blessed

We are all easily offended people. We huff & puff, angry or frustrated at the tiniest of things: the spilt coffee, the unanswered text, the cut-off on the way to work. People fall short of our expectations, and we are disappointed. We doubt if we mean enough to them. 

We do the same thing with God, imposing our standards and expectations on Him as we would anyone else. "He's God," we say, "so surely He will take care of us." Translation: "Surely things will work out just fine, just the way I think they ought." We soon confuse His ways with our ways, and then we end up disappointed again. 

The last 6 or 7 months of my journey has involved a lot of pride, a lot of elevating my own ways above God's, and, this past week, I have sat in the rubble of disappointment as those plans have fallen, and God's way alone has been left like a brick wall in front of me, as my deep desire and expectation of returning to "my city" and "my students" in East Asia for Christmas is walled off with a resounding "No."

To say that I haven't been taking this very well would be a dramatic understatement. I've been ugly-crying at any mention of the trip, overly frustrated when I have seen others interested, and pridefully thinking, "I could lead them. I know that city. I love those kids. Take me back! Take me NOW!"

Frankly, I've been offended by God's answer, by His "No", and by the brick wall before me that definitively gives me that answer. Stiffening my neck, peering over the wall, I've been trying to figure out a way over its height. I'm asking "why" of God and whispering countless times, "I don't understand....I miss it so much." I want this. I desire to go back and once again tell the story of Christmas to those who have never heard it before. This aligns with the will of God, right?! What was such a clear and obvious expectation of mine when I returned last January faced many roadblocks of timing and money through the summer, until I woke up one day a few weeks ago, threw all the roadblocks out the window, picked up my map, and .... WALL. 

And, from behind the wall, there comes a voice, echoing from within and from around me:  "Blessed is he who is not offended by Me." These are Jesus' words to John the Baptist, His forerunning prophet who testified both to His coming and His divine nature. This promised blessing, however, is not in response to John's works, but to his doubts.

John too had been on a journey. He had proclaimed repentance to the masses as a training ground for the coming Messiah. He had seen Jesus and received revelation that this was God's chosen one who would take away the sins of the world. He had even baptized Him. It was a clear path.

But then, John too ran into a brick wall. Literally, one of each side of him. He was thrown in jail for his association with Jesus and His radical ideas. Yet Jesus--unlike John--wasn't acting particularly radically. There were no massive rallies concerning His political agenda, no public, grandiose displays of power. Instead, He was quietly teaching (though they were radical words) in synagogues and on hillsides, sitting with children, and stopping for the broken and the hurting.

These were not John's expectations concerning the coming one. All his life had been spent proclaiming this one's coming, but disappointment in Jesus' methods let to a question laced with doubt:

"Are you really the one we've been waiting for? Are you truly the promised Messiah? Or should we look for another?"

With this question, John raised another wall.

As have I. As we all have, at one time or another.

Jesus' response to John, and to us, promises blessing for the one who does not take offense at Him or His ways. The Greek word for "offense" is literally "to be scandalized" (we get our word for scandal from this Greek verb). What do we say when we confront a scandal?

“Oh, I would never…!”

“I cannot believe they did that!”

See the theme? We separate ourselves. We make it all about us. Our needs or desires are not met, and we are offended. Scandalized. 

We do the same thing with God, when His ways do not rise to meet our expectations or standards. We erect another wall--against the blessing promised to us. 

Jesus' answer to John is, in many ways, affirmative. His words include many fulfilled prophecies by His hands. But in the same passages He alludes to are words concerning the Messiah who was coming to set the captives free. Perhaps He leaves it out because, for John, it wasn’t going to happen. He wasn’t going to be released by a politically powerful Messiah. So, in part, he was receiving a “No.”

“No, John, I don’t fit all the expectations that you have nurtured over the years. But I am still the one you saw on the road coming toward you, when you said, “Behold! the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world! Don't go looking for another.”

“No, John, I’m not working things out the way you expected. But I am working them out according to my Father’s plan and it is the fulfillment of prophecy you have been awaiting all these years.”

“No, John, it is not how you expected or planned at all. But blessed is he who does not take offense at Me. Blessed will you be if you do not let yourself be scandalized by my ways. Even if they do not align with your expectations or plans."

“No, John, I am not the one who will rescue you from imprisonment. But I am the one who is coming; I am the one you have waited for. I am the one who will take away the sins of the world. Look at the evidence of my hands, even if it does not involve your own circumstances today. You will be blessed if you do not take offense at my ways.”

This passage in Matthew 11 doesn't reveal what John's response was. History testifies, though, that he did refuse to be offended, and eventually he lost his life because of that refusal. So, I believe, as he refused to be separated from Jesus, his second wall fell. Even if the prison walls around him didn't.

I know, for me, the wall in front of me isn't going to fall. But the one I've been harboring in front of it--the wall that makes it all about me, the wall that exalts my ways and my standards and keeps me separated from the "No"--it can fall. With surrender. With a heart that refuses to be offended by Jesus. With a heart that draws nearer to Him no matter what. 

And as I inch closer to the wall that does still stand, I find that this wall is adjoined to another, and it to another, as the way before me opens into a journey where there are no dead ends. Only guiding-walls to better things, greater lessons, deeper relationships, and stronger joy and peace in believing in the One who has come. It is here that we will find ourselves blessed. 

"Don't go looking for another way around the walls you face. I am the way."