Reading back through some previous posts, it almost reads like I’ve got it sorted, this walking with God thing, (I don’t) like I never waver (I do).
My favourite stand alone film which I come back to time and again as a ‘feel-good’ film is The Frisco Kid. I may have posted about it before. Its about a Polish Rabbi called Avram who travels to America. He is due to take up a post as a Rabbi in San Francisco but finds himself stranded in New York. The film is about the adventures he has as he travels across America by land. He encounters Amish, Native Americans, silent monks and those who want to take advantage of his trusting nature. He learns a lot about himself and how being a Rabbi is more than knowing the Torah. As he travels he meets a cowboy called Tommy who manages to keep him travelling to San Francisco (rather than Mexico – his sense of direction wasn’t great!)
Apart from being a film that makes me laugh, it also has a good message about going on journeys in life. At the end of the film, Tommy and Avram are having dinner before Avram becomes the Rabbi. Except he is having second thoughts. He made a couple of bad decisions and starts doubting his ability to be a real Rabbi. And it is Tommy, the one who doesn’t stick by the rules, who speaks sense.
Avram: Tommy, I am not a rabbi.
Tommy: Don’t say that! You are a rabbi. I’m a bank robber. I’m a card player. I’m a whoremonger. That’s what I am. You are a rabbi. You can fall in the mud, you can slip on your ass, you can travel in the wrong direction. Jut even on your ass, even in the mud, even if you go in the wrong direction for a little while, you’re still a rabbi! That’s what you are!
It takes someone looking from the outside, at the whole picture, to see past the mistakes that are all Avram can see. Tommy has travelled across America with him and has seen his actions and his character.
And I love that phrase “travel in the wrong direction for a little while.” It is never too late to change direction and get back on course.
What does this have to do with lent and focusing on God? I have travelled in the wrong direction, I have slipped in the mud, I have stumbled and fallen. My walk with God has not been smooth. But through it all God has been there.
There’s a verse in Isaiah that says ‘whether you turn to the right or the left your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, “this is the way, walk in it”‘. Psalm 139 says ‘Where can I go from your presence? Where can I flee from your presence?’. Jeremiah 31: 3 says ‘I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness’
Even at those moments when I wanted to walk away, God followed. At those points where I drifted, God called me back. When I slipped and tripped, when I looked foolish, God never left and never stopped loving me. He could see past the mistakes I thought counted me out, because he has walked the whole journey with me. He knows me better than anyone else.
So I am reminding myself to lay aside the things I think count me out. I am reminding myself that it’s God’s grace that matters. It’s nothing I have done, it is all on God. What I do, the direction I go in, it doesn’t change who I am. And it’s never too late to turn back to him.
So no, I don’t have it sorted. But God does. He always has arms open to welcome his children back. This journey to lent, 40 days of pointing to God, they are me keeping my gaze on God. Because God’s never taken his eyes off of me. That gives me reason to hope.
The Reason for my Hope Blog 