This is a picture of the original cover of the book. This camel is just too cute, isn't he? |
This story is, again, from my "Lamentation" era about four-and a half years ago. What mercy and patience God has! You'll see why I say that after you read this! As we used to say in the 70's "I've come a long way, baby!" Thank Jesus for His saving Grace and the Holy Spirit for His gentle teaching! |
copyright Lin LaTrajet 1999 |
Prologue Ever had a bad day or an endless string of them when you are already way past the end of your rope when the last straw lands? God is never far away! Like a loving father, He is always there to pick us up, dust us off, and send us back out to work or play, always refreshed in body and spirit. He never forgets we are children. |
Another straw, another burden: A friend lost his job last week. Another prayer apparently gone awry. That's the last straw! And this week isn't any better, nothing but bad news flying at me from every direction into friend's lives and into mine. That's the last camel! I isn't just the straws of life falling on all of us, now the camels themselves are landing with a thud! I like that: It's really a much more graphic picture than "the last straw." A camel with all four knees buckling under it from a too-heavy load, and splatting with a tremendous thud to the ground because of one straw too many is a very clear picture. A camel can carry a massive load just as all of us do daily, but ENOUGH IS ENOUGH and TOO MUCH IS TOO MUCH even when it is only one more straw, especially when it is that proverbial "last straw." God deliver us, have mercy on us, raise us up for Thy own sake that we might praise You and glorify You always! Raise us up from the dust and ground of our lives where we lay flattened by worries, endless striving, and all the straws of this life. Can the dead praise God? Can lives void of the visible goodness of the Lord show forth His goodness? Can destruction and defeat and perpetual striving to simply survive running rampant in a person's life be exemplary to others in portraying God's great love and care? Has He purposed to destroy us so that all of life is futile and nothing but vanity? What Solomon shared in Ecclesiastes about the futility of life was God's own wisdom! It was not just Solomon's mental meanderings in a sarcastic bent on a bad day! What did Solomon have to complain about anyway? He had all the wisdom, all the wealth, and all the women! Is all of life just being in bondage in our individual "Egypt"? Then just more drudgery in the 'desert of life?' Is there no promised land flowing with the goodness of the Lord? No fulfillment of His promises? Do we ever get to His promised land to experience the great joy of sitting under a palm in the oasis of life in this lifetime on planet earth? The end of my rope was a long time ago. Soon my hand will cease to lunge for it in panic, it will have vanished out of sight. I will just give up and free-fall, hopeless and helpless, broken in spirit and in heart, in a dead faint from waiting for God to answer. Well, it isn't the last straw that has fallen on me, it's the camel! --- squashing me, squelching my hope, squishing all breath from me. The end of the rope is disappearing from sight above me! I lost my grip long ago, and have waited and waited for the goodness of the Lord to catch me and save me, not just one day at a time, one disaster at a time, but His everlasting goodness that alone is a long-term fix forever!!! "Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved for thou art my praise." (Jeremiah 17:14). Here's one of God's bigeminal verses full of extra power and meaning: Jeremiah 17:17: "Be not a terror unto me: Thou art my hope in the day of evil." I can hear Jeremiah's soul screaming that; my own screams likewise. God has promised to be our hope, so why does it seem at times that He Himself is a terror unto us? Where is He that all of these bad things continually befall us? Surely these days are evil beyond the imagination of any man, and maybe even God. It is hard to imagine that things could ahve been any worse in Noah's day or even in the days of Sodom and Gomorrah! God is fed up, many of us are fed up. The difference is, we are helpless to change anything about this world in which we reside except ourselves. God, on the other hand, can and will change everything in the winking of His own mighty eye, in less than a heartbeat of time, it will all change. He can also change things for us in the interim by harkening unto our prayers and answering. He can hear our primal screams for help,and the squallering of our baby-like souls, and He could pick us up and soothe us like a loving parent. Too many of us are weary of the battle having nothing but battered hope and empty baskets with which to fight our way through life. If we gain an inch, we free-fall a mile backwards. We are weary with looking up, waiting for His answers, hoping beyond hope for His help. How long can a human spirit, broken and defeated continue to salve itself with waning hope, slathering it on over reality, and somehow continue to muster the inner strength to stand, to dust oneself off again, and say, "surely things will be better this time." Falling through the black void of time and space, we must surely sooner or later come to the realization that it was, after all, only false hope or else we would not be lost in this void of nothingness with our soul-wrenched, repetitious cries for help echoing unanswered in the vast emptiness of silence. Yes, Egypt was necessary, that was, in fact, God's own doing, not just to the Jews, but in each of our lives. Bondage and slavery, and the breaking of the spirit to turn us back to Him. Yes, all that time in the desert of life was necessary to convince God that we would continually rely on His promises and not give up altogether, or go seek help and hope from some other source no matter how vain. But, is there no end to the desert of life? Is there no end to the trials of life? Is all of life the bread of adversity and the waters of affliction dished out in heaped up soup plates from the world and God? Interesting to end up in Jeremiah 18 where God says "as a potter with clay He will do as He pleases in every man's life, in every nation's life, in all of life itself of every kind. He is the Lord God and does as He purposes." "Every imagination of mens' hearts is only evil continually", and I see that clearly enough. None but a few on the planet seem to understand that what we give out to others will inexorably be dished back at us, heaped upon us in double measure. Do I have hope to live longer than the payback so I can see even a portion of the land of milk and honey? Or am I for some reason unknown to me, just to get the problems and never the fulfillment of the promises? Suddenly and surely, I flipped back in "Holy Spirit fashion" and looked to see I was at Isaiah 41:13! "For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto you, Fear not, I will help thee." Wow! And I read all the way to chapter 43:21, "This people have I formed for myself; they shall shew forth my praise." I could sense He was trying to encourage me. Well, I do praise Him for all the trials and tribulations. I thank Him for the "Egypt" of my life. I praise Him for the 'desert' of my life; but, I also remind Him that I haven't got another 40 years to wander here. Maybe He thinks I am so grateful for all the truths I'm learning through trials and tribs that He will just leave me here in the desert of life forever. No, He says, "Remember ye not the former things, neither consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing, now it shall spring forth, shall you not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert." (Isaiah 43:18-19). Well, hallelujah! That's what I'm waiting for!!! My heart pounds with expectation to see His goodness evident in my mortal life. God has His own time and purpose and plans. Will He tarry? He says He may, but not forever. Somewhere along here in all of this reading there was a reference to Habakkuk 2:18-19, that goes with Jeremiah's "don't be a terror unto me." Habakkuk 2 to me is God's promise to not tarry forever. "Though He does tarry, I am to wait, for the thing desired will surely appear!" When? Today, at last? Tomorrow, next week, month, year? This lifetime? "The just shall live by faith." Habakkuk 2:4. Yes, but "hope deferred makes the heart sick; but when the thing appears it is a tree of life." Proverbs 13:12. His own words! When each and every desire of my feeble heart is never realized on this earthly plane, I become devoid of hope, broken in mind and spirit. God knows that, that's how He made us. He knows we only survive with the "tree of life" that comes to us when the thing desired appears. How far does God Himself let me or any of us go in this? (Well, I think the Jews were in Egypt for 420 years, so that's frightening to think about!) How much of life is just learning lessons and for what? Surely all of this perpetual lesson-learning isn't going on in eternal heaven so that I will need all of this experience there, and exclaim, "Oh! I am so glad I learned that there!!!" No, that is not my concept of God or eternity, and not His portrayal of Himself or His eternal plan either. My God is a great God! He is capable of miracles, mighty works in the lives of those who love Him and in the lives of those who do not even acknowledge Him! His ways are marvelous! Nothing prevents Him when He purposes. I do thank Him for all the daily providing He does. I fully, still, beyond reasonable hope, having long ago lost my grip on my life rope, expect to see His overflowing goodness to the complete eradiacation of all that besets, burdens, and buries me in the here-and-now of my life. With my heart racing in fervent expectation, my soul pleading for God to deliver me from all these circumstances, am still looking up to see the salvation of my Lord and my God. I am parched to the point of perishing, expiring in the endless desert with no path in sight. I am waiting still to see His streams of water in the wilderness of my life. I am waiting for Him to show me the way in the wilderness. I am waiting for His promised, "Here is the way, walk in it." (Isaiah 30:21) I will not survive forever in the desert unattended and forsaken, not in a physical sense and, more importantly, not in a spiritual sense. When His Jews cried out for water in the desert, He did not give them anything but what was needed. When they cried out for food, He did not give them a pile of stones instead and tell them that was all they deserved. What they deserved was what He gave the Egyptians; but what He gave His people instead was everything they needed, including His mercy, His everlasting love and kindness, His providing, His plenty. I am standing by the road of life with an empty basket, and I have asked Him to fill it with that which is needed. Will He create a whirlwind to fill my basket with dust and stones? Will that satisfy my needs? Will that help me to help a friend or stranger along the path of life whose basket is also empty? Is that what He would have me do to others? Will that glorify God? Will it cause great praise and rejoicing in those around me to whom I am witnessing about His love, protection and care? |
Interlude I hope some of you can relate to what may appear to others to be incessant whining and complaining. This is how I process life and especially spiritual learning and growth. This was one of my marathon lessons one Saturday which lasted for 6 hours, and the result was so powerful, so blessedly wonderful, I hope you will continue reading to experience all of it! |
This page was last updated on: 2/18/02