March 23
Num 36:1-Deut 1:46 | PS 66:1-20 | Prov 11:24-26 | Luke 5:29-6:11
Dashed dreams! As children we all imagine what our lives might be. Some are fanciful, such as participating in the Olympics, etc, but many are more common, such as one day getting married, or having children, or what life will look like as you get older surrounded by your growing family. Often these dreams don't quite happen as we thought. Yesterday, I saw an Orthodox patient who, now in her early thirties, was diagnosed with breast cancer in her mid twenties, required bilateral mastectomy, chemotherapy, etc. She is not married, and she is not sure how her prospects look for her in this regard. Another patient, also Orthodox, was married at the age of 19, only to find out that she has extremely low ovarian reserve. What that means is that outside of IVF, pregnancy will most likely not happen (she has one child now through IVF). With both women we talked about how God can use them where they are. God calls some of us to singleness, and some married women to a life without children. This might not have been their dreams, but God never promised them these things. But there are so many things that God does promise if we engage in a true relationship with Him. His promises, as opposed to our personal desires, will not be thwarted. That is why it is so important to continually be in His Word, to remind ourselves of God's faithfulness, and the many (some have counted over 8000) promises that He has made to us throughout His Word to us. Our hope must rest in Him, not our personal dreams.
Deuteronomy means "Second Law". These were not new laws, but God's perfect law being told to a new generation as they prepared to finally enter the Promised Land. We read in Deuteronomy 1:2-3, "It is eleven days’ journey from Horeb by way of Mount Seir to Kadesh Barnea. Now it came to pass in the fortieth year, in the eleventh month, on the first day of the month, that Moses spoke to the children of Israel according to all that the Lord had given him as commandments to them,". You can only imagine their dreams leaving Egypt, walking through the midst of the Red Sea, then receiving personal instructions for a year assembled at Mount Sinai. But that was 39 years ago. The generation entering was not that same generation. Due to disobedience and unbelief, the fathers of that previous generation perished in the desert. Discouragement is common and paralyzes people. Moses was calling the people to remember, recollect, and restate their trust in God. Things had not turned out as they planned, but God never changed their goal line, the people had lost seeing God along the journey. We read the promise stated in 1:8, "See, I have set the land before you; go in and possess the land which the Lord swore to your fathers—to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—to give to them and their descendants after them.’" On the brink of the Promised Land so many years ago, Moses reminded them what he had told their forefathers in 1:29-31, "“Then I said to you, ‘Do not be terrified, or afraid of them. The Lord your God, who goes before you, He will fight for you, according to all He did for you in Egypt before your eyes, and in the wilderness where you saw how the Lord your God carried you, as a man carries his son, in all the way that you went until you came to this place.’" But fear indeed overtook them, and that generation forfeited their right to enter the land that God had promised them.
It's important that when we reflect on God's goodness, faithfulness, and promises, we reflect on what God actually said and does according to Scripture, and not on man-made sentimental traditions. We read Jesus' words in Luke 5:36-39, "Then He spoke a parable to them: “No one puts a piece from a new garment on an old one; otherwise the new makes a tear, and also the piece that was taken out of the new does not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; or else the new wine will burst the wineskins and be spilled, and the wineskins will be ruined. But new wine must be put into new wineskins, and both are preserved. And no one, having drunk old wine, immediately desires new; for he says, ‘The old is better.’ ”" We should beware if we get discouraged because the God of our traditions has been dashed. Our traditions are often faulty and are meant to be dashed. Holidays filled with secular things have little to nothing to do with God's promises. God will not disappoint. His Word is true. He is faithful. We must keep our eyes on Him and nothing else to maintain ourselves on the course that He has set for each of us.
Messages from Pastor Lloyd Pulley: