Author: Dave Dishman (Page 2 of 347)

In high school I joined the Caving Club. Caves riddle the limestone topography of the Ozarks, and our science teacher led a group once a month or so to visit a different cave. Dodging bats in the ceiling, wiggling through tight passages, and emerging as muddy explorers all made for a rollicking good time. I enjoyed spelunking, but never desired to live in a cave. A few hours in a dark hole pushed all of us to yearn for the light of day.

David spent a lot of time in caves hiding from King Saul, and in the darkness putting pen to papyrus. He wrote:

Have mercy on me, my God, have mercy on me, for in you I take refuge. I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings until the disaster has passed.

From his refuge in a cave David recognized the refuge of the Lord.

But while a cave makes for a good hide-out, it’s no place to spend your life. David wearied of the cave and prayed, I cry aloud to the Lord; I lift up my voice to the Lord for mercy. I pour out before him my complaint, before him I tell my trouble...set me free from my prison, that I may praise your name.

You and I find ourselves stuck in caves, some of our own choosing and some by life’s circumstances. Regardless, we don’t have to stay there. We too can pray for God’s mercy, asking him to pull us from our dark places. Like with David, the Lord is also our rescuer. He hears our complaints and sets us free.

Psalm 57 & 142 in Through the Bible in 2024

Photo by Justin Zhu

David took off running. Fellow Israelis revealed his hiding place to King Saul and David barely escaped. Saul tightened the noose, but at the last minute a crisis called him away. A close call brought on by the treachery of David’s once trusted neighbors.

David never forgot his betrayers. Even though they were of his own tribe, he called them strangers, ruthless, people without regard for God. David prayed, Let evil recoil on those who slander me; in your faithfulness destroy them.

There’s a boomerang effect to sin. What goes around comes around. David prayed for such action on those who double-crossed him and his men.

It’s an appropriate prayer today. Let the corruption of people who promote evil bubble up and burn them, may their wickedness blow back into their faces. I think of the vicious and profane King Herod who because he did not give praise to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died.

What goes around comes around. We should pray for our enemies, that those who commit evil would find Jesus and repent. But following the example of David, we can also pray that they would reap the results of their dishonorable acts and experience the recoil of their evil.

Psalm 54 & Acts 12 in Through the Bible in 2024

Photo by Dmitry Bukhantsov

Several years ago I traveled to New York City for a work trip. One evening a colleague gathered a group to visit a trendy restaurant. I joined the party, looking forward to the culinary excursion. We started our meal sharing a variety of appetizers. My friend ordered one featuring beets, long forgotten but once again in vogue.

As a kid I hated beets. I thought they tasted like dirt. Now after many years, I spooned a few on my plate. I thought, Why not? I’m a grown man and enjoys lots of different foods, so maybe beets aren’t so bad. One bite brought me back. Same grainy mash of soil. I scraped the remaining beets onto my neighbor’s plate and reached for a chicken wing to kill the taste.

It’s easy to let a crowd pull you where you don’t want to go. At a restaurant it’s actually a lot of fun, but in life the wisdom of the crowd sometimes turns to madness.

Paul and Barnabus experienced such madness as they carried the good news of Jesus to a town named Lystra. Paul miraculously healed a man lame from birth, and when the crowd saw the man jumping around, they went wild. They shouted, The gods have come down to us in human form! Thinking Paul and Barnabus were Hermes and Zeus, they hung wreaths in their honor and wrangled cattle to sacrifice.

Paul responded: Friends, why are you doing this? We too are only human, like you. We are bringing you good news, telling you to turn from these worthless things to the living God.

The crowd roiled around them. Deprived of their gods, they eventually turned on the evangelists. They stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, leaving him for dead. Only by the good hand of the Lord did Paul survive.

In the chaos, the crowd lost the message of a Savior. One minute euphoria, the next minute dashed hopes morphing into rage. Hope lay trampled under the madness of the mob.

Paul and Barnabus moved on, leaving the people of Lystra with the empty myths of Hermes and Zeus. But amazingly, months later they returned. Not everyone missed out on their message of Jesus. Among the believers they met Timothy, who joined them on their missionary journey.

Gobs of people chase popularity. But behind the masses are folks quietly considering the truth. Worry less about appealing to the crowd and more about connecting with those seekers of the Way.

Acts 14 in Through the Bible in 2024

Photo by Farhad Ibrahimzade

Along with April showers and May flowers, spring brings baseball. I follow three major league baseball teams—the St. Louis Cardinals and Kansas City Royals (whose fandom I acquired growing up in Missouri), and my local team, the Colorado Rockies.

Last season all three finished dead last in their respective divisions. But a fresh year births new hope! Currently the Royals are in second place, but the Cardinals and Rockies remain in the rear. Hopefully they’re pacing themselves for a long pennant run.

Fans pray for our teams. Mostly in desperation—please not last place again! When a team goes from last to first we call it a miracle, but I’m convinced last to first mostly involves good pitching. Still, I appreciate audacious sports prayers.

Jabez offered up an audacious prayer of his own: Oh, that you would enlarge my territory! Let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain.

Then the amazing response—God granted his request.

Jabez sounds like the Hebrew word for pain. His mother named him that after giving birth in great distress. Maybe Jabez feared pain growing up (or maybe he was a Rockies fan). Along with freedom from pain, Jabez also brazenly asked for more land, greater influence and freedom from harm.

One side of me doesn’t believe Jabez’s prayer is proper, not modest enough. It’s simply too in God’s face. Then I’m afraid of what enlarged territory might look like in my life. Do I want more responsibility?

It took faith and desperation to pray such an audacious prayer, and yet the Lord answered in the affirmative. God may not grant baseball prayers, but if we cry out to him like Jabez you and I might be surprised at his response.

1 Chronicles 4 in Through the Bible in 2024

Photo by Lesly Juarez