Footracing Horses, pt. 2

Bibiana is on vacation for six weeks. Five weeks to go...
I'm glad for her, but I never wanted her to leave. I found myself sad, nervous, scared, unsure, at the prospect of taking care of these children and this house on my own.

A friend suggested I re-read the book of Numbers, the account of Israel's wandering in the wilderness. He told me that the desert doesn't only represent difficulty, but that it is the place where they experienced God's presence and holiness and provision. That my own desert wandering, during these six weeks, could be the same.

If you've kept up with my blog, maybe you remember the post a couple months ago, in which I wrote about Jeremiah 12:5. "So, Jeremiah, if you're worn out in this footrace with men, what makes you think you can race against horses? And if you can't keep your wits during times of calm, what's going to happen when troubles break loose like the Jordan in flood?" (The Message)

Bibiana left on a Wednesday morning, right before the kids walked out the door for school, while they were still eating breakfast. After they were all gone and I was alone with a cup of coffee, the morning view of the valley, and God, I asked him if he was going to teach me to run with the horses now. A fellow missionary told me that I need a picture of some horses galloping to remind me of this.
--"What, with me running like crazy after them, trying to catch them? Oh, and I should put the kids' faces over the horses'!"
--"Just so long as you're not running ahead of them, about to get trampled down!"
--"I think it's more likely that I would be hiding behind a bush in the fetal position, letting them run on by."
Because that's my standard reaction: shut down, block it out.

My friend sent me another passage, Isaiah 54:2-3
“Enlarge the place of your tent, stretch your tent curtains wide, do not hold back; lengthen your cords, strengthen your stakes. For you will spread out to the right and to the left; your descendants will dispossess nations and settle in their desolate cities."
Here, according to the person who sent me the verse, I was supposed to feel that I'm not alone. Instead, I felt the Holy Spirit nudging me to not shut down, withdraw, block out. In fact, to do the opposite: to open up, to live fully, not on half-power.
But how? How does one keep up with horses? How do I strengthen my stakes and lengthen my cords when I feel like my resources are running low?

How have others done the impossible in the past?
In the book of Numbers, Moses has the ridiculously, impossibly difficult task of leading the unruly and incredulous People of God. Time and time again, when the people rebel, when they complain, when there seems to be no way out, this is the response: "Moses and Aaron fell facedown and cried out, “O God!" What strikes me about this is that these were the big guys, yet they didn't dare try to resolve the issues on their own. They realized their complete dependence on God and their utter incapability apart from him.

When I am pushed to the breaking point, this is not my natural reaction. I daresay it was not Moses and Aaron's natural reaction either, but they learned through trial and error that it was the only way. At Sinai, Aaron gave in to the people and made a golden calf for them to worship. Moses broke the stone tablets that God himself had written. They screwed up. But they moved on, and they became more dependent on God.

From that same post near the beginning of July:
"I believe that everything that comes my way passes through God's hand, is permitted by him (even though this is hard to accept when I think of the horrible things that happen in this world). Also, I believe that God uses it all for my best interest -- to conform me more to Jesus' image. Thirdly, that God permits more than I can handle, so that I must become more dependent on Him."

Dependency... when Bibi is here she covers my weaknesses at times. it's uncomfortable to have to go it alone, exposing myself and feeling like I have no one to keep me in check or support me. But maybe her absence is an invitation to let God work on those weaknesses and faults. A wilderness where I confront my errors, which I am incapable of redeeming, and let the Holy, Present One make me into something new.



"The power of the LORD came on Elijah and, tucking his cloak into his belt, he ran ahead of Ahab [and his horse-drawn chariot] all the way to Jezreel." (1 Kings 18:44-46)