Lubbock Chinese Church

Randomness

“Every two lengths of them were put to death, and the
third length was allowed to live.”       2 Sam 8:2

     After Davidand his army defeated the Moabites, he had all of enemies lie on the ground and
measured them off with a length of cord and killed all of them except the ones
who happened to fall on the third length of cord. There are many places in the
Scriptures that puzzle me, but this verse may be one of the more difficult ones
for me to comprehend. Why did David do such a cruel thing to the Moabites?

     Was it because he had difficulty figuring out who to kill and who to spare among the Moabites
he had captured, therefore he came out with this random way of selecting the
ones to kill? If he desired to show mercy to his enemies, why didn’t he just
spare all of them? I suppose he decided to spare one third of his enemies and
it was the best way to calculate.

     The randomness of this selection still abhors me a great deal. What David was dealing with was
human life, which was precious in God’s sight. It wasn’t some sort of game the
king was playing.

     What were the Moabites thinking when they were prostrate on the ground, waiting for the sword
to fall? All of them were expecting death, since it was a common practice for
victors to execute their enemies. They were thrilled when they realized there
was a slim chance that their lives would be spared, but one out of three was
still a very strong odds against them, as far as one’s life was concerned. Most
of them simply closed their eyes, waiting for the inevitable as the sound of
footsteps drawing closer and closer to them.

     O the dread of death and the zeal for life! How did it feel to be lying there, counting the
minutes before their heads fell? What were the Moabites thinking during those
critical moments when the Israelites were measuring their lives off with a
cord? How did they prepare for death? Did they pray to their gods for mercy for
themselves or for the loved ones who would be left behind?

     How do we prepare for the inevitable?

     One third of the Moabites’ lives were spared that day and they lived for another month or
another year, but lives would have been extremely difficult, for they surely
would spend the balance of their lives as slaves, laboring in the fields for
their masters. Did those surviving Moabites have any envy for their companions
who were executed while they were still being tortured by their masters? Some
twenty or thirty years later all of them would have been dead and all things would
be equalized. It mattered very little whatever manner they lost their lives,
since a good death was still death.

     Was David playing a joke on his hated enemies? It was indeed inhumane and cruel, but the
Moabites would have done the same thing, if not worse, to the Israelites had
they emerged victorious. Things such as this will continue to take place in the
world if we don’t eliminate the root cause of our inhumanity toward other men.           

Good Things

“Your covenant is trustworthy, and you have promised
these good things to your servant.”     2 Sam 7:25

     “Would you rather have a happy family or a successful career? You can only choose one of
the two,” I asked David during supper time last night.

     He pondered about this question for a while and ended up not giving an answer. It surprised
me, for I thought the response was quite simple.

     “Why can’t he have both?” Kathy jumped in, trying to help David a little bit.

     I guess the high school student who was staying with us had trouble responding to the question because he deemed having
a successful career very important, even more important than having a happy
home. Perhaps he felt having a happy home was a given and it would take great
effort to build a successful career.

     What were the good things David was referring to in his prayer?

     It is obvious that the king was speaking about God’s blessing his children and that his
kingdom would remain forever, which are indeed good things. Not only did God
endow David with a kingdom, he also promised that his children would succeed
him and the kingdom would last. What else could a man have asked?

     Did those good things have any eternal significance?

     Our relationship with the Lord should always precede the benefits we may receive from him, be
they physical or spiritual. What we need the most isn’t the gifts; we need the
Giver. We put the cart before the horse if we only seek blessings from the
Lord, but don’t seek the Lord himself.

     Solomon inherited his father’s kingdom, but he did not get his father’s heart;
therefore the throne really didn’t do the man any good except giving him some
earthly power and vain glory.

     I don’t really envy David’s kingship, albeit I am sometimes tempted by earthly power and
glory, but I do covet his heart for the Lord. My greatest desire in life is to
become a man after God’s own heart; and my biggest fear is I may turn into a
man who lusts for worldly pleasure and gain.

     The photo of Steven Jobs holding an IPad seems to me so hollow and empty, for I doubt the
man was thinking about all he had accomplished when he was standing before a
big crowd, applauding his great accomplishment. It was hardly a good thing to a
person who was struggling to regain his health. What would have truly been a
good thing for him at the time? A cure for his illness.

     If there truly is a final judgment, what will the good things be when we stand before the
judgment throne of God? A thing is only good if we still consider it good when
we stand before the portal of death, and it remains good after we cross the
river, assuming that we are still aware of things then. A thing is good only
it’s good eternally.     

Promise

“Do as you promised, so that your name will be great
forever.”                    2 Sam 7:24

    God always keeps his promises, but oftentimes we make a mistake by considering something
to be his promise, when it really isn’t.

    God isn’t beholden to us nor does he owe us anything. He pours his mercy upon us not for
our sake, but for his own sake, for he is by nature loving and gracious.

     “Are you saying that God simply can’t help loving his creatures?”  Here is a sticky question.

God is love and he can’t do anything that is contradictory to his attribute, but it doesn’t mean that he
does not have other options available to him as far as loving his children is
concerned. There are thousands of ways by which he expresses his love to his
children, many of which we may not appreciate.

Was it love when God took something we treasured away from us? Was it love when our hearts were broken to
pieces and life seemed to be so unbearable? Was it love when we experienced
sorrow so excruciating beyond what we could bear?

Do as you promised, Lord, we
pray.

It’s crucial, however, for the Lord to show us what his promises are so that we will know exactly when his
promises come true and will not grumble or start to question God’s love for us
when seemingly unloving things take place in our lives.

The greatness of God’s name should not be based on our interpretations of his actions in our daily lives.
How we perceive him on the basis of what has happened to us has nothing to do
with his greatness or lack thereof. God is by nature great and his reputation
will not be enhanced or impaired in any way by our perception of him. Let’s not
fool ourselves by considering otherwise.

God’s name is great forever, no matter what we do or how we perceive him. He was great before he created the
first man and will remain great when the last man perishes on earth.

O the divine self-sufficient, who can fathom?

The things we have done for the Lord may actually have been done for our own sake without us knowing it. To
love God is in reality to love ourselves and to serve the Lord is actually
“self-serving,” for we feel the most fulfilled when we fulfill God’s will and
feel the most complete when we complete what God has designed for us to
accomplish.   

What are God’s promises for us then?

He is the most glorified when we are the most satisfied in him. I came across this idea somewhere. The
promises he has made to us are actually the ones he made to himself and, as
long as we do his will faithfully, all his promises will come true and we will
find true fulfillment in life.   

His Very Own

“You have established your people Israel as your very own
forever, and you, Lord, have become their God.”           2 Sam 7:27

     The Lord is God over all, but he is yet to become your God. The universal God must become a
personal God to you so that the fact may turn into a reality in your life.

     Our perception of God does not in any way change God’s attributes and he still exists
eternally even if we don’t believe that he exists. God loses nothing if we
don’t love him, but we lose all things by not loving him.

     Why is it so hard for people to submit themselves to him? Why do people continue to wrestle
with him? Aren’t we all like Jacob, whose sole goal in life was to grasp
something for himself?

     Did God stoop to conquer us and make himself so small so that he can be recognized by our
timid minds and arrogant hearts? Do we treat him as if he was a mere man, since
he became a man?

     Why does the Sovereign care about me as if there was a void in his heart to be filled by my meager
presence?

     He was wooing me because I was beautiful, wasn’t he? There must be something really desirous
in me that made him pursue me so persistently, I fancied.

     I had great difficulty surrendering to him, for I was so afraid that he would completely overpower and
possess me and I would lose my entire self and turn into a non-entity. He was
coming toward me fast, and I ran away from him ever faster.

     I was a mere phantom that was drifting aimlessly in the air and fancying myself as something
solid and important. I was holding my present yet dreading my future, for I
could see nothing beyond my limited horizon. I desired to soar in the air as
free man, yet I was grounded on earth by my selfishness and sins.

     I am sure God had absolutely no use for me in his household. What did I have to contribute
toward his kingdom? In reality, I could easily have become quite a burden to
him with my loathsome presence.

     Why did he still come to me so persistently and so deliberately, as if there was something
in me that was worth his pursuing? Why didn’t the Lord give up the effort to
bring me to his house, since I had no intention of submitting to him?

     Ah, he was the father and he wanted me to become his son.

     What God intends to do, he will achieve, and he will never violate our will to rush the
process, for he is eternally patient. Therefore he will come after us
persistently and deliberately until we turn around and say “yes.”

This Far

“Who am I, Sovereign Lord, and what is my family, that
you have brought me this far?”         2 Sam 7:18

     David must have often looked with great amazement and wonder at how his life as a lowly shepherd
had transpired. He couldn’t help thinking while he was sitting on the throne about
the days when he was tending his father’s sheep in the wild.

     “How could this be?” he exclaimed.

     It seems quite impossible for someone’s life to turn out as David’s did, if we look at his life
from a human point of view. He didn’t come from a prominent family and he was the
most insignificant one among his brothers. How could such a humble person
become a king over a nation?

     The shepherd boy was by no means ambitious, nor did he dream big dreams. In fact, David
would have been quite content being a shepherd his entire life, for his
greatest joy was meditating on the goodness of God and he would have had ample time
doing just that being a tender of sheep. He didn’t aspire to go all that far in
his life, yet the Lord decided to take him as far as he could go, both
physically and spiritually.

     David would have had a lot of leisure cultivating his relationship with the Lord and his
intimacy with God would have been greatly enhanced had he remained a shepherd
his entire life, but that wasn’t what the Lord had planned for David’s life.
The Lord had something in mind for David to accomplish with his life and no one
was able to keep it from happening.

     I used to dream about doing great things for the Lord, which naturally involved me
becoming well known in the world and well recognized by my peers, for my
perception of greatness was pretty tainted by worldliness. My idea of becoming
great in the Lord was no different from achieving greatness in the world.

     How has the Lord brought you thus far?

     David had never envisioned himself becoming a king over a nation and most likely did not aspire to become one, yet the Lord
made him one without consulting him. Although he had become a king, I think
David still viewed himself as a shepherd in many ways. His outward circumstances
surely had changed, but his inner self remained unchanged. David had gone
thousands of miles from his old self, yet as far as his love for the Lord was
concerned, he remained the same person as before.

     Our circumstances may change constantly, but our love for God should remain
constant. Becoming a well known man would certainly do us harm if our status in
society caused us to perceive ourselves differently and to place ourselves
above all others. The weight of worldly glory may crush us and, if we are not
alert, we may be drowned by the waves of applause that rush toward us. 

God’s Love

“But my love will never be taken away from him, as I took
it away from Saul, whom I removed from before you.”          2 Sam 7:15

     We tend to base our love on fleeting feelings and powerful emotions; but God grounds his
love for us purely on his will to love. God does possess powerful feelings and
strong emotions, but those elements are not the basis of divine love.

     We love more when we feel more, and love less when we feel less, but fortunately, God doesn’t
act like we do. His love for his beloved is steady and unchanging. He loves to
the end after he has determined to love, and will not change, no matter how
difficult the circumstances are.

     I was caught by surprise that the market was so crowded yesterday when I went to pick up
something for supper. It dawned on me that it was the day before the Valentine’s
Day and many men were hustling to get something for their wives or girl
friends. The weather was quite cold but spring was in the air and people seemed
to be ready for the first breath of love brought by a valentine.

     “Shall I get something for my wife?” I asked myself as I was walking down the aisle, trying
to find something.

     “Hey, we don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day,” Kathy told me yesterday at supper. Should I take
her seriously and do nothing for the special day? I pondered. What will the
consequence if I do nothing for her tomorrow? I remember thinking.

     Probably nothing. I thought. After thirty-one years of marriage, I think we have gone
beyond all the trappings that people consider essential to maintain romantic
and to keep romance glowing. I hope that our love for each other has advanced
far enough and has been converted into agape love that is not grounded purely
on feelings and emotions.

     Come to think of it, a dozen roses and box of chocolate candy on Valentine’s Day can only enhance our love relationship. It
may not do a whole lot to improve our marriage; but surely it doesn’t hurt,
does it? Maybe I should quit being stubborn and get Kathy a little something.
No matter how tawdry they are, the things we do to express our affection for
our beloved should always be applauded.

     King Solomon was a God-fearing king initially, but he became increasingly worse as he grew
older and was seduced into practicing idolatry by his Gentile wives and
concubines, which was quite appalling considering his upbringing. Yet even so,
the love of God was not taken away from him, for the Lord had long determined
to love David’s son no matter what the situation was. Solomon had changed over
time, but God’s love for him didn’t change.    

Discipline

“When he does wrong, I will punish him with a rod wielded
by men, with floggings inflicted by human hands.”         2 Sam 7:14

     I once soiled a new shirt at school and the fear of being scorned by my mother gripped me for
an entire day. I don’t remember what actually transpired when my mother found
out, but the dread of being punished seems to be quite fresh up to this day.

     My dad had a bad temper and he yelled very loudly when he got mad, but it was thunder
without rain most of the time. I have never been spanked, as far as I can remember.
The worst punishment I ever received as a boy was kneeling down for an hour or
so when my grandmother took me back from running away for an entire week. My
heart was filled with apprehension during the long bus ride home, not knowing
what severe discipline I would receive when I arrived at home, but to my great
surprise and relief, the punishment didn’t seem to fit the crime at all. I, in
fact, got by rather easily for causing such unthinkable heartache to my
parents. I suppose they were just overjoyed that I was found and brought home
safely.

     The fear of being punished is often worse than the punishment itself.

     Most of us have total confidence in our parents’ love for us and, even after we do
something horrible, we know they will never punish us beyond what we can bear.
We know we will always come out safe and sound. However, we don’t seem to feel
the same way with God’s discipline. We dread that we will be completely crushed
if God ever lays his hand on us after we sin against him. Our heavenly Father
seems to be so much more unpredictable than our earthly parents, and he evokes
great fear within our hearts. Therefore, some of us may be leading our lives in
constant dread, fearing that God intends to bring us to our knees by exacting
severe punishment on us for certain things we have done.

     He will not spare us if he didn’t spare his only son from suffering. Don’t we all have this
morbid thought from time to time which robs us of our joy as God’s children?

     Indeed we have read so much about how suffering brings us back to Christ and how immensely
people grow spiritually after they have gone through severe trials, as if the
only key to spiritual maturity is trial and tribulation. We do want to grow
spiritually, but dread the method by which we can achieve that end. O let me be
shallow so that we can be spared from sorrow, we cry out.

     Up this point in my life, I haven’t been disciplined by my heavenly Father physically, for
which I am extremely thankful, for the Lord seemed to know what I could bear.
However, I have endured much emotional agony in the past, which might have been
God’s punishment for all my wrongdoings or spiritual failures. I guess whatever
he measures out for us is in perfect proportion with what we can endure when we
are in need of discipline.              

Father

“I will be his father, and he will be my son.”

               2 Sam 7:14

     I didn’t become my father’s son out of my own volition; I was born into his household.
My dad did the best he could raising me, but his best was indeed very limited.
My dad was a poor fisherman and a farmer who was illiterate. He could write his
name and his ID card identified him as “literate,” but writing his own name was
the furthest he could go as far as literacy was concerned.

     My dad was man with quick temper and powerful emotions who cried easily, yet he was
melancholic by nature, the character trait I unfortunately inherited. My father
couldn’t do a lot for his eldest son except to love him with all his might,
which was probably the only valuable thing he could have offered to him. Being
a young man with a strong romantic inclination, I left my father’s home to seek
adventure as early as I possibly could and had absolutely no consideration of
how my dad would feel losing his son to the glitz and glamour of a big city.

     I started to appreciate my dad’s love for me after I became a father myself at twenty-nine,
yet I still had great difficulty expressing my love to him and only did a
minimum of calling and visiting while he was alive. I was indeed a horrible
son.

     Being a father of three sons now I seem to experience what my father experienced with me as a
child. My children were born into my household not of their own choice and, had
they a choice at all, would they have chosen me as their father? Only they
themselves can answer this question, but I tried to do the best I could to
raise them just like my dad once did for me.

     Whether we are sons or fathers, there is a strong bond between us that can never be broken and
we all do our best to play the role well. The end result may not always be that
satisfactory, for we all have our limitations, but we do have the best
intentions for our loved ones.

     I lost my dad five years ago, creating a void that can never be filled, yet I still have a Father
to whom I always cling and upon whom I can always depend for solace and
support.

     Did I choose to love my heavenly Father? Not really. How could I choose to love him if I had no earthly idea that he
existed? How did I get to know him unless he revealed himself to me first? No,
I didn’t choose to know him or to love him at all; it was the heavenly Father
who decided to make himself known and to love me as his child.

     “I will be his father, and he will be my son.”

     The day finally came when I could call him “Abba, Father” without any second thoughts or
reservations. It was as natural as I called my dad abba when I was a little boy
and the intimacy behind the calling was heart-felt and true. My heavenly Father
chose to love me first and, by his grace, I was able to love him back.    

Greatness

“Now I will make your name great, like the names of the
greatest men on earth.”          2 Sam 7:9

     David didbecome great, but his greatness was quite different from other great men on
earth.

     David did conquer some nations, but his greatness didn’t lie in his conquest of nations;
he did slaughter many of his enemies, but he didn’t establish his greatness on the
destruction of enemies; he did found a formidable kingdom, but he didn’t derive
his greatness from being the father of a nation; he did compose many psalms
that moved people’s hearts, but his greatness wasn’t based on his literary
skill. David the man rose above all these superfluous things, which were
nothing but chaff and straw.

     David wasn’t great because of his loyalty to either to his nation or friends; he was great
because of his holiness and integrity of being a man of God. David was, in fact,
flesh and blood like all of us, and was capable of committing heinous sins.
Surely the man wasn’t above abusing his power while he was sitting on the
throne, for he took many wives and concubines and, in one incident, he even
took another person’s wife and, to cover his crime of adultery, he committed a
crime of murder.       

     David was great because he was a man after God’s own heart.

     This doesn’t mean that the man never did anything to tear God’s heart apart; it only means
the man’s heart was so very tender that he was quick to repent when the Spirit
convicted him of his sins. The worst moment in the great man’s life was when he
called the woman into his tent and the time when he schemed to take the life of
the woman’s husband, but the most glorious moment was the time when he repented
in sack clothes and ashes and composed a psalm of brokenness that has spoken to
millions of broken hearts and will continue to speak.

     It makes me feel rather uneasy when I read through David’s life, for he did some
unthinkable things and the blood he shed was beyond what I can bear. Yet, I
encounter a man whose relationship with the Lord was beyond compare when I read
through the book of Psalms and his love for the Lord often lifts me so high
that it causes my spirit to soar and to dance in the sky.   

     Do I desire to be great like David when he conquered his enemies and established his kingdom?
Do I want to be like him when he stood a head taller than his peers with a
crown on top and a scepter below? Do I yearn to be like him when he was
surrounded by the virgins of Israel and encircled by his concubines who craved
for his attention and affection? O let me be a dwarf if greatness is defined by
such things. Do I envy the man because his name was recorded in history and his
deeds of glory were lauded by school children studying history? O may this
never be. I just want to be like the man when he was lying in ashes, confessing
and repenting his heinous sins, which is the true greatness we should strive to
achieve.  

Moving

“I have been moving from place to place with a tent as my
dwelling.”

             2 Sam 7:6

     I made my first move from the village where
I was born to a city about a two-hour bus ride away to work at chicken farm at
age fourteen. I suppose the Lord made the move with me, for even though I had
no idea of his presence, he nonetheless was with me during that year when I
labored all day feeding the chickens, picking up the eggs, and drying and
packing chicken manure.

     About a year later I moved to Taipei and worked as an electronic store clerk for a few months and
then became an assembly line worker, working the grave shift at a GE plant.
There was no doubt the Lord made the move with me from a small town to the
largest city in Taiwan, for although I didn’t know the Lord, he certainly knew
who I was and took great interest in my development as a young man.

     I often went without food when I became a high school student, but the Lord took pity on me
by moving one of my classmates’ hearts to share his lunch box with me for an
entire semester. I didn’t know the Lord, but surely he knew me; and I didn’t
love him, but he must have loved me.

     Three years later, I failed to get into a college and the Lord took the opportunity to lead
me to a school where I heard the gospel for the very first time in my life and
I started to get inkling that there was an invisible someone who loved me.

     Then came the most difficult three years in my life when I was drafted, but the Lord must
have moved with me into boot camp as well, for apart from his protection I
could not have survived the kicking and beating during those months. When it
was time for me to move to the army engineering corps the Lord also move with
me, and with his help I was able to survive the hardships and boredom of the
next two years and nine months.

     The Lord moved to Taipei with me after I was discharged from the army. It was during this time
he revealed himself to me and I finally came to realize I was his beloved and
the Almighty had been wooing me without me knowing it.

     There were many more moves that I would make during the following years, but it finally
dawned on me that the Lord didn’t have to move with me no matter where I went
for he was omnipresent. I have since moved away from my country and settled in
a place thousands of miles removed both physically and spiritually from my
home, but there hasn’t been a single moment that the Lord wasn’t standing next
to me, caring for me and whispering in my ear how much he loved me. I have been
a sojourner in this world for close to sixty years, but I have been able to
make a home on this foreign soil, this planet earth, an enemy’s territory, for
wherever my heavenly Father is, I am home.