Dead End Options

The highway rushes down a long, steep incline which ends in a T. You absolutely must turn left or right. As I top the hill, my brakes give out. The old pick up truck continues to pick up speed. I pump the brake pedal to no avail. The speed intensifies so quickly that the antiquated axles are screaming, but I'm traveling much too fast to make a turn either to the left or the right. The tires are squealing as I try to veer to the left....

I still have flashbacks of that highway crash, although it happened many years ago. In fact, I have the same sensation today as I watch our nation accelerating on our seeming rush to destruction. Many of you know what I mean:

• There's the economic recession and the $9 trillion dollar fix. The people who insist they can fix this problem are, unfortunately, the very politicians who helped create it.
• There are sexual orgies and blasphemy on prime time television.
• There is the loss of credibility in public education.
• And there is the accelerating disappearance of healthy, American families.
• The brakes are gone, the axles are squealing, there is no way to turn...!

I take great comfort in the promises of my Heavenly Father, our Almighty God. When Moses killed an Egyptian and was forced to escape into the desert, he was moving in the wrong direction. Behind him were the people of God, the treasury of God's teachings, the history of God's work in the world. Ahead of him lay blistering sand, withering heat, waterless stretches without a tree in sight. And there were no "Chosen People" on the horizon. Whatever peace or victory could he hope to find by leaving God's community of promise behind?

Moses made his way to a region of the desert populated by descendants of Midian. Midian was one of Abraham's sons by Keturah. He had not been included in the Promise. He and his nation were not counted as Chosen People. And yet there in the wilderness among those Un-chosen People, Moses encountered Jethro, a priest of the Most High God. Jethro was not one of the Chosen Ones, but he was one of the worshipping ones. And he paved the way for Moses to rediscover the God of Israel.

God always knows what he must do next. Before Moses could lead the Israelites out of bondage in Egypt, he would need to experience desolation himself, and discover his own profound need for the One True God. But running for his life and advancing into the dreaded Sinai desert, he must have had the sensation of hurtling down a steep incline, out of control, with no place to turn.

God knew how to make an impossible turn in the life of Moses. He is the Lord of the Unlikely: unlikely people; unlikely circumstances. And so I pin my hopes on him and look calmly at the road ahead, even without brakes. Even when we are out of our control, we are never out of His.

Shalom!