After Pentecost Devotional - Day 23

“When that happened, Yahweh told the donkey to speak, and it asked Balaam, “What have I done to you that made you beat me three times?” ... The angel said, “You had no right to treat your donkey like that! I was the one who blocked your way, because I don’t think you should go to Moab.” Numbers 22:28 & 32

All too often we are willing to shoot the messenger in our dislike of the message before us. We want to discredit the signs that we are in the wrong. We cast blame upon others, offer up doubts as proof, and focus our attention upon maintaining the course upon which we have embarked. In the process, we find ourselves bull-headed, stubborn, and refusing to see beyond what we have already assumed as truth.

Rather than assessing the information before us, we proceed without challenging our assumptions. After all, our assumptions about life have so often served us well. They allow us to locate food, water, security, friends, family, and proceed through life in relative safety. They allow us to drive with relative security, knowing that in general other drivers will obey the same rules by which we are operating.

The problem is when the unexpected crosses our path and we cannot manage to take a step back from our prejudices to make sense of the truth before us. Too often, we want to protect ourselves from addressing truth or uncertainty by simply discrediting the messenger. We claim that women can't preach. We claim that young people haven't earned the right to speak. We have claimed that Jews are Christ-killers, Blacks are less than human, that Muslims are all terrorists, Mexicans are lazy, the homeless are dangerous, Native Americans are dirty alcoholics, and users of social services are welfare queens.

What we find in the Bible is that all people are of value before God. More than that, we find here that God is willing to use an ass as a prophetic voice, and instrument to express his will and guidance. We even see here that the ass Balaam was riding exhibited greater perception than the prophet himself.

Instead of God backing up our negative stereotypes of people, we find a rather constant refrain in the Bible of God taking up beyond the limits of our stereotypes. We find God calling us to a greater perception than we more normally settle for. We find God calling us to recognize people as something more than our prejudices will allow for.

Sure, we still need to hang on to certain prejudgments of how life works. We also need to be ready and willing to understand that our assumptions about life and others are not always adequate, acceptable, or accurate.

Balaam had to confront several issue in this narrative. The central one was that he needed to be faithful as a prophet to speak God's message, not the words he was being paid to speak. This second one was that he lacked some very important perception of the truth right before him. Rather than laying blame externally, he needed to see beyond his established assumptions the reality before him.

What assumptions about others are you hanging onto that you need to let go?


"Lord, give em the courage to be more perceptive, aware, and willing to step beyond my prejudices in following you."

—©Copyright 2016, Christopher B. Harbin
http://www.sermonsearch.com/contributors/104427/ 
My latest books can be found here on amazon

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