Cattle Work and Toe Screws
Notes
Transcript
Appreciate the time at the conference. Had sessions about culture change in a rural area, about pulpit ministry in the public square, brushed up on some preaching concepts, and got a whole bunch of encouragement from people that I only see once or twice a year.
The Sunday after conference, I like to share something that I learned from conference. We had four plenary speakers, one of which was Dr. Mark Yarborough the current president of Dallas Theological Seminary. Maggie and I both had him as a professor before he became president.
I would like to share with you his message on Monday night. This is his outline, with some of his illustrations, interspersed with my words.
I have retitled it: Cattle Work and Toe Screws.
Before, I jump in, will you pray with me.
Dr. Yarborough grew up in rural Texas, ranching country. He regularly worked on local ranches as a kid to pick up some spare cash. He really looked up to those older seasoned ranch hands. He really wanted to be like them, because they were so mature. I mean, they were 18.
Well, when he was 12, he was invited by those super-awesome 18 year olds to help work cattle. He was so excited because this was a big deal. He was moving up in the business. They told him that he had two rules to keep. 1) Wear steal toe boots and 2) don’t get backed into a corner. No problem. He’s got this.
The morning came, and he is stoked. He’s getting ready, packing his bag, getting dressed. He puts on his overalls, without a shirt, because he wanted to show off the muscles that he’s been putting into his 12-year old arms.
Then he looks at his boots. His steel-toe boots aren’t as cool as his other boots, and they are clunky, less maneuverable. So, he sets them over here, and grabs his snazzy cowboy boots.
He gets to the corral and jumps into it. The whole day goes without a hitch. He has been given them enviable job of a Chalker. He was to mark the back of the critters that had been worked with a line of chalk. He was jumping around, chalking forwards, chalking behind his back. Showing off all his moves.
Well, it was towards the end of the day, and one cow stepped down on one foot. Couldn’t move. He yelled, he pushed. He jerked the tail. But, the cow was not moving. As he was focused so much on this cow that he didn’t notice this other cow that stepped back right onto his other foot.
There he is, stuck, with cattle on both feet. If you can imagine what that felt like. He finally realized that no amount of pushing was going to move these giant bovines.So, he thought that he might be able to jump backwards.
That’s when he realized he was backed into a corner. He couldn’t go forward. He couldn’t go backward. He was stuck.
It gets worse. As on cow was standing on this foot, and the other cow was standing on that foot, a third cow managed to wiggle herself backward in-between the other cows, directly up to his face.
Her tail came up, and she unloaded what must have been weeks worth of poo right onto him, all over his face, down his clothes. He was covered.
That was just too much for him. He fainted. He fell back and hit his head on the post behind him. Thirteen stitches later, he wakes up to a group of eighteen year old cowboys staring down at him. He opened his eyes, and they said: “We told you two rules: wear the steel toe boots and don’t get backed into a corner.”
It’s amazing how easy it is for us as humans to forget easy things.
The Israelites consistently forgot two basic facts.
Who God is
What God desires from those who are his
Let’s read our passage.
And Samuel’s word came to all Israel.
Now the Israelites went out to fight against the Philistines. The Israelites camped at Ebenezer, and the Philistines at Aphek. The Philistines deployed their forces to meet Israel, and as the battle spread, Israel was defeated by the Philistines, who killed about four thousand of them on the battlefield. When the soldiers returned to camp, the elders of Israel asked, “Why did the Lord bring defeat on us today before the Philistines? Let us bring the ark of the Lord’s covenant from Shiloh, so that he may go with us and save us from the hand of our enemies.”
So the people sent men to Shiloh, and they brought back the ark of the covenant of the Lord Almighty, who is enthroned between the cherubim. And Eli’s two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, were there with the ark of the covenant of God.
When the ark of the Lord’s covenant came into the camp, all Israel raised such a great shout that the ground shook. Hearing the uproar, the Philistines asked, “What’s all this shouting in the Hebrew camp?”
When they learned that the ark of the Lord had come into the camp, the Philistines were afraid. “A god has come into the camp,” they said. “Oh no! Nothing like this has happened before. We’re doomed! Who will deliver us from the hand of these mighty gods? They are the gods who struck the Egyptians with all kinds of plagues in the wilderness. Be strong, Philistines! Be men, or you will be subject to the Hebrews, as they have been to you. Be men, and fight!”
So the Philistines fought, and the Israelites were defeated and every man fled to his tent. The slaughter was very great; Israel lost thirty thousand foot soldiers. The ark of God was captured, and Eli’s two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, died.
So, let’s paint the scene.
First, the Israelites are going to war against the Philistines.
This is a melodrama. The storyline is easy to follow. The Israelites are lined up here against the Philistines.
The Philistines are lined up against the Israelites.
The names of the towns here are known. This is a border war. The Israelites and the Philistines both want more land. It is the same stuff that we know these days.
Let’s put ourselves back there. Old testament warfare. Border war for jurisdiction. The fighting is all about terrain. One side on one hill. The other side on the other hill. It’s about visibility and mobility.
The Israelites think that they are set up well, but they are slaughtered. 4000 of them are killed by the Philistines. It’s a rout.
That is the first part of the scene to paint. Border war that is not going well.
Second part of the scene, this isn’t just a border war, this is an ark narrative. Something important is being said here about the Ark of the Covenant.
In 1 and 2 Samuel, the Ark is mentioned 61 times.
However in 1 Sam 4-7 the Ark is mentioned 36 times, over half of all the mentions in 1 and 2 Samuel.
How do the Israelites respond to royally losing to the Philistines? How do they respond to loss in order to get a blessing?
They bring in the Ark.
God had told the Israelites to build this Ark as they are leaving Egypt. It was to be a sign of God’s presence, filled with relics and memories of how God worked. It was stored in the Holy of Holies, to be kept pure by the priests.
It was not God. It was merely a symbol.
So, why did they bring in the Ark?
They lose. Their family, their neighbors, their friends, are lying dead in a field and they ask:
When the soldiers returned to camp, the elders of Israel asked, “Why did the Lord bring defeat on us today before the Philistines? Let us bring the ark of the Lord’s covenant from Shiloh, so that he may go with us and save us from the hand of our enemies.”
This is a great question!
It’s probably a question that all of us have asked. Something bad happened and we ask why?
And instead of waiting to actually see the why, we try to fix it. We say, I am going to do better. I am going to do something that will change the result in the future. I must not be going to church enough. I must not be reading my Bible enough.
So, we attend church, we dust off our Bible, hoping that our actions will change the future.
But, it doesn’t work that way.
The Israelites are living under the law. Between Genesis and Deuteronomy, there are 613 laws that the Israelites are charged to keep. If they don’t keep those laws, God brings judgment on them. If they are not in good standing with God, they will lose their battles.
However, if you do not obey the Lord your God and do not carefully follow all his commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these curses will come on you and overtake you:
The Lord will cause you to be defeated before your enemies. You will come at them from one direction but flee from them in seven, and you will become a thing of horror to all the kingdoms on earth.
After the Israelites win at Jericho, when the walls come falling down, God told the Israelites to destroy everything, but one man doesn’t. He steals some of Jericho’s treasure. The next battle, it was against Ai, the Israelites are miserably defeated. They find out that it is because of one man’s sin.
Basically, if anything bad happens in Israel, famine, pestilence, defeat in battle, it is because of not being in good standing with God.
So, it is a logical question: we have lost. Therefore, why did the Lord bring defeat on us today before the Philistines?
Their answer? Let’s bring the ark:
When the soldiers returned to camp, the elders of Israel asked, “Why did the Lord bring defeat on us today before the Philistines? Let us bring the ark of the Lord’s covenant from Shiloh, so that he may go with us and save us from the hand of our enemies.”
So, they said: Let’s bring the ark, so that “he” may go with us and save us from the hand of our enemies. Who is the “he”?
You might say: God. But, the Ark is merely a symbol of God’s presence. God doesn’t live there. Many translations actually say: Let us bring the ark of the Lord’s covenant from Shiloh so that it may go with us and save us from the hand of our enemies.
The Israelites wanted the Ark, because if they had the Ark, they had God.
They forgot basic fact #1: Who is God?
God is bigger than anything that represents his presence. The Ark just symbolizes his presence. God is much bigger than an ark.
You know, we are privileged people.
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
It is an awesome thing to be part of a chosen people, God’s special possession. We get to have a personal relationship with our creator. We get to know him.
Whenever something bad happens, we get to come to his throne:
Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
Any conflict or problem is an opportunity to trust God.
So, how big is our God? Is our God a cosmic being who created the heavens and the earth and is holding it together by the power of his hand?
Or have we put our God in a wooden box, like the Israelites did? Do we look at the Bible and say: That is our God! Do we look at the church building and say: That is our God! Do we look at religious rituals and say: That is our God!
As Kenneth Chafin wrote:
Having the paraphernalia of God and having God are not the same.
The Israelites forgot who God is.
They also forgot basic fact #2: What God desires from those who are his:
God wants a life-change that starts from a heart change. If we truly understand who God is, how we live in this world will change.
Looking at the text, who had a better understanding of who God is?
When the soldiers returned to camp, the elders of Israel asked, “Why did the Lord bring defeat on us today before the Philistines? Let us bring the ark of the Lord’s covenant from Shiloh, so that he may go with us and save us from the hand of our enemies.”
So the people sent men to Shiloh, and they brought back the ark of the covenant of the Lord Almighty, who is enthroned between the cherubim. And Eli’s two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, were there with the ark of the covenant of God.
When the ark of the Lord’s covenant came into the camp, all Israel raised such a great shout that the ground shook. Hearing the uproar, the Philistines asked, “What’s all this shouting in the Hebrew camp?”
When they learned that the ark of the Lord had come into the camp, the Philistines were afraid. “A god has come into the camp,” they said. “Oh no! Nothing like this has happened before. We’re doomed! Who will deliver us from the hand of these mighty gods? They are the gods who struck the Egyptians with all kinds of plagues in the wilderness. Be strong, Philistines! Be men, or you will be subject to the Hebrews, as they have been to you. Be men, and fight!”
The Israelites said: Let’s bring God into the camp, so they haul this wooden box and say: this is our God. He is here. Now we are fine.
The Philistines, in their pantheistic, idol worship, say: We are doomed. We remember who their God is. We remember what he has done. We cannot face him.
Eve though the Philistines are technically the bad guy in this story, they have a better understanding of who God is. And they present what God desires from his people. They show a broken and humble heart. They don’t follow through. They fight against God’s people, but at least they were humbled by him, as opposed to the Israelites who wanted their God as a good luck charm.
Years later, David commits adultery with Bathsheba. Nathan comes, confronts him, and David is convicted that he has sinned against a holy God. He writes Psalm 51, and says
Create in me a pure heart, O God,
and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Do not cast me from your presence
or take your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation
and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.
Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
so that sinners will turn back to you.
Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God,
you who are God my Savior,
and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.
Open my lips, Lord,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;
you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart
you, God, will not despise.
Realizing who God is, being humbled by it, and changing.
Do we present God a broken and humble heart?
The basic form of this is at the moment of salvation. We see God for who he is, the holy God who cannot have sin near him, and we realize that we are sinners. We are humble and broken and realize that we can do nothing about our sin, so we turn to Jesus as our only hope.
There are some of us who have never humbled ourselves before our God, and we are still trying to work our way to salvation, work our way to heaven. God says, will you stop! Realize who I am and be broken and humbled by it. Give up your pride and come to me.
This doesn’t just apply to salvation, but it applies to all areas of life. In farming and ranching, during calving season, haying season, planting and harvesting, in our businesses, dealing with employees and coworkers.
One thing, I have been convicted about this past week is how much of my life I try to do by myself, saying that I can do it, I am sufficient. When I am not.
I reflect on the rancher who said: God’s a better rancher than I am, so I am going to trust him to do the ranching. So he spend time with his family during calving. He made sure to still attend church and actively volunteer for church during calving and haying.
Realizing that we can do nothing. Without God we are nothing. Without him we can do nothing.
Well, Dr. Yarborough grew up and had a son. When the son was four, he was being a normal four year old boy. He decided to turn the bathroom into a jungle gym. He grabbed the towel rod and tried to walk up the wall.
He has no idea how it happened, but the towel rod was ripped out of the wall, the boy fell, and the screws attached to the bracket were in the boy’s toe. Directly through it.
Mark gets the phone call that they are going to the hospital. He’s confused as to what actually happened. But, he rushes to the hospital. Met by a four year old laying in the hospital bed, saying “I’m okay, dad”
Doctors are coming and going, all trying to figure out how to remove the screws that have impaled this foot.
They can’t just pull the screw out. So, they call the maintenance guy. He comes in with a screw driver.
It seems like all the doctors in the hospital have appeared at some time. The thought goes through his mind, that they better not all bill him for this, especially if he could have just brought his boy to Menards.
They explain the procedure. They are going to need to unscrew the bracket from the boy’s foot. Just then, this four-year-old voice pops up, “I need to talk to my dad.”
Immediately, all the doctors leave the room. Just Mark and his son.
His son asks him: Dad, will this make me fast?
Well, he will be faster with the bracket out than with the bracket in, so Mark says “yes”
Dad, is it going to hurt?
Yeah, it will hurt, but they will give you some medicine to help with that.
Dad, do you trust that man?
Yes, I do.
I don’t trust him, dad. But, I trust you.
If we realize who God is, we will have a life-change that is a result of a heart change.
We will look at the world around us and say: yes, I don’t trust what is going on. But I trust you God.
Yes, I am hurt by the pain of this life, but I trust you God.
yes, I don’t know what the next stage in life is going to be, I don’t know how my body is going to get through this, I don’t know how I am going to make it emotionally, but I trust you God.
I don’t trust him, dad. But, I trust you.
The Israelites didn’t.
This passage is very anti-climatic.
The Israelites said: We are going to bring God into camp, so they bring this box.
The Philistines said: God has entered the camp. We are doomed.
They go to battle. They fight hard.
And Israel is slaughtered again.
So the Philistines fought, and the Israelites were defeated and every man fled to his tent. The slaughter was very great; Israel lost thirty thousand foot soldiers. The ark of God was captured, and Eli’s two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, died.
This is a text that is meant to teach.
Trust God
Present him a broken and humble heart
But, the Israelite don’t get it. They need reminded over and over again.
Have you ever studied the memory of goldfish. There is a misconception that Goldfish have a memory of 3-10 seconds. That was disproven sixty years ago. They can have a memory of months, up to years.
However, bees have a short-term memory of 2.5 seconds. If the experience has to do with food, they will remember longer. But, ordinary experiences, 2.5 seconds.
Chimpanzees are a little longer. They have a short-term memory of 20 seconds.
So often we are like these. We need to have the basics over and over again.
But, these basics are important. Because the faithfulness of our life and ministry is based upon our view of God.