“I can’t let you out of my sight for one minute!” How many parents here have ever said that? “I can’t let you out of my sight for one minute.” You said it to a small child, bent on doing something that would hurt. You said it to a teenager, on the phone instead of doing homework. You maybe even said it to your spouse, who, like somebody I know very well, is glued to his computer instead of bringing up the package of frozen food that was requested an hour ago! “I can’t let you out of my sight for one minute.”
For those of you who knew the Smith family when we were here as members twenty years ago, it may come as a surprise that people who look as young as we do have three grandchildren! But we do, and when the first one, Olivia, was little, we took care of her quite a bit while her parents worked. My story, then, comes from when Olivia was only about a year old – she is now six. Margaret went to the kitchen, just for a minute, and when she came back out to the living room, Olivia, just learning to walk, had crawled up about six steps toward the second floor of the house. She was not supposed to do that, but it’s hard to tell a child that young what she cannot do. So up the steps she went, as soon as her grandmother’s eyes were not there to see. Now Olivia had figured out how to crawl up; but clearly she did not know what to do to get back down. It was likely she would fall. So what was Margaret to do?
There were several possibilities. First, Margaret could have decided to demonstrate danger in a very definite way. She could have reached up and pulled that baby off the step, making her fall down and feel the pain. That sounds cruel, but it is a possibility, sort of like the Navy method of teaching people how to swim -- throw them in and let them learn. Margaret’s first option was to cause the very thing she feared might happen – falling down and getting hurt.
Or, second, Margaret could have decided to berate the little tyke in no uncertain terms. Can you hear it? “You disobedient little brat, I am going to paddle you so hard you’ll never climb steps again. You miserable little scamp, you’ll pay for this.” If you think that’s far-fetched and not likely from my sweet Margaret, I have to tell you I hear far worse in grocery store aisles, where mothers deal with grabbing little hands! One of the options was to tongue-lash the child and shame her.
Or, third, if she did not want to make the child fall, and if she did not want to vent her spleen in angry language, she had another option. She could have run up the steps, grabbed Olivia, and rescued her. That’s what grandmothers do, isn’t it? It would have been possible to end the crisis by jumping in and bringing the child down to safety. .
All of these things could have been done. But actually none of these things happened. You want to know what did happen? You’ll have to wait to the end of the sermon to find out!
You see, sometimes we do need to be watched. Sometimes somebody needs to keep an eye on us to supervise us. Many of us will not do what we are supposed to do without somebody looking over our shoulders. When I’m working at my desk, and I’m alone, I strew papers all over the room, I put my feet up on the desk, I surf the web at random. But let someone else come in, and I straighten up and fly right in a hurry! We need to be watched. Watching is good for us.
So, what do you think about God watching us? Do you feel that God sees what we are doing? My guess is that most of us forget about that. Most of us are oblivious to God’s oversight. We are not conscious of God watching, unless and until things get tough. But let stressful times come, and then, suddenly, we are aware that God is watching.
In the Bible, Job, after all his calamities, and after listening to the windy speeches of his supposed friends, is suddenly aware that God is watching. After all his losses, after his prayers and his pleas seemed to find no answer, suddenly Job is aware that God is watching. And he’d just as soon God not watch, for he finds the eye of God oppressive. He is troubled at what it means for God to watch him. Job considers three possibilities:
I
First, Job thinks that maybe God is watching, but is against him! Job wonders whether God no longer cares, but just wants to make him miserable. Is it possible that God wants the powers of evil to win? Job is becoming paranoid. God is watching, but Job wonders if maybe God is out to get him. So Job asks God a question:
“Does it seem good to you to oppress, to despise the work of your hands and favor the schemes of the wicked?”
Lord, are you now on the other side? Are you about to destroy your own handiwork? Lord, are you like the potter who is not satisfied with his craftsmanship, and so breaks it up before anybody can use it? Is God like the artist who looks at his painting, sees its flaws, and slashes it to ribbons before it goes to the gallery? Is it possible that God sees us, but is bent on making things as tough as possible? Just as Margaret might have jerked Olivia off those steps and made her fall, is it possible that God jerks us around, wanting to hurt us? Job’s question is a pointed one: “Oh, God, does it seem good to you to oppress?”
I’ve dealt with people who felt that way, people who felt as though the whole world was against them. Nothing they attempted succeeded, and the very universe was their enemy. I’ve worked with people who fear that God Himself has turned against them and is bent on destroying them. I had a parishioner at Takoma Park who suffered many things. She lost her health, she lost several jobs, she faced severe challenges from difficult family members. She told me on more than one occasion that she was afraid of God. She thought of God watching her as if He were looking for a chance to hurt.
But then when we would sit together and think about her problems, I would ask her who she spends time with. To whom did she listen? Invariably I would find that she sought out people who were themselves so damaged, so troubled, that they were bound to pull her down with them. Your experience of other people colors your experience of God. And so when your community, your peers, seem to want to do nothing more than tear you down, you will begin to feel that God too wants to tear you down. Job’s fear that God may want to destroy him actually came from the vibes he was getting from his friends. Job’s friends took a special delight in watching him suffer. They enjoyed his misery. It took their minds off their own deficits if they could see somebody else in trouble. And so they tore Job down and led him to wonder if God was out to get him.
Are you surrounded by hostile people? Have you allowed the venom that comes from jealous lips to poison your spirit? Have you permitted the Cains out there in the world to kill your Abel? If you are feeling that God is watching you only so that He may pull you down, then consider whose voices you are listening to. They may be the voices of those who would like to have you down in the gutter where they are. As the saying has it, “Misery loves company”.
No, let’s reject the first possibility. Just as Margaret did not jerk Olivia off the steps and make her hurt herself, so also when God watches us, it is not because He wants to destroy us. Be careful who you listen to.
II
Now then Job thought a little more, and this time Job wondered whether God was watching just to catch him in a fault, just to trap him in a mistake, sort of for recreation. Job said to God, “I know you are watching”. Is it this, Lord, that you just enjoy “gotcha”? That you just take great pleasure in my mistakes?
“Do you have eyes of flesh? Do you see as humans see? ... that you seek out my iniquity and search for my sin, although you know that I am not guilty”
Friends, it’s one thing to have somebody find and correct your mistakes in order to help you. It’s another thing to have somebody search them out and make billboards for all the world to see! Does God watch us in order to ridicule us and shame us?
I started my college career as an engineering student. I had an organic chemistry professor who took great delight in putting on public display the stupidity of his students. He would grade our papers and then he would sort them in grade order to give them back. Not alphabetical order, not the order of seating in the classroom, but in grade order, from the best to the worst. So on those rare occasions that I might have lucked out with an A or a B in that class, the test was handed back quickly, with no comment. A C might merit some wry remarks when it was given back. But let me tell you, organic chemistry was tough, after one test I sat waiting and waiting for my name to be called. It seemed that everybody else had their paper back, and I knew what that meant. I had failed and was going to be named a failure in front of my classmates. When the professor got way down to my paper, he started to pick it apart in public. “Listen to this. Isn’t this ridiculous? What was Smith thinking? How could anybody write such drivel?”
What about that! My teacher had watched for an opportunity to humiliate me. Yes, I did poorly on the test. Yes, I messed up. But he shamed me; and I found that I even lost the desire to learn that subject! I just wanted to go home and escape into a mindless TV show or fill my stomach with calories, just to forget! And eventually I listened for another voice. I listened for another voice to tell me something I could hear. I watched for another pair of eyes to affirm me rather than tear me down. In fact, after that class I listened to the Lord calling me to do something else! Shame did not take me where the professor wanted me to go! If you don’t like the preacher this morning, blame the organic chemistry professor who made me realize I was not going to make it as a chemical engineer! Shame sent me off in another direction!
Job is mistaken. When God watches us, it is to love us into obedience and not to humiliate us. Margaret didn’t berate Olivia for climbing the stairs. That wouldn’t have done any good. The baby was not equipped to understand. She would have responded badly to a tongue-lashing. God does not pursue us just to watch us fail. Nor does God seek out our iniquity just to enjoy our failures. God seeks us, but in love. God watches our sin, but to guide us. It is to urge us to turn elsewhere. It is to move us from fruitless pursuit to positive productivity. Job says, “I know you are watching.” But we need to be sure we understand that God watches with the eyes of love and encouragement, and not with a heart of ridicule.
III
There was a third option. Do you remember? Here was Olivia, up the steps, dangerously teetering on the brink of disaster. Margaret, watching her, could have pulled her down and let her get hurt, but she did not. Seeing what the baby had done, grandma could have chewed her out royally, but she did not.
A third possibility, the one most likely, the one most of us would use: rush up the steps, lift the child, and rescue her. We’d like that, wouldn’t we? Just as we’d like a God who would reach out His arms and scoop us up when He sees us in trouble; just as we’d like a God who would watch us and fix everything. Oh, don’t you like to sing that Gospel song, “Everything is going to be all right”? Don’t you love that hymn, “Be not dismayed, whate’er betide, God will take care of you”? Don’t you warm to the notion that God is going to fix it all? Amen? Right?
That’s what Job wanted and hoped for. “Lord, you are watching me. I know you are. Do for me what nobody else will do.”
“You clothed me with skin and flesh, and knit me together with bones and sinews. You have granted me life and steadfast love, and your care has preserved my spirit.”
Lord, you’ve taken care of me all along. Can’t you do it again? Can’t you rescue me? Can’t you just lift me and let me stand on higher ground? Oh, we would love that. We would love to think that God is a cosmic insurance policy such that every time we get it wrong, big old God steps in. “You’re in good hands with all-God!” We would love a safety net, so that no matter what foolishness we visit, no matter what blunders we make, God would step in and take charge.
But Job discovered that God does not do that. God does not rescue us from our own mistakes. God watches but does not step in on our timetable, at our command. God watches us, yes, but God does not rescue us from our own foolish pride or our own selfish arrogance. God does not override our freedom. Instead God equips us. He empowers us. He provides for us resources to use. God refuses to violate our freedom, but puts at our disposal the things we need for a productive life.
You know the old story, don’t you, about the fellow whose house was surrounded by floodwaters? He climbed up on the roof and began to pray that the Lord would rescue him. His neighbor next door, whose house was a little higher, said, “I can throw you a rope and pull you over to my house.” But the fellow said, “No, the Lord is going to rescue me.” As the waters rose, someone came along in a boat and said, “Here, come down off that roof and get in this boat.” But the man said, “No, I’m waiting for the Lord. The Lord will save me.” In a moment, just as the waters were about to crest on the top of the house, along came a helicopter. The pilot dangled a rope ladder and shouted, “Here, take this. I can get you out of here.” But the fellow waved off the helicopter. “No, don’t want your help. The Lord is going to save me.” And as he prayed on, with the waters rising up to his eyeballs, he cried out, “Lord, when will you save me? When will you help me?” They say that as he went under for the last time, a great voice was heard from heaven, “Who do you think sent the rope, the boat, and the helicopter?”
No, do not expect God to reach out of heaven and do for you what you would not do for yourself. Do not sit back and dare God to rescue you when He has already provided you with resources. Yes, God is watching. He is watching in love, and is watching to see if you will be responsible with what He has given you.
No, Margaret did not grab Olivia up and just rescue her. For the good news of the Gospel is that God is available to us only when we trust Him. All that God asks of us, when life is falling apart, is that we trust Him. The good news of the Gospel is that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us, becoming one with us in our trials, and making Himself available to us – but we must trust Him. We must trust that He accepts us and loves us. He expects us to take Him at His word, to abandon our anxieties and jettison our fears. Trust Him and He will partner with us. Doubt Him, and He will watch and watch and watch some more, but He will not simply rescue us. He wants our trust.
So no, Margaret did not jerk Olivia off the stairs and hurt her. And no, Margaret did not scream at Olivia and make her feel ashamed. Nor did Margaret rush up the stairs and snatch the little tyke from certain disaster. Here’s what really happened. Are you ready now? Olivia turned around, saw where she was up the steps, saw her grandmother out there, and, without hesitation, without a moment of fear or a touch of anxiety, threw herself off the steps toward Margaret’s arms. That child trusted that her grandmother was watching, she trusted her grandmother’s love, and she put herself in the care of one who loved her.
Job said, “I know that this was your purpose ... you watch me.”
But we say, “… I am not ashamed, for I know the one in whom I have put my trust, and I am sure that he is able to guard until that day what I have entrusted to him.”
