Ensign: Abraham, Sarah, and The Cat in the Hat
AN ENSIGN ON THE MOUNTAINS 3 March 2017
[I'd originally written this piece in January five years ago, when I was still teaching Sunday School at my church. I hadn't done something for Dr. Seuss' birthday (which was yesterday, and you or your kids have likely seen or been to or will be going to something commemorating the creator of the Grinch, the Lorax, or The Cat In The Hat) yet, and I was hard pressed for an idea when I came across this little gem ... enjoy!]
It was hard to write the script for this Sunday school rotation. Not because of a lack of material – from this past Sunday through mid-February we're teaching about Abraham and Sarah from Genesis – but because there's so much about them (in the case of Abraham, we first hear mention of him in Genesis 11:26 as Abram and his own life takes up about fourteen chapters, and his descendants' lives are ongoing) it's hard to pick a lesson that will take up forty minutes of teaching time. But so little needs to be known about them too; I asked the fourth graders in my class if they knew anything about Abraham and one person referred to our sixteenth President! Abraham Lincoln was likely named for him.
So all we could do was to
Sit!
Sit!
Sit!
Sit!
And we did not like it.
Not one little bit.
Nah, the kids did better than that. For some reason in church on Christmas Day, I made a connection between Abraham and Sarah's three visitors at Mamre – see Genesis 18 for more details – and The Cat in the Hat from Dr. Seuss' book of the same name. Sally and her brother also had three visitors (the Cat carried Thing One and Thing Two in their box into the house, remember) and they proceeded to, perhaps a little more flamboyantly, turn their lives upside down. It's a safe bet when Abraham who was ninety-nine years old – from the previous chapter, when he gets a sneak preview of this news – heard the news that a promise he first heard about a quarter-century earlier would finally be fulfilled, he was laughing on the inside.
And then
Something went BUMP!
How that bump made us jump!
And if he was on the inside, even after he'd heard God's promise and known God's blessing in his life, then Sarah's reaction was understandable. Abraham had probably told Sarah about God's promise (you know, the way husbands tell their wives everything) but as “Sarah laughed within herself” (Genesis 18:12) you have to wonder if she really believed it. Any more that you or I do sometimes; one downside of teaching from the Bible (oh yeah, there is a downside) is that if we tend to magnify the heroes to heights of greatness, we also magnify the flaws people are shown to have. Abraham lying. Elijah depressed. But one thing even its harshest critics can't accuse the Bible of is glossing over people's flaws and human frailty – whether a sin like David committing adultery with Bathsheba and having Uriah murdered to cover it up, Abraham lying to Pharaoh in order to keep his hands off Sarah, or something so ungodly (we imagine) as Jesus weeping, it's all there. We're all here, and we can learn something from these.
“Have no fear of this mess,”
Said the Cat in the Hat.
“I always pick up all my playthings
And so …
I will show you another
Good trick that I know!”
Don't start what you can't finish, no matter how mind-numbing it gets. Don't try to take shortcuts to God's promises, no matter how s-l-o-w it goes. For the remaining hundred years of his life from when Abraham was given the promise he would be a great nation back in Genesis 12:2, Abraham made plenty of mistakes. We've cited his lying to Pharaoh in verses fourteen through twenty, but not his having a son through Sarah's handmaid from chapter sixteen (that's another story, still with consequences today), and between the lines I imagine Abraham and Sarah had plenty of other moments when trusting God didn't seem like the best idea in the world. But God never gave up on them. Why are we convinced He'll give up on us when we sin, when we seek our way and not His, and then come back knowing we were wrong? I can see why, but God I pray you'll let me and all who read this see past it. We're not playthings, but God still picks us up!
That is that,
David
P.S. I will continue as long as God allows me to write this devotional to keep in touch with you, and I hope it encourages us too! If it's not or you would like me to get lost, please let me know. Thanks!
Thank YOU, Lord, that we can come to You in prayer and that we can count on You to provide for all our needs according to Your riches in glory, even when we don't know what our needs are. And we come to You in prayer for the peace of Jerusalem on both sides of the fence and all over the world.
Thank You as well, Lord, for everyone in leadership and service, in authority and power, both here and abroad. Thank You for the opportunities we have and the promise of new life through You by Your Son Our Brother, Jesus the Christ.
And now I pray that we all seek and have a blessed week! Amen.
And now I pray that we all seek and have a blessed week! Amen.
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