Strait Blessings

I have been amazed and bereft of speech when it comes to how God can bless obedience and submission to His plans!

For over two years now, I have been purposefully and willfully choosing to submit and to be obedient to God’s plans and timing with respect to a certain issue. It has, without a doubt, been the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do my entire life. So many times, it would have been much easier to walk away from my authority and simply do that which seemed right in my own eyes.

Throughout this long journey, two paths were clearly discernable. The easy path was broad and inviting, lined with alluring promises and tempting offers. The other path was excruciatingly narrow and limiting, lined with boulders and strewn with obstacles.

Robert Frost talks about two paths diverging in a wood; one clearly defined and well-trodden, the other not as clear. Like the narrator of his poem, I chose – emphasis on choice - the more difficult, less-traveled, limited path. Many times along that rocky walk I questioned the sanity of what I was doing. Why would I subject myself to this difficult life path?

Because I had a promise. God had promised me at the very beginning that I would attain a life prize at the end… but I had to do it His way, not mine. Filled with fluffy and excited thoughts, I set foot on that path toward that promise. I had no earthly idea how difficult the road would be. I never guessed just how many rocks, boulders, obstacles, and pitfalls would be along the way. It never occurred to me how painful or how breaking my journey would be. I never thought it would take such a long time to traverse that path and never imagined what mountains I would have to climb or what lonely valleys I would have to tread.

I was never alone… and that with the vision of the promise given to me, urged and encouraged me onward in the harsh, restricting path. Though early on, I had many impulses to turn back and take the other route, at some recent point, the reward was so close that there was absolutely no point in even thinking of turning back or sneaking onto the other route.

The last mountain was actually a mountain range and I had to climb without human aid or consort to its peak. It was on that mountain range that I broke and became emptied of self, seeking only to let God’s will be done… it hurt too much to try and push my own agenda. Yet the struggle was not in vain and, footsore and weary I at last stood on that last mountain, looking into that Promised Land.

I have but taken a few steps down the mountain into that luscious valley and every step has issued jewels and priceless wonders. Blessings and miracles rain down on me at every turn so that I have no words to thank God for them. I cannot believe how much beauty and blessing are in this valley of promise – and I have not even descended the mountain!

Every sacrifice and every tear, every prayer and every cry, every choice to remain on that narrow restricting path has not gone in vain. The testimony of this walk has not gone unnoticed, the lessons learned have not affected only me – this story is much larger than I ever realized.

It is worth it all. I would never have appreciated the blessings which are starting to fall had I not been through the valley of affliction. I am amazed, stunned, blessed, agog with wonder, delighted, overjoyed, fascinated, touched, speechless at how God has blessed my faithfulness to Him. He has opened doors I never would have imagined and worked miracles my mind could not conceive of.

Now truly may I and those witnesses to my story say, “This is the Lord’s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes.”

The Importance of Being Obedient

Throughout I Samuel, we read about the lusting after a king by the Children of Israel and the subsequent answer to their prayer. Samuel was distressed that the Israelites would want a human to be their king instead of God, who was their king and he cried out to the Lord – and the Lord told him to give the people what they wanted.

The Israelites wanted a physical man to lead them in their battles, to tell them what to do, to guide them through life; someone they could see and interact with instead of the invisible, omnipotent God who led and guided them.

Samuel told the people the consequences of having a king. Yes, they would get their king, but the cost would be great. This king would take their sons for his armies and their daughters for his household staff. This king would take the best tenth of their fields, vineyards, and oliveyards not for himself, but for his servants. This king would take their servants and the tenth of their sheep. Finally, the Israelites would be the king’s servants.

You would think the Israelites would be deterred in their demand for a king… not a bit! After that terrible list of consequences, the people still rebelled and shouted that they would have a king so they could be like everyone else. And God heard their request and told Samuel to anoint Saul as their king.

Saul was a wonderful king, filled with the spirit of God and anointed to be king over the God’s people of Israel. He led them victoriously in battle and reigned with wisdom. This lasted for all of two years. Saul began to take himself more seriously than he ought and one day, because Samuel hadn’t shown up yet to offer the burnt offering, Saul stepped into that place and offered the burnt offerings himself – an act which was completely in violation of sacrifice protocol.

No sooner had he finished then Samuel appeared. “Thou hast done foolishly,” Samuel told Saul. He hadn’t kept the commandment of the Lord and therefore lost the promise of his kingdom forever in Israel; his lineage were no longer promised the kingdom. And this right at the point in his career when God was about to establish the kingdom on Saul and his descendants forever. Because of his disobedience here, he lost that right.

Some time after this, Saul again disobeyed the Lord in a profound way. Samuel brought the word of the Lord to Saul telling him he was to destroy Amalek completely – every man, woman, and infant; every ox, sheep, camel, and donkey… everything.

The first thing Saul did was to tell the Kenites who lived in Amalek that the should clear out because they had been good to the Israelites… then he started the battle. However, he kept the king alive and he and the people spared the best of all the animals and didn’t completely destroy everything.

When Samuel confronted Saul on this issue, Saul blamed the people and said he had followed the Lord, but the people took the animals to sacrifice with. At that point, God told Samuel that the kingdom had been taken from Saul himself. “To obey is better than sacrifice,” Samuel told Saul. “and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry.”

Because of his disobedience, Saul not only lost the promise of the kingdom for his descendents, but he lost his own kingdom a few short years after being anointed. The Lord took His anointing and Spirit from Saul and selected another who would love, serve, and obey Him. Not only that, but evil spirits beset Saul and he was mentally disturbed for the rest of his life.

Saul had lost everything as a direct result of disobedience.

A Royal Downline

Moabites were a pagan people in Biblical times. They followed their own gods and were not Israelites, yet when the two sons of Elimelech found themselves living in the land of Moab with a newly-dead father, they married Moabite women.

For about ten years, everything was fine. The two men and their widowed mother lived in Moab until they, too, died leaving no children. It was at this point that the mother decided it was time to go back to the land of Judah, pointing out to her daughters-in-law that she had nothing to give them – no more sons to raise up children to her dead sons’ names, no husband, nothing.

One of the women, though distressed, left to return to her people and her religion while the other insisted on going with her mother-in-law. “Whither thou goest, I will go;” she said.

This simple step of faith and dedication launched Ruth on the path to greatness. Her obedience and submissiveness to her mother-in-law opened the doors to a future I’m sure she never imagined. Not only did Ruth and Naomi end up living off the gleanings from Boaz’ field, but he “just happened” to be a near kinsman and therefore entitled to marry Ruth and raise up seed to Naomi’s sons.

Ruth listened to Naomi’s advice time after time, even though it seemed at times to be inappropriate or questionable. God blessed Ruth’s quiet submission and obedience by giving her, not just a husband and future, but a place of honor in the lineage of Jesus – one of three women mentioned.

Jesus was born of the line of David, but without Ruth, there would never have been a David. If she had decided to do her own thing instead of waiting on God’s timing, the chances are that she would never have met Boaz, let alone marry him.

She was strong in a quiet way, supportive, faithful, and loyal. Nothing she did seemed remarkable, yet her choices to do right did not go unnoticed or unrewarded. With faith, she worked and obeyed… towards a reward which had never entered her head.