A Word for the Church: Mirrored Rocks and Chasing Straw

If you're at all familiar with Greek mythology, you'll likely have heard the story of Sisyphus, who -- after he dies and enters the underworld -- is forced by Zeus to roll a massive boulder uphill for all of eternity. Each time Sisyphus nears the top the hill, the boulder slips by him, plunging back down the hill, and he must begin all over again. It's like the worst repetitive rendition of Groundhog Day ever. No matter what Sisyphus does, he's defeated and has to begin all over again.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I've got my laptop on my lap and a word in my heart that I believe the Lord has given me, and I don't have the first clue how to begin to package it up into a neat little post. This may be messy. Lord, help.

Habakkuk 2:2-3 says: "Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it. For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it; it will certainly come and will not delay." And then in 3:2, it says: "Lord, I have heard of Your fame; I stand in awe of Your deeds, oh Lord. Renew them in our day, in our time make them known; in wrath remember mercy."

Habakkuk is contextually speaking of the nation of Israel and their captivity under Babylon the Great... but I think our prayer can be the same: "Renew your deeds in our day, Lord. In our time, make Your great deeds known. In Your wrath, remember Your mercy."

In Exodus 5, we meet the new Pharaoh of Egypt (probably Amunhotep II). The old Pharaoh (Thutmose III) has died during Moses's 40 year sojourn in Midian. Moses and Aaron have received their instructions from the Lord, accepted their mission, and have now arrived back in Egypt's capital city to stand before the king. They look up at the most powerful man in the known world at that time and they say: "This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says, "Let my people go, so that they may hold a festival to me in the desert" (Exodus 5:1).

Pharaoh nods and says, "Sounds good. Take your time; you'll be missed."

Right? Oh, sorry, I read that wrong. Pharaoh says: "Who is the Lord, that I should obey Him and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord and I will not let Israel go" (Exodus 5:2).

Who is the Lord? It breaks my heart to hear people I love declare this very word. "Woe to him who quarrels with his Maker, to him who is but a potsherd among the potsherds on the ground. Does the clay say to the Potter, 'What are You making?' Does Your work say, 'He has no hands'?" (Isaiah 45:9).

Pharaoh does not recognize his Maker. He, the formed pottery, refuses to acknowledge the Potter. He calls Him a stranger. He will not listen to the authority of the Creator God. In today's terms, he may have even denied His existence, called Moses and Aaron toxic, told them to stop pushing their beliefs on him and his people. 

Here's the situation: The Israelites are Egypt's slave force who are building some grand and glorious cities. To build the cities, they have to make bricks. Every day, they have a quota of bricks to shape, and every day, they work under the hot Egyptian sun, mixing their daily portion of straw into mud to form bricks and let them dry. The bricks are carted off to the cities and the Israelites are building the structures with them. The straw -- in this case -- is the essential binding ingredient.

Pharaoh gets so angry over Moses and Aaron's message, he demands that his foremen stop giving the Israelites their daily portion of straw and tells the Israelites they have to find their own straw -- and still meet their daily brick quota. 

"So the people scattered all over Egypt to gather stubble to use for straw. The slave drivers kept pressing them, saying, 'Complete the work required of you for each day, just as when you had straw.' The Israelite foremen were beaten and were asked, 'Why didn't you meet your quota of bricks yesterday or today, as before?" (Exodus 5:12-14)

The Israelites might feel a bit like Sisyphus. No matter their best endeavors, no matter how much effort they put into their work, the king has asked the impossible of them. There is no way they can do what they've been asked to do.

In light of this, Moses and Aaron have lost a bit of their We-Are-Here-To-Save-The-Day superhero shine. Rather than thanking the brothers for the efforts on their behalf, the beaten Israelite foremen leave Pharaoh's palace after unsuccessfully presenting their case, and they find Moses and Aaron waiting to meet them. "May the Lord look upon you and judge you! You have made us a stench to Pharaoh and his officials and have put a sword in their hand to kill us."

This is a 180° reversal from the end of chapter 4 where it says: "They heard that the Lord was concerned about them and had seen their misery; they bowed down and worshiped."

See, they had been told that something big would happen. They had been told by reliable sources who claimed to speak the very word of God -- prophets, mouthpieces of God. They had seen the staff turn into a snake and back, and they had seen Moses stick his hand in his cloak, pull it out covered with leprosy, put it back in, and pull it out again renewed. They had seen the water turn into blood on the ground when it was poured out of a pitcher. All of this seemed like really convincing evidence that the Lord was speaking through His prophets.

They believed their governmental situation would change... 

Until it doesn't. Pharaoh's not going to open up his hand and let his slaves go. 

"But the prophets told us that he would!"

But Pharaoh hasn't.

"The prophets were wrong! May the Lord look upon them and judge them!"

Does any of this sound familiar in a slightly more modern context? It should. 

Israel's story isn't over yet, and we're going to unpack that story in all its grisly splendor over the next several chapters. Here's your spoiler: Pharaoh loses. The Israelites go free. But before that happens, God lays waste to the entire country of Egypt. He thoroughly routs them. He completely conquers them. If Pharaoh had said, "Sure, go ahead..." Egypt would have been a continuing threat to the nation of Israel, but God makes sure they will never hold His people in slavery ever again.

The Israelites, however, stop believing after the first time Pharaoh says, "No way!" They scatter over Egypt, looking for straw, for chaff. 

In case you're unfamiliar with straw... it's light, windblown. The breeze catches and carries it. When a farmer separates the wheat from the straw, from the chaff, he tosses the product of his fields into the air, and the heavy wheat falls back down while the straw blows away. 

The Israelites are following the straw; they're chasing after the wind. Their purpose is stripped from them. Only empty, blind, daily drudgery greets them. Their hopes are dashed. A brief, shining moment lights their visions when Moses and Aaron enter their lives, and then -- despair. Anger against the prophets. Anger against the false hope they'd brought. The stone rolls back down the hill.

In prayer this morning, I saw a vision of a deep canyon with a crowd of tourists preparing to navigate it. The canyon was strewn with enormous tabletop rocks, and the deeply creviced pathways through the rocks were where the tourists were getting ready to walk -- a complicated maze from one side of the canyon to the other. Tour guides stood in front of the crowd, struggling to talk over top of the people, who were milling around and looking confused.

Why? Because the rocks throughout the canyon were coated in mirrors, so you couldn't even truly see where the rocks were. Everything reflected everything else, so the pathways were obscured. The tour guides knew which way to go, but the tourists didn't trust them, because it didn't look like they knew. They kept yelling at the tour guides, calling them "blind guides." 

The guides pointed at the road, but the road was a hundred times reflected to most eyes, so no one could understand which road was the true one and which roads were false. 

Frustration rose. Many people sat down in despair. Many gave up hope. The purpose of the tour seemed to have disappeared. It was a chasing after the wind -- meaningless, mirrored fragments of illusory dreams -- vanishing with the daylight.

Y'all, there is one Way, and His name is Jesus. There is one Truth. Jesus is His name. There is one Way to the Father, and Jesus provides it. All the mirrored images in the world, all the look-alikes will lead to dead ends and confusion. 

Let me say this: if you find yourself in a dead end, a wrong road, a hopeless impasse, listen to the instructions. The Scriptures point to the one Way. His servants point the one Way. He will confront the power of the known world; He will lead His people out of bondage. 

"For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the One who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God" (Romans 8:20-21).

Straw, my friends, is decaying matter. Don't chase after it. Rather, walk in the hope of the glorious freedom from that slavery. Jesus is the one Way. There is no other.