Trusting God - is it safe or risky?

Without trust, it is impossible to have a relationship with God. How often must I learn this lesson?

Security is a myth without God, yet obeying God and keeping in step with the Holy Spirit feels like the riskiest thing on the planet – like bungee jumping without a chord. Leap and the safety net will appear!! In reality, though, walking in God’s will is the safest place I can be. But O does it take trust!

Here’s an example of what I mean from the Bible. Being an agricultural engineer, I would rather go for an irrigated crop than a rain-fed one. After all, who wants to depend on the elements? But true to character, God chose a rain-fed system for the special Land He chose for His people. Take a look:

10 The land you are entering to take over is not like the land of Egypt, from which you have come, where you planted your seed and irrigated it by foot as in a vegetable garden. 11 But the land you are crossing the Jordan to take possession of is a land of mountains and valleys that drinks rain from heaven.12 It is a land the LORD your God cares for; the eyes of the LORD your God are continually on it from the beginning of the year to its end. (Deut. 11:10-12)

Irrigating “by foot” is exhausting work though the farmer has the illusion that he is in control. But who can resist the appeal of “a land of mountains and valleys that drinks the rain from heaven”? Even our little garden of flowers and shrubs seems to leap with joy after a shower of rain. Water from a hosepipe just does not have the same effect. I read somewhere that rain contains dissolved nitrogen which has been “fixed” from the air by lightening. This nitrogen then fertilises the plants it falls on.

However, depending on rain meant that Israel would have to trust God to send it. Further, the reliability of the rains would hinge on their obedience to God.

13 So if you faithfully obey the commands I am giving you today-to love the LORD your God and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul-14 then I will send rain on your land in its season, both autumn and spring rains, so that you may gather in your grain, new wine and oil. 15 I will provide grass in the fields for your cattle, and you will eat and be satisfied. (Deut. 11:13-15)

Now one might be persuaded to think that God was arm-twisting His people. He wasn’t. He was establishing an early warning system intended for their safety. One can live independent from God and make things work without Him. It is tempting to do this even as a Christian. But because we are depending on ourselves it is possible to stray dangerously far from God without realising it. Would it not be better to have an early warning system? The Israelites knew that drought and crop failure was a warning that they had drifted from God, their source of true life and all good things.

We should live life in such a way that failure will be inevitable without God’s help. In fact, this is how God wants you to live. So may you allow God to lead you into that risky place of abundant blessing where obedience requires trust and success hinges on Him.

Cheers for now - Ian

The Theology of Border Crossings

We spent over four and a half hours crossing the border from South Africa to Zimbabwe. It was hot and sweaty. And I discovered that most of my fellow sufferers in the queue had no concept of personal space. At one stage, the person behind had established full body contact with me from my left ankle to my right shoulder.

It was staggering. But we got through in the end. One usually does. We kept reminding ourselves that nobody has ever spent the rest of his or her life at a border post. At times, however, it felt like we had.

Eventually, the exit was in sight, but we almost drove over a ZIMRA inspector because he had the temerity to jump in front of our car when we thought that there was only a gate guard between us and freedom.

“Why are you in such a rush?” he asked.

Oh, how delicious it was to be zipping along again at 120km/h in an air conditioned car, weaving around potholes and police roadblocks. In fact, we were so relaxed that we slipped into a theological discussion ... as one does on such occasions.

It began when I shared with the family my temptation to falsify our customs declaration. I was anxious that some unreasonable ZIMRA official would apply an unfair duty on something we had to declare. I did the right thing in the end, having decided it was more important to honour God by being honest than to save a few thousand rand. But my confession led to an interesting discussion about anxiety.

Gail had been reading a book entitled Redemption by Mike Wilkerson. Wilkerson makes the piercing observation that idolatry leads to anxiety. For example, if one idolises money, one worries about having enough. And when one has enough, one worries about losing it. And because of the anxiety one adopts all sorts of unrighteous tactics to either make or hold onto money – like falsifying a customs declaration.

The same could be said for finding a spouse. How many women have compromised God’s standards for fear of becoming an old maid? How many people live with an irrational, nagging fear of losing a loved one? Then there is anxiety over health related issues. Could health and security have become idols which prevent you from serving God with an undivided heart?

It certainly got us thinking... how about you? But before you go – is it obvious that I’ve put on weight during my holiday? Not that I’m worried about it...

Cheers for now - Ian

Unearned blessings

More than two decades ago when I was at university in South Africa, a friend and I were discussing the ethics of owning a luxury car.

“As soon as I can afford the repayments,” he said, “I am going to buy a fancy BMW.”
“Why would you want to do that?”
“By then my hard work will have earned me the right to enjoy a little luxury,” was the reply.

At the time, I can remember wondering whether he had earned the right to be born into a privileged race and a family that had the means to send him to university. How would his life have differed if he had been the son of an HIV positive, single mother living in Soweto? 

So many of the things we take for granted were neither earned nor deserved. Most good things are granted to us as a gift. We don’t earn them.

A few years ago, we were driving though a tiny Zimbabwean village called Bromley. Suddenly, my eye was drawn to a dog that was running towards the road. I braked and hooted.

“It’s a good thing you hooted when you did,” said Gail, “or that child would have run across the road.”

I hadn’t seen the child. In fact, if I had been on my own, I would have been totally unaware of the catastrophe which had been so narrowly averted.

But let’s not even think about behind-the-scenes-providence. What about the fact that your new-born baby is healthy and normal or that you have never been the victim of violent crime or that your father wasn’t a drunk or that you weren’t born in Homs, Syria?

Who does one thank for such blessings? And will we be called to account one day for the way we played the cards we were dealt in life?

Cheers for now - Ian

God's Presence

It is just not the coolest thing when one’s car overheats three days before a 2200km road trip.

“But at least it happened on the Borrowdale Road rather than the Biet Bridge one”, said Gail.

She had a point there! My wife always has a great perspective on things.

God had been gracious once again, protecting us from a breakdown on some remote, dangerous stretch of road in the middle of nowhere.
So having been warned by my Heavenly Dad, my earthly one towed us home, and we rushed to get to a wedding I was conducting.

On Monday morning, my good friend Mike from (you guessed it) Mike’s Radiators found a large hole in the radiator which he was able to weld shut. But the same evening, having taken Katherine to sing in a school musical, we discovered that coolant was gushing from the bottom of the car... hmmmm.

“Bring the car in tomorrow morning sometime”, instructed Mike, “and I’ll have another look at it”.

I got up early on Tuesday morning, anxious to get the car to Mike’s workshop first thing. Then a conversation struck up inside my head:

“What is your justification for taking the car early instead of having your usual devotions first?” 
“Erm... I want to be first in the queue”.
“But when you arrive, Mike will move you to the front of the queue. He knows about your holiday. Besides, the traffic will be lighter after eight. Perhaps God has something for you if only you will stop and listen...”

Reader, it was a struggle, but in the end I sat down at my desk when every part of me was screaming “do something to fix your problem” even if my efforts were going to be illogical and motivated by anxiety.

I am currently reading through the Bible in a year and wondered what encouragement I would find in the OT reading which was from Genesis 33. This chapter deals with Moses’ intercession on behalf of Israel after the incident of the Golden Calf. Because of Israel’s sin, God said that He would allow Moses to lead the people into the Promised Land, but God’s presence would not go with him. Moses was devastated.  So he pleaded with God, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here”. 

God’s response resonated powerfully with my spirit:

“My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest”.

It is hard to explain the effect these words had on me. But I knew that they were God’s promise for our holiday. Actually, this is a promise for life. God’s rest is founded on a sense of peace that transcends understanding because it comes from the settled conviction that God is in control and we are walking in His will, care and provision.

Moses was to go through some tough times. And so will I. But God says: “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” I would not trade God presence and rest for anything in the universe. And here I am overlooking the lagoon, rejoicing in the presence of God and the rest he is giving my family.

Cheers for now - Ian

Forget not all His benefits

I’m told that a new way of life is developing in some suburbs of Harare. Since the electricity comes on between midnight and four in the morning, people go to bed early, wake up at midnight to cook, wash and iron, and then go back to sleep again. Some friends of ours, however, haven’t received a single electron for more than three days.

This morning, I was up early taking Matthew to a Saturday athletics meet. I could hardly get out of my driveway there were so many water tankers buzzing around my neighbourhood making water deliveries. Our area hasn’t had a drop of municipal water for ... ten days? I think it’s been about ten days. Actually, I can’t remember. But, hey, we’ve had it easy; some people haven’t had municipal water for years.

Anyway, what with one thing or another, some people I know have had a belly full of it. And from time to time they get that stop-the-world-I-want-to-get-off feeling. I don’t blame them. But our experiences do show that there is truth in Jesus’ statement that “in this world you will have trouble” (John 16:33). Our fallen world will never be a place of comfort or safety. And at least our Zimbabwean experience denies us the illusion that life is stable. We are so frail. And our fragile lives depend on so many things that we have absolutely no control over.

It is no wonder that the psalmist wrote:

As for man, his days are like grass, he flourishes like a flower of the field; the wind blows over it and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more (Psalm 103:15-16)

However, he then goes on to say:

But from everlasting to everlasting the LORD's love is with those who fear him, and his righteousness with their children's children- with those who keep his covenant and remember to obey his precepts. (Psalm 103:17-18)

God has an everlasting love for you. His love endures from this life to the next. In fact, without His love, you won’t make it to heaven. Continue to respect and honour God, walking daily in His ways and everything will turn out ok in the end. Yes, you may not have water today, but “forget not all his benefits” (Ps. 103:2). Perhaps you should remind yourself of them by reading Psalm 103. I did, it was like drinking from a mountain stream on a hot day.

Cheers for now - Ian

Keep it real!

“Testimonies” at Christian meetings have great entertainment value. They can be better than reality TV ... by a long way. One testimony I heard years ago started with the words: “Six weeks ago, my parachute didn’t open. So I fell to my death. But praise the Lord, God raised me from the dead.”

I kid you not. That got our attention I can tell you. As one, we pastors stiffened, waiting for the young man to claim that his resurrection had happened on the third day! We would have taken him down quicker than you could say “schizophrenic” let alone “illusions of grandeur”.

Then there are those people who use testimonies to confess the sins of others whilst making themselves look good. “We had a bad day yesterday. It began with a puncture on the school run. My husband got out to the change the wheel, but before long he was swearing and throwing his tools out of the cot. Fortunately, with God’s help, I was able to calm him down and point out where he was going wrong. Isn’t God good?” Indeed He is, but you have a problem with spiritual pride, madam. In fact, I am surprised you don’t have a problem with loose teeth!

Occasionally, one experiences the jaw-dropping wonder of listening to someone who has learnt completely the wrong lesson from a close shave. “Last weekend, I joined the bikers’ weekend run to the Vumba. As I was coming into Marondera doing about 160 km/h, I was shocked to see a policeman step into the road. I was in an 80 km/h zone which meant I would be liable for a jail sentence. Immediately, I started praying in tongues under my breath. To cut a long story short, I got off with a stiff fine – Praise the Lord! Then, by the grace of God, I was able to catch up with the rest of the guys by sitting at 220 km/h – hallelujah!” 

Stunned silence!

God’s grace for other road users should have had this lunatic locked up with his own helmet for a chamber pot.

The last men’s breakfast I attended, however, had testimonies of a different nature. One elderly gentleman stood up to tell us that he had recently been diagnosed with an inoperable tumour in his neck. He had decided against chemo therapy and would let the illness take its terminal course. He was at peace with his decision. Would we pray for him till the end?

Another man admitted to having a problem with fear. He had been a Christian for close on thirty years, but he had only recently realised just how frightened he really was. All sorts of things made him afraid. Things like border crossings and his work.

What struck me about this man’s testimony was that he didn’t say, “I used to have a problem with fear, but God has helped me to get over it.” He admitted to being a work in progress. He confessed to weakness. You don’t hear that in too many testimonies. In fact, I think he is the first man I’ve ever heard confess to being afraid and anxious. Men just do not get afraid or anxious. That is for women and children. Men might get “stressed” or they might be “under pressure”, but they never get scared. Or do they?

All I can say is well done, sir, for keeping it real. After all, isn’t that what real men are supposed to do?

Cheers for now - Ian

Your kingdom come

Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven (from the Lord’s Prayer – Luke 11:2-4 and Matt. 6:9-13) .

How often have I prayed these words without reflecting on their true meaning? Come to think of it, what do they mean?

Let’s take the first phrase, “your kingdom come”. The word kingdom refers to the kingly rule of God. This kingly rule is both a present and a future reality. At present, God’s kingly rule has been established in every believer. Those that believe and follow Christ have God ruling in their hearts.  In this sense, then, much of the world does not belong to the kingdom of God.

One day, however, "the kingdom of the world [will] become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he will reign forever and ever” (Rev. 11:15). This will happen when Christ comes for the second time. Bring it on, I say!

 Therefore, when we pray “your kingdom come” we pray that God’s kingdom will spread one heart at a time until its full and final consummation at the return of Christ. This is not to say that every person will believe before Christ returns but rather that the harvest will have been completed.

The prayer “your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” is very similar to “your kingdom come”. In heaven, the heavenly beings carry out the will of God with complete obedience. We want the same thing to be true on earth. We want people on earth to follow the will of God in the same way as the heavenly beings do: with complete obedience.

It is significant that the Lord’s Prayer begins with an upward focus - “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name” – followed by an outward focus: “your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven”. The inward focus of provision, forgiveness and protection comes last. Focusing upwards to God and then outward to a dying world brings my personal needs into perspective.

So lately, I have been spending more time than I used to praying for the lost amongst my family and friends. I pray that God’s rule would be established in their hearts through conversion. I pray that they would start following God with complete obedience. And I pray for organisations like Alpha Zimbabwe, Foundations for Farming and Harvest church, for they are building the kingdom of God. Lastly, just as Jesus taught us, I try to make these prayers near to the beginning of my prayer time, before I get too bogged down with my own needs.

Cheers for now - Ian