Reading about Jabez in Charles Swindoll’s study guide, Old Testament Characters, really got my attention. He titled this chapter, Jabez: Disabled But Not Disqualified. My first thought: “Was Jabez disabled?” Of course, I was looking at the physical. He wasn’t born blind or deaf. He could walk, run, even leap. He didn’t have a withered hand and yes, he was in his right mind. Where was his disability?
The author began with the physical as well. He compared Olympic athletes. Each prepared for their specific area of ability. Swimming. Running. Gymnastics. Not one disability.
So, what was Jabez’ disability? I read those two verses that tell us all we know about Jabez:
“Now Jabez was more honorable than his brothers, and his mother called his name Jabez, saying, ‘Because I bore him in pain.’ And Jabez called on the God of Israel saying, ‘Oh, that You would bless me indeed, and enlarge my territory, that Your hand would be with me, and that You would keep me from evil, that I may not cause pain!’ So God granted him what he requested.” (1 Chronicles 4:9-10 NKJV).
I still didn’t get it. I saw that his mother “bore him in pain.” I thought about it. Maybe his gestation was arduous or his delivery painful. Maybe he was another mouth to feed in a poor, already full house. So, was he small? Hungry? Mistreated? Turn the page:
His name, Jabez, meant “pain.” Whatever caused his mother to name him “Pain,” he lived every day with a reminder that he was a distress. He asked God to keep him from evil so he wouldn’t cause pain.
Next, Jabez’ reputation: verse 9 begins: “Now Jabez was more honorable than his brothers ....” More honorable. He rose above the name that seemed should tear him down and God was able to use him in his specific calling.
Dr. Swindoll then quoted Charles Spurgeon:
‘“It will sometimes happen that where there is the most sorrow in the antecedents, there will be the most pleasure in the sequel. As the furious storm gives place to the clear sunshine, so the night of weeping precedes the morning of joy. Sorrow the harbinger; gladness the prince it ushers in .... More honourable than his brethren was the child whom his mother bore with sorrow .... The honour [Jabez] enjoyed would not have been worth having if it had not been vigorously contested and equitably won.’”
That’s where the author got me! My entire study time focused on “Where is his disability?” My self-righteous indignation as a person with a disability had clouded my perspective! I had quietly known it was there. I would think things like, “I shouldn’t always look for disabilities when a car parks in a disabled space, but ....”
My faith rose through the cloud as I faced my prejudice: I’m not special because I’m disabled. I’m special because I’m a child of the living God. Forgiven and set free. And God has been able to use me in His specific calling on my life.
“‘The honour [Jabez] enjoyed would not have been worth having if it had not been vigorously contested and equitably won.’”
He called me to be a person who would boldly proclaim what He does for me.
In Christ Alone,
Berta
Charles R. Swindoll, Old Testament Characters Bible Study Guide (1986 pgs. 51-52)
Charles H. Sturgeon, The Treasury of the Bible (Grand Rapids, MI,: Zondervan Publishing House, 1968), vol. 2, p. 1.
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Friday, August 5, 2011
What Can One Person Do?
Lost and alone, living in the turmoil of self-hatred and despair I worked in a hospital full of strangers and retreated to a bar each night. I had abandoned my daughter to her abusive, alcoholic father because I believed his words, “You can’t make it without me. You’ll either be back in two weeks or you’ll be dead.” I walked away.
One evening at work, I saw a man in a blue lab coat walking down the hall and asked a fellow nurse, “Who is that?”
“Earl? He’s the chaplain for our floor.”
Anger filled me. How could I be attracted to a preacher? We became friends despite our differences. Then we dated. Then we married. Baptism seemed the right next step for a preacher’s wife, but I didn’t feel “saved.”
Earl’s appointment to a local church helped me get custody of my daughter. As a pastor’s wife, I lived in guilt over my past. My lack of Christian faith and knowledge sent me into a tailspin of insecurity and isolation. Earl struggled with my behavior until I went on a Walk to Emmaus where God ministered His forgiveness of my past and healing for my spirit. Earl continued to love me as he helped me learn about the Savior who died for me.
What can one person do? As I’ve grown in Christian faith, God has placed people in my life who have needed Christian love and guidance. Most recently, I’ve befriended a young mother in need. Her love and dedication to her family and her willingness to share her family’s meager supplies with neighbors who have less has blessed me.
As Christ gave everything for me, if I could do one thing to change a person, I would be like Him and love them.
Paul said, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase” (1 Corinthians 3:6 NKJV).
In Christ Alone,
Berta
One evening at work, I saw a man in a blue lab coat walking down the hall and asked a fellow nurse, “Who is that?”
“Earl? He’s the chaplain for our floor.”
Anger filled me. How could I be attracted to a preacher? We became friends despite our differences. Then we dated. Then we married. Baptism seemed the right next step for a preacher’s wife, but I didn’t feel “saved.”
Earl’s appointment to a local church helped me get custody of my daughter. As a pastor’s wife, I lived in guilt over my past. My lack of Christian faith and knowledge sent me into a tailspin of insecurity and isolation. Earl struggled with my behavior until I went on a Walk to Emmaus where God ministered His forgiveness of my past and healing for my spirit. Earl continued to love me as he helped me learn about the Savior who died for me.
What can one person do? As I’ve grown in Christian faith, God has placed people in my life who have needed Christian love and guidance. Most recently, I’ve befriended a young mother in need. Her love and dedication to her family and her willingness to share her family’s meager supplies with neighbors who have less has blessed me.
As Christ gave everything for me, if I could do one thing to change a person, I would be like Him and love them.
Paul said, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase” (1 Corinthians 3:6 NKJV).
In Christ Alone,
Berta
Friday, July 29, 2011
God of the Old Testament
Today's post is provided by my husband, Earl Dickerson
My bride, the amazing Berta, asked me about the Old Testament several times recently. Other persons had been questioning her. Their doubts had managed to raise thoughts.
For example, "Is the God of the Old Testament really our God?" What about the violence and murder and stuff? Why did God go through all the heartaches of Hebrew Scripture? Was all of it necessary or was part of it God's mistake? Why not jump directly to Jesus and the good stuff?
Berta answered them in faith, but then came to me for confirmation.
Jesus makes it very clear in Scripture that He is a continuation of what His Daddy had been doing in the Old Testament. (Consider the words of Jesus in Matthew 5:17, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.” Or in Luke 16:17, “But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away, than for one stroke of a letter in the law to be dropped.”)
Jesus believed in the whole Bible, Old and New. But still we question. Was all that happened in the Old Testament necessary? Was God just finding what really works?
The best explanation I've heard of what God has done since humanity's Fall in to Sin at the Garden of Eden comes from Sandra Richter, professor of Old Testament at Wesley Biblical Seminary. Dr. Richter says God has been acting in a sequence of steps or increments represented by the five major figures of Hebrew Scripture. Increments were required because of the effects of Sin and the weakness of our humanity. Each increment offered God something lost through the Fall.
Before the Fall, every person on earth (both of them) was God's person. After the Fall, no one was God’s person, represented by the fallen Adam. In Noah, God gained a man. In Abraham, a family. In Moses, a people. In David, a leader, the forerunner of the Messiah. Each step was necessary to build to the crescendo where God could complete the Salvation Act in Jesus Christ.
Dr. Richter writes, “Genesis 1-2 essentially provides a blueprint to God’s original intent for humanity: God’s people dwelling in God’s place with full access to his presence.*” To get there, God took us through the incremental covenants of Noah, Abraham, Moses and David.
Finally, we have the New Covenant with Jesus - which by the way was first spoken of in the Old Testament:
“The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. {32} It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt--a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the LORD. {33} But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. {34} No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, "Know the LORD," for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the LORD; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.{35} Thus says the LORD, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar-- the LORD of hosts is his name:” (Jeremiah 31:31-35)
Hebrew Scripture turns out to be part of God’s grand rescue plan for me (and you, if you want it). As I see it, humanity started in a garden, Eden. We end in a garden, New Jerusalem. And a garden runs through the middle, Gethsemane. Our story has to account for all three gardens or it is inaccurate.
There were never any missteps by God, no intentional cruelty or second tries. The only way of humanity’s salvation was by the long and diligent investment on our behalf by a loving God in Christ Jesus. This is the Bible, the whole of it!
“Then He who sat on the throne said, "Behold, I make all things new." And He said to me, "Write, for these words are true and faithful." (Revelation 21:5)
In Christ Alone, Earl
End note: * The Epic of Eden, A Christian Entry into the Old Testament by Sandra L. Richter, copyright 2008 IVP.
My bride, the amazing Berta, asked me about the Old Testament several times recently. Other persons had been questioning her. Their doubts had managed to raise thoughts.
For example, "Is the God of the Old Testament really our God?" What about the violence and murder and stuff? Why did God go through all the heartaches of Hebrew Scripture? Was all of it necessary or was part of it God's mistake? Why not jump directly to Jesus and the good stuff?
Berta answered them in faith, but then came to me for confirmation.
Jesus makes it very clear in Scripture that He is a continuation of what His Daddy had been doing in the Old Testament. (Consider the words of Jesus in Matthew 5:17, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.” Or in Luke 16:17, “But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away, than for one stroke of a letter in the law to be dropped.”)
Jesus believed in the whole Bible, Old and New. But still we question. Was all that happened in the Old Testament necessary? Was God just finding what really works?
The best explanation I've heard of what God has done since humanity's Fall in to Sin at the Garden of Eden comes from Sandra Richter, professor of Old Testament at Wesley Biblical Seminary. Dr. Richter says God has been acting in a sequence of steps or increments represented by the five major figures of Hebrew Scripture. Increments were required because of the effects of Sin and the weakness of our humanity. Each increment offered God something lost through the Fall.
Before the Fall, every person on earth (both of them) was God's person. After the Fall, no one was God’s person, represented by the fallen Adam. In Noah, God gained a man. In Abraham, a family. In Moses, a people. In David, a leader, the forerunner of the Messiah. Each step was necessary to build to the crescendo where God could complete the Salvation Act in Jesus Christ.
Dr. Richter writes, “Genesis 1-2 essentially provides a blueprint to God’s original intent for humanity: God’s people dwelling in God’s place with full access to his presence.*” To get there, God took us through the incremental covenants of Noah, Abraham, Moses and David.
Finally, we have the New Covenant with Jesus - which by the way was first spoken of in the Old Testament:
“The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. {32} It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt--a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the LORD. {33} But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. {34} No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, "Know the LORD," for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the LORD; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.{35} Thus says the LORD, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar-- the LORD of hosts is his name:” (Jeremiah 31:31-35)
Hebrew Scripture turns out to be part of God’s grand rescue plan for me (and you, if you want it). As I see it, humanity started in a garden, Eden. We end in a garden, New Jerusalem. And a garden runs through the middle, Gethsemane. Our story has to account for all three gardens or it is inaccurate.
There were never any missteps by God, no intentional cruelty or second tries. The only way of humanity’s salvation was by the long and diligent investment on our behalf by a loving God in Christ Jesus. This is the Bible, the whole of it!
“Then He who sat on the throne said, "Behold, I make all things new." And He said to me, "Write, for these words are true and faithful." (Revelation 21:5)
In Christ Alone, Earl
End note: * The Epic of Eden, A Christian Entry into the Old Testament by Sandra L. Richter, copyright 2008 IVP.
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