Elimelech

Elimelech was a good man. A responsible member of society. Never missed synagogue, and his sweet wife Naomi was always at his side, always helping with the nursery, always willing to fill in for a missing kids worker. So people understood when he took his family to Moab. There was no food in the land remember, and everyone was doing what was right in their own eyes. Even though his friends indulged in a sharp intake of breath when he shared their plans, it all made sense. It's Elimelech you see, God is his King.

But what happened in Moab hardly bares repeating. His sons married pagan girls, well, surely there had been saved by Naomi's prayers...right? The stories kept coming back to Bethlehem. No children. Barren women. Then the worst of all news. Elimelech dead, his two sons left standing over a hole in the ground, and then, surely not, but a few months later came still worse news, Mahlon and Chillion had died too. Whether in an accident or from an illness, the reports weren't clear. All they did agree on was that Elimelech had chosen himself as King, not God, and it had led, as it always does, to separation.

Just like Adam and Eve. They wanted to be their own king, and it looked sensible. We've got all the other trees, surely we can have this one, and this friendly snake makes such a good case. And they, like Elimelech died. When you're your own king, however sensible it looks, you'll always die. When you skip church to work, or play, or sleep in, however good it feels, and however sensible it looks, you'll die. When you leave the house of bread to get bread, when you do what is right in your own eyes, you die, no matter how sensible it looks in the moment..

And sin looks sensible, it looks reasonable, it looks good. We know we probably shouldn't, but what's the harm. And if it doesn't ruin your union with Christ, it will ruin your communion with Him. Where there used to be a fire, now a rock, where there used to be joy only duty, where there used to be service only shirking.

The Jews cried out, 'we have no King but Caesar,' and my heart cries amen all the time. It looked sensible at the time. Why choose this redneck carpenter over the imperial machine. And what did it lead to? Separation, Mahlon and Chillion, burying and then buried.

When my heart cries no King but Caesar, for whatever good or bad reason, the Spirit replies, no King here but Jesus. When the guerrilla forces in my life take ground, the real King fights them back. Aslan is on the move, and it's certainly not safe. The real King, not Caesar, but Jesus claimed you by dying for you, by bleeding for you, by removing His grave clothes and humming Psalm Two, early in the morning on the first day of the week. The first first day, of the rest of the weeks.

 Because what we need is not to say, 'God is my King, and i'm going to make it.' We won't, it'll be death by a million paper cuts. What we need to say is 'Jesus is my King, and i only have hope as i hold tight to Him.' If Jesus is your king, yes, there are serpents in the garden, but they'll be crushed, yes there are holes in the ground, but they'll only be filled until He calls, yes there are sins we struggle, but they've been bled for.

Whisper it with humble confidence, and ask God for help...elimelech...God, be my King.