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Editorial | Our Humiliation
bread only, but by every word that
proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth
man live” (Dt. 8:3). The tragedy is that so
many fail to respond as intended to the
humbling hand of God as a loving Father. The
Hebrew word there translated “humbled” is so
often used about the afflictions of Israel- in
Egypt, in the wilderness, at the hands of their
invaders. But they wriggled against it, their
bitterness driving them deep within them-
selves rather than to God and His Son. This is
the enduring tragedy of Israel, and Jewish
history. And it is the same with so many lives
today.
Job is a classic example of our humiliation,
although his exaltation was achieved even in
this life. We see the end of the Lord, that He
is very pitiful and of tender mercy (James
5:11). And out of that dialogue came the
statement: “All these things worketh God
oftentimes with man” (Job 33:29). We see this
to be true throughout the Bible and our own
experience, both of ourselves and of others in
our lives. And in all these things, man is not
alone. God is with us, Emmanuel, in Christ- in
the sense that the humiliation of our minds
and bodies is in order to forge ever further and
deeper our connection with Him. For we are
“in Christ”. Our baptisms signed us into
covenant with His death and His life eternal,
world without end: “For the death that he
died, he died to sin once, but the life that
he lives, he lives to God… We were buried
therefore with him through a baptism into his
death, that like as Christ was raised up from
the dead through the glory of the Father, so
we also might walk in newness of life. For
if we have become united with him in the
likeness of his death, we shall also be in the
likeness of his resurrection” (Rom. 6:4,5,10).
| Duncan Heaster
The Second Time
When Jonah found himself in peril because he
had evaded his mission to Nineveh, he prayed
to God “out of the belly of hell,” pleading
that he had observed “lying vanities” and
“forsaken his own mercy.” The Lord hear-
kened, and shortly afterwards Jonah found
himself upon dry land. In view of his
cowardice, the prophet must have wondered
whether God had any further use for him. The
answer to his thoughts was “The word of the
Lord came unto Jonah a second time saying,
“Arise, go unto Nineveh.”
Other servants of God were granted the means
to show that past mistakes really were
mistakes. The apostle Peter, who was brought
into such gall by his denials, was soon invited
to be converted and to strengthen his
brethren. John Mark, who forsook Paul and
Barnabas and thus broke up their partnership,
came to write the first of the Gospel records.
Those men are our comforters. We also have
failed, sometimes miserably, to heed the
word of God: but none of us need despair. The
experiences of Jonah, Peter and Mark, teach
us that God is not looking for our failures.
When, in our folly, we run away from our
responsibilities, He understands our weak-
nesses, and although sorrows may befall us,
He does not forsake us. His work comes to us
“the second time”, recalling us to the task we
shirked, He says, gently, “Go again!”
In refusing the bidding of God, we “forsake our
own mercy,” and when we fail in this manner,
let us recover ourselves, for He is faithful and
just to forgive our sins and cleanse us from all
unrighteousness.
Sorrow looks back, worry looks around
faith looks up
“Fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author
and perfecter of faith, who for the joy
set before Him endured the cross,
despising the shame, and has sat down
at the right hand of the throne of God.”
Hebrews 12:2 NASB
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