Friday 5 August

1 Chronicles 19:1-22:1

Hold up.  No mention of Bathsheba, no mention of the murder of Uriah the Hittite, no mention of the rebellion of fancy-locks Absalom? This is like the bible’s version of the South Beach diet - life with all the interesting bits cut out.  The 20 year gap between the close of chapter 20 and the opening of chapter 21 may have been intended to spare David some blushes but, sadly, he crushed too many lemons in his latter years to be completely spared any bitterness.  Why did things turn so sour for David?  He had a heart after God, he wrote sublime poetry about his yearning for his Lord.  He said things like “I will not sacrifice a burnt offering that costs me nothing” and “let me fall into the hands of the Lord, for his mercy is very great”.  In so many ways he was a spiritual rock-star.  And yet he sinned so majorly that 70,000 of his people were put to death for it.  How could this be?  Well the writer of Chronicles identifies the cause of David’s problems as Satan.  Never before in this whole book has that name been uttered.  In Genesis we read of a deceiving Serpent and in Job of a great Adversary but not before was the name Satan used.  Satan tempted David into a great sin of pride, into trusting his future to the increased number of his fighting men rather than to the provision and protection of his God.  And, when Joab gave David the opportunity to recognise his sin and to relent, he chose to pursue it anyway.  I can’t quite work out what would be today’s equivalent of counting the fighting men in Israel.  Would it be counting up our savings or keeping an album of all our live’s achievements?  I just don’t think that is it.  But it could be both of those things if they lead us to self-reliance and pride and a sense that we can do this thing on our own.  Above all things I think this passage urges us to be cautious and to be alert to the work of our Adversary.  After all, even spiritual rock-stars can fall.

1 Corinthians 1:18-2:5

This isn’t about success.  It isn’t about prestige and esteem.  It’s not about sharp suits and brilliant books and incredible sermons and astounding music.  It’s not about mankind’s achievements or any form of human impressiveness.  The point is not that they look at us and stand in amazement.  The point is not that the church gets acclaim.  We are weak.  We are lowly.  We tremble and we fear.  But we do know Christ.  We do know him crucified.  We do know the Spirit’s power demonstrated among us.  Faith should and could never be based on our own nobility or influence.  Faith should and could never focus on our own wisdom (or lack of it).  That is to entirely miss the point.  That is like thinking that a boat has the sea stuck to the bottom of it or that a bird has the sky all around it.  The boat floats on the sea.  The bird flies in the sky.  We rest on the power of God.  We rely on the wisdom of God.  His wisdom makes our greatest minds look foolish and his strength makes Geoff Capes look like Mr Muscle.  Our faith has never been impressive.  We were not called to be impressive.  People won’t come into the kingdom because they are impressed with us.  They will come into the kingdom because they see the power of God at work within in.  We won’t grow in the faith by doing impressive things.  We will grow in the faith by having God demonstrating his wisdom in us.  He is the great one.  He is the impressive one.  Our job is to remain aware of our foolishness and, in doing so, we will point to his wisdom.

Psalm 91:1-8

“He will save you from the fowler’s snare”.  Oh no.  I’ve never been worried about a fowler’s snare before.  I don’t even know what one is.  Oh Lord, thank you that you will save me from these terrible sounding things that I don’t have a clue what they are.