Being movable
This week is on Isaiah 4:2-6:
This is a glimpse of the future. Once disasters fade and God resettles Jerusalem and reestablishes a holy place, this is kind of what he has in mind. It'll be a beautiful and fruitful place, and in the middle of it you'd imagine some kind of gleaming jewel-encrusted citadel, maybe a compound with satellite dishes on it and a helipad, neon signs pointing the way to God, etc. Instead, we get this:
1. Some kind of fire thingie.
2. Smoke (surprise, surprise, given item one.)
3. A party tent.
If you were a kid handed a box of crayons and tasked with drawing God's ideal place for meeting mankind, if he'd subdued the earth for us again and set things up himself, this is not what you would probably draw. This is the God who presides over a sea of glass, from a throne surrounded by custom-built science fiction creatures. A giant tent with smoky fire seems a bit anticlimactic.
The fire and smoke are all we really need. The tent is God's first "dwelling" among us. People can find smoke easily in the daytime, and fire easily at night. (Or at least before we had our skies blasted open with zillions of street lights.) A tent can be set up anywhere quickly. That's why we use them in refugee camps and relief efforts, and don't do too much in the way of stone buildings with flying buttresses and stained glass windows.
The holy campfire and tent setup says a couple things about God's relationship with us. First, he wants us to find him. Fire and smoke are dead giveaways in finding where someone's camp is. Secondly, he wants us to get to him quickly. If we had to build a proper church before we could invite God into our community, that could take generations to complete. (Look up cathedral building times if you don't believe me.) God is on the scene quickly, and he's easy to find. After all of mankind has been through when these verses take place, that's exactly what we need.
God wants to be obvious and accessible. And so he is. We are so lucky. Next time you've got a few minutes, invite God to set things up in your life in that moment. It's not the complicated affair you'd imagine it to be.
In that day the Branch of the LORD will be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land will be the pride and glory of the survivors in Israel. Those who are left in Zion, who remain in Jerusalem, will be called holy, all who are recorded among the living in Jerusalem. The Lord will wash away the filth of the women of Zion; he will cleanse the bloodstains from Jerusalem by a spirit of judgment and a spirit of fire. Then the LORD will create over all of Mount Zion and over those who assemble there a cloud of smoke by day and a glow of flaming fire by night; over everything the glory will be a canopy. It will be a shelter and shade from the heat of the day, and a refuge and hiding place from the storm and rain.
This is a glimpse of the future. Once disasters fade and God resettles Jerusalem and reestablishes a holy place, this is kind of what he has in mind. It'll be a beautiful and fruitful place, and in the middle of it you'd imagine some kind of gleaming jewel-encrusted citadel, maybe a compound with satellite dishes on it and a helipad, neon signs pointing the way to God, etc. Instead, we get this:
1. Some kind of fire thingie.
2. Smoke (surprise, surprise, given item one.)
3. A party tent.
If you were a kid handed a box of crayons and tasked with drawing God's ideal place for meeting mankind, if he'd subdued the earth for us again and set things up himself, this is not what you would probably draw. This is the God who presides over a sea of glass, from a throne surrounded by custom-built science fiction creatures. A giant tent with smoky fire seems a bit anticlimactic.
The fire and smoke are all we really need. The tent is God's first "dwelling" among us. People can find smoke easily in the daytime, and fire easily at night. (Or at least before we had our skies blasted open with zillions of street lights.) A tent can be set up anywhere quickly. That's why we use them in refugee camps and relief efforts, and don't do too much in the way of stone buildings with flying buttresses and stained glass windows.
The holy campfire and tent setup says a couple things about God's relationship with us. First, he wants us to find him. Fire and smoke are dead giveaways in finding where someone's camp is. Secondly, he wants us to get to him quickly. If we had to build a proper church before we could invite God into our community, that could take generations to complete. (Look up cathedral building times if you don't believe me.) God is on the scene quickly, and he's easy to find. After all of mankind has been through when these verses take place, that's exactly what we need.
God wants to be obvious and accessible. And so he is. We are so lucky. Next time you've got a few minutes, invite God to set things up in your life in that moment. It's not the complicated affair you'd imagine it to be.
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