Never Disowned

God make a promise never to leave us or forsake us. That’s stunning since we humans have always had a tendency to leave and forsake Him. The Bible says God does this because He loves the world. So how does that work when no person and no nation consistently love Him back?

Exodus 30:11-34:35; 1 Kings 18:1-39; Isaiah 49:14-16; Jeremiah 30:10-11; Zechariah 8:23; Romans 8:38-39

Click here to download the transcript: Never Disowned.pdf

 

 

Once I had the honor of hosting Stephen Lungu when he came to Washington to speak at the Pentagon. I didn’t know much about him at the time, except that he was the Malawi Team Leader for African Enterprise. He had already served for decades as an evangelist, and with his wife had practiced the gospel they preached by taking African street children into their home. He had strong motivation to do so since he was a street kid himself. His mother abandoned him when he was a small child, leaving him to grow up in an orphanage, where constant abuse compounded the wounds to his soul. No wonder he became a Marxist gang leader, bent on killing white people and anyone else whom he deemed complicit in kindling the searing pain in his heart. It was only after God intervened miraculously that his pain was turned to peace, and he began to proclaim the gospel of salvation in Jesus across Africa. Years later, his mother came to one of his evangelistic rallies, and there he led her to salvation. It is a testimony to God’s healing mercy and grace that Stephen and his mother were reconciled, and that he could preach at her funeral.[1]

Stephen Lungu’s testimony is uplifting in the way few abandonment stories can be. He received closure and peace, but that is not always the case. Sometimes children have done nothing to deserve such a fate, but sometimes their offenses are so grievous that their parents can no longer tolerate them. We have heard stories of people cast out by their families because they have converted to another religion, or allied themselves with an enemy, or committed heinous crimes. The burning issue in our day is the gender question: what do parents do when their son decides he is their daughter, or their daughter decides she is a boy? The stereotypical response, I suppose, is that strict Christian parents would have nothing more to do with such rebellious offspring, but that’s not what I have observed. Godly parents I know remain in relationship with their children, although they cannot support all their decisions. The alternative of casting them out is simply not an option, no matter how grievously their children wound them. Whatever their own faults (and these parents are quick to admit their own imperfections), their parental love compels them to remain in relationship in hope that they might somehow help their children to a better place.

We see that kind of parental devotion in our Creator in declarations like this:

But Zion said: “Adonai has forsaken me, Adonai has forgotten me.”

“Can a woman forget her nursing baby or lack compassion for a child 

of her womb? Even if these forget, I will not forget you. Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of My hands. Your walls are continually before Me.”

Isaiah 49:14-16 TLV

That is what the Almighty says to Israel, His beloved Covenant Nation. By the time Isaiah recorded these words, God had been practicing tough parental love on Israel for nearly a thousand years. They were always a headstrong, rebellious people, just like all the rest of us. It’s a bit different, though, when you’re God’s Chosen People. That’s why He was so angry when, at the first opportunity, they decided to amend His commandments in ways that appealed to their accustomed practice. The result was a golden calf they worshipped as a physical representation of the God Who told them never to worship Him in the same way other nations worshiped their false gods.

God’s anger tempted Him to consume Israel, and then start over by making a new nation from Moses’ offspring. Would the God Who parented Israel really do that? Maybe not, but Moses didn’t know it. He had midwifed the birth of the nation, and he wasn’t about to let that effort evaporate in the burning Sinai sands. That’s why he pleaded with God in the same way a mother pleads for the life of her child, offering to give himself in their place.

That’s when we see that this was actually a test for Moses. God knew what He intended to do, but He needed to make sure the one he had selected as His agent was up to the task. He was, as this conversation indicates:

So Moses said to Adonai “You say to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but You have not let me know whom You will send with me. Yet You have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found grace in My eyes.’ Now then, I pray, if I have found grace in Your eyes, show me Your ways, so that I may know You, so that I might find favor in Your sight. Consider also that this nation is Your people.”

“My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest,” He answered.

But then he said to Him, “If Your presence does not go with me, don’t let us go up from here! For how would it be known that I or your people have found favor in Your sight? Isn’t it because You go with us, that distinguishes us from all the people on the face of the earth?”

Adonai answered Moses, “I will also do what you have said, for you have found favor in My sight, and I know you by name.”

Exodus 33:12-17 TLV

Moses understood the most important point: the presence of the Almighty is what distinguishes Israel from all the people on this planet. No matter how rebellious they would become, He would never abandon them, although they would suffer the consequences of their poor choices. That’s why He could issue this word of comfort on the eve of Israel’s captivity in Babylon:

So now, do not fear, Jacob My servant,” says Adonai, “nor be dismayed, O Israel, for behold, I will save you from afar, your seed from the land of their exile. Jacob will again be quiet and at ease, and no one will make him afraid. For I am with you,” declares Adonai, “to s

ave you, for I will make a full end of all the nations where I scatter you, but I will not make a full end of you. For I will discipline you justly, but will not leave you unpunished.”

Jeremiah 30:10-11 TLV

This is a hopeful word, but a stern one. The Creator doesn’t give Israel carte blanche to act as they see fit just because He has promised to preserve them as a nation. Their preservation is the fruit of His love and grace, not only for Israel, but for the entire world. If God does what He says and makes a full end of the other nations, then the only hope we from the nations have is to become part of Israel somehow – which, by the way, is exactly what God intended, as He explained to Zechariah:

Thus says Adonai-Tzva’ot [the Lord of Hosts], “In those days it will come to pass that ten men from every language of the nations will grasp the corner of the garment of a Jew saying, ‘Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.’”

Zechariah 8:23 TLV

We from the nations are even now attaching ourselves to a Jew by proclaiming our allegiance to Jesus, the Jew known in His day as Yeshua. By identifying with Him, we identify with His people Israel. That’s why we can be sure we will never be disowned by our Heavenly Father.

 

[1] Stephen Lungu served in ministry until his death at age 78 in January 2021. To learn about his amazing life work, see “Remembering Stephen Lungu:1942-2021,” African Enterprise United States, https://africanenterprise.org/story/remembering-stephen-lungu-1946-2021/.

 

Music: “Amazing Grace, ” John Newton, performed by the African Children’s Choir, Devotion, African Children’s Choir, 2004. To learn the story of the African Children’s Choir, visit https://africanchildrenschoir.com/.

Cover Image: Stephen Lungu (Photo via African Enterprise Australia).