March 31

Day 17: Imagining potential challenges to our eventual re-emergence

1 Samuel is a fun book to read, with lots of stories that easily convert to coloring pages for our little ones on Sundays. 2 Samuel not so much. I find it to be sad in a lot of ways.

Try to hang with me through this...

Today I was in 2 Samuel 19-21. The backdrop describes King David re-emerging and returning once again as king. His son, Absalom, who had tried to take the kingdom from his father, finally died after getting his hair stuck in low hanging tree branches. True story: back in the early 70's I had a Sunday School teacher attempt to use this episode to tell us that this is why young men should not have long hair!

The previous chapter ends with David mourning his dead son. In chapter 19, the General of David's army, Joab, (rightly, in my view) rebukes David for caring more about his dead son than he did about the many still-living people who had risked everything to remain loyal to him. He tells David to greet and thank the people, or Joab would see to it that they would not be his people.

The chapter ends with the 12 tribes of Israel now arguing about who got the honor of escorting David back to Jerusalem. Oh, and David (having his grieving interrupted, and not liking being told what to do) tries to replace Joab with another guy. David formally forgives a lot of people; but Joab is not one of them.

2 potential challenges: 1) Leaders not responding well to counsel, and 2) everybody arguing about their place in line.

Chapter 20 tells of another rebellion that draws most of the population away. And Joab kills his replacement (always a questionable workplace behavior.)

Potential Challenges: 1) Power grabs, and 2) Self prioritized over everyone else.

Finally chapter 21 then tells us of David trying to right a wrong done against the Gibeonites, a subset of the people. He gives them seven male relatives of Saul to execute. And, those pesky Philistines keep causing trouble.

Potential challenges: 1) Needed restitution for wrongs done, and 2) the same problems we had before will absolutely come with us when we re-emerge.

I know this is kind of clunky. What's my point?

All of us, our entire church, leaders and followers both need to consider and prepare NOW for our eventual (and certainly hoped for) re-emergence. Our return to each other may be different than we imagine. We may find ourselves encountering challenges we did not see coming.

Some of us will have gained weight. Some of us may be in financial peril. Some of us may not be well. Some of us may be grieving. We might be afraid to hug each other. And many of us will experience attack, attacks that could be forming in our hearts right now.

Can we pray that we will all emerge from this season in unity, with forgiving hearts, aware of the threats to our souls, Biblically more grounded, and asking Jesus to intervene in our own hearts?

-Mike Rydman, Lead Pastor, Radiant Church | Juneau