The Lord is watching everywhere, keeping his eye on both the evil and the good. [Proverbs 15:3 (NLT)]
After eating the forbidden fruit, Adam and Eve hid from God in the garden. Did they think God wouldn’t know what they had done and come looking for them? Did they really think trees could hide them or that fig leaves would cover their transgressions? We’re not much different. I remember when my brother used his questionable artistic skills to crudely enhance the illustrations in one of my mother’s favorite art books. Thinking she’d never look for it, he then hid the defaced book at the back of the bookcase. She, of course, did find it; like God, parents have a way of discovering our misdeeds!
While Adam, Eve, and my brother failed at hiding their transgressions, sometimes people appear to be successful at covering theirs. I have a friend with a “lead foot” who brags of talking his way out of numerous speeding tickets with such heart-breaking stories (none of which are true) that policemen are usually comforting him by the end of his tale. We all have ways of trying to conceal our wrongdoings, deny culpability, or avoid punishment. A word of caution: while our methods may work with people, concealment, rationalization, misrepresentation, and deceit will never work with God.
In the introduction to The Shadow, an old-time mystery radio program, this question was asked: “Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?” Said with an ominous laugh, the answer was, ”The Shadow knows!” At the end of each melodramatic episode, the Shadow’s eerie voice reminded listeners that, “The weed of crime bears bitter fruit. Crime does not pay…The Shadow knows!” While I have my doubts about the invincible crime fighter knowing what’s in our hearts, I know who does see the evil lurking there: God. We can hide, conceal evidence, lie, and deny responsibility, but we can’t fool God. We must never forget that He sees us all, all of the time.
Father, forgive us our sins and for foolishly thinking we can conceal them from you. Thank you for watching over us, for holding us accountable, and for your beautiful gift of forgiveness.
In failing to confess, Lord, I would only hide You from myself, not myself from You. [Saint Augustine]
Since we’ll be held accountable for our words, I wondered how many words that might be. In 1984, Gyles Brandreth claimed that by the time a typical American dies, he (or she) will have uttered more than 860 million words. Since Brandreth is an actor, writer, and Scrabble fanatic rather than a scientist, his number seems questionable. In 2006, Louann Brizendine claimed that women speak an average of 20,000 words per day while men speak a mere 7,000. Based on her numbers, in a lifetime of seventy years, women would have to account for over 511 million words while men would answer for about 179 million. While Brizendine’s qualifications as a neuro-psychiatrist lend credence to her statements, she provided no source for her statistics. Skeptical of her lopsided numbers, psychology professor James Pennebaker conducted a systematic study in 2007 that recorded the daily conversational word output of both men and women. He found that women averaged 16,215 words a day and men 15,669. Based on his numbers, both men and women will speak well over 400 million words in a seventy-year lifetime.
Knowing that God’s people must be fully committed to their cause in battle, Deuteronomy 20 provided several exemptions from combat. An anxious man wouldn’t have his mind on battle and could make blunders that might endanger the entire army. Because men too preoccupied with concerns at home wouldn’t fight wholeheartedly, those who were engaged to be married, had built a house and not yet dedicated it, or planted a vineyard and not harvested it were released from service. Moreover, anyone who admitted to being afraid was also sent home. This was done to keep their negativity and fear from infecting the entire army’s morale. A small army of faithful men was better than a large army of worried, frightened or fainthearted ones.
Two disciples, Philip and Andrew, are mentioned in John’s account of the day Jesus fed over 5,000 with a boy’s lunch. When Jesus asked Philip where they could find food enough for all of the people, the right answer would have been, “Lord, you have the power to feed them all.” Instead, Philip, who may have been the first century equivalent of an accountant before following Jesus, immediately did a feasibility study and figured the massive expense. Ignoring the solution standing in front of him, he only saw impossibility.
As I put away our various nativity sets until next December, I noticed they all include at least one lamb. Since shepherds came to see Jesus, it’s logical there would be a lamb or two in most depictions of Christmas. Nevertheless, as I packed up the figures, I thought about the shepherds and sheep visiting the child who was both the Good Shepherd and the Lamb of God. That Jesus took on both roles is a bit of a paradox. The shepherd may have watched over the sheep but, in the end, his lambs were destined to be slaughtered for food or ritual sacrifice.
Devotions of the Heart 