORD!!
Jonah 2:3-7
…the flood surrounded me; all your waves and your billows passed over me. Then I said, ‘I am driven away from your sight; yet I shall again look upon your holy temple.’ The waters closed in over me to take my life; the deep surrounded me; weeds were wrapped about my head at the roots of the mountains. I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever; yet you brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God. When my life was fainting away, I remembered the Lord, and my prayer came to you, into your holy temple.
Was Graham right to move from his only home? I don’t have an answer for that, but I know I can’t question God and I don’t want to second-guess my boy.
All I know is, he’s not in that cemetery we both passed by, and where Sandy and I make a regular stop to ‘talk’ to him. He really is home. He made it. God remembered him in his dying hour.
