Predicaments, and the Rescues from Them

by Herman Riffel

           What do we do with predicaments?  How do we find a means of rescue?

           In the 1940s the CCC (Civilian Conservation Camps) boys were sent from the inner cities of New York and New Jersey to the mountains of the west. That environment was entirely new to them, and led to many new predicaments for them.  One boy was sent to bring a bucket of water.  He came back with an empty pail because he could not find the spigot – a predicament which affected many until it was resolved. The cook in the camp was very eager to see a bear cub.  One evening he did not arrive in time to prepare for dinner so about 30 of the campers set out to look for him. They found him, halfway up a tree with the cub far above him and the mother bear and at the bottom. Now that was a predicament!

            I have a photograph of a little twin engine plane sitting on the runway of a desert setting in Africa.  The pilot has probably run to see his friend, or check on orders.  When takeoff time arrives, the pilot has come back to his aircraft and sees a pride of 9 lions resting in the shade under the wings of his plane. That is a predicament!  What shall he do? How can he get back into his plane? He dares not try to drive off the lions, but he has a schedule to meet!

             A woman was busy cooking dinner for her husband and family.  She remembered that she needed to run outside a moment to check on the flowers.  She did not realize that the automatic lock of the door was on, and she had not taken her keys with her.  Her dinner in the oven is cooking, but if she does not get into the house soon, the dinner will burn. It will catch fire and her whole house may burn up.  She is in a predicament!  But to call a locksmith will cost money that she cannot afford to spend.

           I needed to sell my house to buy another.  I did the usual thing.  I negotiated the highest price that I could ask for the house and arranged it with the realtor. Then I asked that my daughter and husband, who were in business, to arrange the sale.  My daughter signed the contract for me, however without the contingency clause that would say that I would agree to buy the new house only if and when the old one sold. Furthermore, what I did not know was that it was the beginning of the stock market crash in the 1970s.  My old house did not sell, even when lowering the price from one level to the next. Suddenly the time was up and I needed $100,000 quickly at a time when I had been living hand to mouth. That was a predicament!  I might be heading for jail.  What was I to do? 

          God knows that we will get ourselves into predicaments and he does not desert us, but has various ways to rescue us, and for that we need to listen to Him.

           The boy who wanted to see the bear cub had the eager desire to try something new, and  that was good, but he should have sought the advice of his counselor.  In his case the rescue came from his fellow campers.  Since he did not bother to listen to his camp counselor he got into this predicament.  But God’s provision was the other campers. Very often God will have others, whom we have ignored, to become the means of our rescue.  This was so in my life.  I had earnestly sought to seek God’s spiritual counsel from the Scriptures, but I despised psychology, really because I was ignorant of it.  But when my ministry came into a crisis, I yielded to a brief study of psychology that restored my ministry and even opened up much wider opportunities to serve God in an international and cross-denominational context. Up to that point, psychology was like the despised Samaritan – a Godless heathen – but remember it was that Good Samaritan that saved the man who had been robbed, beaten and left half dead. Christ had given me truth and life, but psychology gave me the practical application of it. Psychology brought me down to earth and rescued me.

           Sometimes we find ourselves in a situation like the man who had to wait for the lions to leave his plane.  His means of rescue is to do nothing else but wait.  The lions in our lives may be the means that God uses to cause us to listen to Him. I had a series of dreams in which I was running from lions or others of the cat family.  Night after night I would dream of running to hide and wake up of a nightmare.  Finally I was told that I must face the lion in the dream.  With that thought I went to sleep and in the dream I faced the lion.  To my surprise I found the lion to be friendly, so that I was no longer afraid.  In the last of that series of dreams as I was walking I saw the lion come in leaps and bounds behind me.  I put out the crook of my arm.  He put his head through it and we walked off together.  The lion represented a fear of taking assertive action in a situation, but when I did I found the results to be positive. Now instead of fighting and fearing that positive action I could actually integrate it into my life. Waiting for God is one of the hardest things to do, for reason wants to have dominance.  But waiting for God’s answer is the means of rescuing us from the predicaments into which we have put ourselves.

            The woman who had locked herself out of her house, found that her rescue will be the locksmith, but at a cost that she does not like to pay. But that cost is nothing compared to the cost of having her house burn down. Like the woman, I locked myself out of my house one day, and I found it very disconcerting to pay $50 to get the door opened. But that cost was nothing compared to the cost when I locked myself out of knowledge that did not fit into my world view.  For 25 years I struggled to be a good pastor, after the pattern that I saw around me.  The problem was that the pattern around me did not fit with the pattern that Jesus lived and taught. I was so frustrated because I could not do what I ought to do, but I had to learn that God did not expect me to do that.  He wanted to do His greater will with power in and through me if I would let him.  However I had been told that was not for today.  Finally God had to hit me over the head, so that my heart could hear.  Jesus had plainly told his disciples not to leave Jerusalem until they had received the power to be witnesses. The Holy Spirit would provide that power if only they would accept it. When I finally did open the closed door of my heart to the Holy Spirit and his power the world opened to me.  Jesus stands at the door and knocks, not only to come in for salvation, to heal us and give us all we need, but we think that the cost is too great.  But the cost will be our little reputation with its puny plans in exchange for the help of the One who is the heir of all things and wants to make us joint heirs with Him. Jesus said that there would be a cost involved in following Him.

            When I needed to sell my house, after looking at all the reasonable things to do, I needed to listen to God’s advice, but I did not wait.  That would have rescued me from the embarrassment, anxiety of perhaps going to prison, and the worries that came upon me.  My rescue came with personal and bank loans and the sale of the house at a low price that took anxious months to repay.  It was all because I had not listened to God before. There is no language that is as simple as the voice of God, but so hard for the rational mind and heart to accept. But it is so natural that Jesus said, “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:27). The lowly shepherds heard the voice of God through the angels telling them of the birth of the Savior.  But it is not the lowly alone, but the Magi, the wise men of the east, who heard and followed the voice that they saw in the stars, and Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council, knew that the voice that he heard was more than man’s voice.

            Learning to listen never stops.  God is gracious when we get ourselves into a predicament.  But His rescue may come in one of different ways. It may be by listening to others, or to wait upon God, or to be willing to pay the cost of God’s wisdom and putting the voice of God above reason.  Life’s problems become more and more complicated but God’s wisdom is sufficient for them all. It will be resisted by the mind that wants glory for itself. When we become quiet we will hear God’s voice. It doesn’t seem reasonable at times. And no wonder, because it is beyond reason.  It wants to enter subtly into every confusing situation and rescue us from our predicaments. The apostle Paul, with all his training in the best of Hebrew culture, cries out,

“Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!

How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!

Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?  ---

For from him and through him and to him are all things.

To Him be the glory forever! Amen” (Romans 11:33-36).