Good morning, everyone.
Our verse for today comes from Acts 9:24, “But their plot became known to Saul. They were watching the gates day and night in order to kill him.”
Please tell me you have seen The Sound of Music at least twenty times. Three hours can hardly be spent any more enjoyably than watching this gorgeous musical about Fraulein Maria and the von Trapps. Julie Andrews plays Maria, who hires on as the governess to Georg von Trapp and his seven children. Eventually, Maria and Georg get married, but upon returning home from their honeymoon, Georg is met with orders from the Third Reich to report for duty, an order that Georg’s love for his beloved Austria and his abhorrence for the Nazis will not allow him to accept. So they decide to load up the car and flee Austria. Unfortunately, their brilliant plan is not so brilliant. They were going to pretend to be driving to a concert performance that evening, but instead head for the borders of Switzerland. However, Major Zeller, the officer in charge of commandeering Georg, sniffs out their plan, and he and his men are waiting for them outside their home to escort Georg to headquarters. Like I said, their plan wasn’t much of a plan. It had about as much cunning and ingenuity as the plan of the men who were waiting by the gates all day and night to catch Saul as he walked by. Georg’s plan to escape became known and he got scooped up by the authorities, just as the Jews’ plan to capture was known to Saul and he eluded them in a basket through a window under cover of darkness.
We can be simple-minded folk, can’t we? It doesn’t take much for us to think we have pulled the wool over someone else’s eyes. A little false emotion, some embellishment in our explanation, and we think no one is the wiser. Especially if we get away with it. But really, there’s nothing new under the sun. Our subterfuge and chicanery may include some modern props, but it springs from the same sinful heart that broke back in the garden of Eden. And truthfully, God hardly even needs to be God to see right through what we are really up to. Invariably it’s about self, and that motivation eventually shows itself. We may try to disguise it or dress it up, but we are all about us. And it’s exhausting, frivolous, pointless, and degrading to our Lord. He knows your plans, and He has better ones for you. Submit to the One who loves you with an everlasting love.
As we seek Him today, drop the finagling and the maneuvering and try following the will of the Savior.
Have a pleasant Tuesday.
#4 Rich Holt
Dad of Ripken, Koy, TrishaJean, Samantha, Kakie Holiday and Raleigh
Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them.
