A Terrible Loyalty

Faithfulness is in short supply these days; but God stays ‘with us’ through ‘thick and thin,’ unchanging. I love the way Lamentations 3 summarizes God’s loyalty:  “It is because of the Lord’s…loving-kindness that we are not consumed, because His [tender] compassions fail not. They are new every morning, great and abundant is [God’s] stability and faithfulness…” (Lamentations 3:22-24, The Amplified Bible).   

But often we’re not stable and faithful, abandoning each other at the first sign of trouble. There’s a great story about a couple who had a quarrel and gave each other the silent treatment. Well a week into silence, the husband realized he had to get up at 5 a.m. for a business trip, and needed his wife to wake him.  But by golly he wasn’t going to be the first to ‘break the silence’!!! -- so he wrote his wife a note and left it by her bed.  The note read:  ‘please wake me at 5 a.m."  Well the next morning  came -- and the husband indeed did wake up -- but at 9 a.m.!!  Furious he jumped up, ‘hit’ the floor, and bolted to scold his wife – only to find a note from her -- by his bed.  The note read: "It's 5 a.m. Wake up!"

But we can do better!  No matter the circumstance we can emulate a dependable God, by being dependable and loyal to each other.  In scripture there are multiple portraits of loyalty, none more striking than the loyalty of Abraham, the Old Testament patriarch, to his nephew Lot.  Why in Genesis 14, Lot is captured by four Mesopotamian kings and imprisoned.  But does Uncle Abraham forsake him – forget him?  No, Uncle Abraham comes to the rescue!  Why Genesis 14 tells us that when Abraham “…heard his [nephew Lot] had been taken captive, he called out…318 trained men…and went in pursuit…”  (Genesis 14:14).  In spite of danger, in spite of inconvenience, Abraham went in pursuit.  And bingo: Abraham and his men recovered Lot, snatching up as well, “…all [Lot’s] goods…and possessions…”  (Genesis 14:16).   

We're also to be in pursuit of each other.  No matter 'the jam we're to 'come to the rescue,' mustering our 318 trained men, our best resources, to get folks out of 'the jam.'  It's what I call a 'whatever it takes' philosophy.  'Whatever it takes' to serve  you, 'whatever it takes' to help you, 'whatever it takes' to rescue you -- I will do it through the power and anointing of God.  For we're not called to forsake each other when 'the going gets tough'; we're to 'run to each other' - defeating whatever tries to capture and thwart life.  I love the way G.K. Chesterton puts it:  "We're all in the same boat in a stormy sea -- [thus] we owe each other a terrible loyalty."