Second Hand, Second Best

We knew it was the day my mother would leave this earth to go and be with the Lord. She had already slipped into a coma, and the doctors told us she would not live twelve more hours. My sister, my Dad, and I kept vigil by her bedside. As terrible as the situation was, I did have a sense of anticipation for the moment when her spirit left her body. I had heard so many stories of last moments when a departing loved one suddenly sat up in bed, raised their arms, or talked to some invisible being in the room indicating their readiness to go. I remembered the Acts account of Stephen, describing what he could see of God’s glory in the clouds as he departed this earth. So I waited in expectation for the Big Moment.

It finally came late that evening. No angels appeared, no fanfare was heard. My beloved mother simply stopped breathing. My sister looked up from where she sat at Mom’s head. “That’s it,” she said tearfully. “She’s gone.”

So much for the Big Moment! In the days that followed, in my intense grief, I questioned God. Why hadn’t He allowed us to see a hint of eternal reality as Mom passed from this life to the next? Why hadn’t He done something to reassure us He was present in the room? Why did we continue to only get silence from Him in our time of sorrow?

Eventually I came to realize that it was not God who let us down, but my faulty expectations of God that disappointed me. Where did those expectations originate? In the personal accounts of others.

Second-hand knowledge of God is truly second-best.

While the Children of Israel were in the wilderness, Moses pitched a tent outside the camp and called it a tent of meeting. Anyone who sought the Lord could go to the tent. We don’t know how many took advantage of the invitation. Exodus 33 does tell us that when Moses visited the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend upon the entrance. The Lord and Moses would then speak face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend. In contrast, the people remained at the entrances to their own tents and worshiped from afar.

Moses did not enter the tent alone, however. Exodus 33:11 reveals a young man named Joshua, a servant of Moses, went with him to meet with the Lord. Aside from Moses, only Joshua is also recorded as experiencing God on this first-hand, up close and personal basis at the tent of meeting.

So it comes as no big surprise when months later, as the people stood on the border of Canaan, that Joshua trusted God enough to go against the rest to voice an extremely unpopular opinion. They should go in and take the land. “Only do not rebel against the Lord; and do not fear the people of the land, for they will be our prey. Their protection has been removed from them, and the Lord is with us; do not fear them” (Numbers 14:9, emphasis added). This was a man who had grown to understand the character and power of God.

Where did his assurance come from? Joshua knew God. The time he had spent in God’s presence gave him an unshakable confidence. He faced the angry mob threatening to stone him with a conviction only first-hand knowledge could give.

However, when it came time for Israel to put their trust in God, they faltered. Their understanding of Him was not nourished by a first-hand relationship.

There is much we can learn from our brothers and sisters in Christ. But nothing can replace first-hand knowledge learned at the feet of the Savior. As a teacher, I found that active participation and investigation were far better instructors for my students than passive listening. God has fresh, wonderful things to teach you about who He is. Spend time getting to know Him on a first-hand basis and read what He has revealed about Himself in His word. Only then, when the moments of truth come along, stretching our faith to the max, will we be equipped to believe him because of what we know, first-hand, of his character.

“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” Jeremiah 17:7-8