Have you seen one of these front-end loaders that dig a trench down the center of the street to lay pipe? One has been working over on Colonial Ave. in front of the Community College lately. Do you know the first thing they do before they ever start digging? It’s really cool: they pull a lever that engages these two huge hydraulic pistons that simultaneously plant two, solid, widespread ‘feet’ way out to either side of the cab. These lift the front end and the wheels off the ground and like an offensive guard taking his stance, they anchor the shovel in a way that says, “No matter what I hit with the bucket, not matter how hard I pull or how hard the resistance to that pull, I’m not gonna budge; i may shake, but I will not be moved.
That’s the way I think about the Micah Mandate to DO JUSTICE, LOVE MERCY and WALK HUMBLY with my GOD. I don’t want to become a self-absorbed, personal achievement-oriented, comfort-seeking, can’t-wait-to-retire-and-get-on-easy-street kind of guy. I don’t want to remain silent, remain detached, throw up my hands and say there’s nothing we can do. I don’t want to turn inward, like a wood shaving coming off the front of my wood plane: curling back and back on myself. That’s not holiness. That’s not even close to whole-ness. It’s not even satisfying. Jesus doesn’t make Christian consumers, He makes fishers of men.
Let’s not be like Jonah: “I’m not going. I don’t like those people. Send someone else.”
Let’s be Like Isaiah who had a vision of God’s glory and volunteered, “Here am I LORD, send me”.