I drove by it again today. The 7-11 I drove by a week ago; at almost dark. Cars were slowing. One car was stopped diagonally on the road, in the opposite direction.
A few people were gathering and I wondered if they were picketing? I looked to my left, rolled my window down, and saw a gray-haired lady slowly pacing, with a few others, just standing around.
With home beckoning, I was wondering why the slowed traffic, the stopped diagonal car, mounted as if a monument in the middle of busy Broadway.
Then, I see him. The man my mind can’t shed from seeing; the sight, I have kept playing, over and over again in my spirit.
He lay there, back against pavement, hands stretched high up in the air, not moving, not seeming to be breathing.
I wanted to run and give him CPR, but I had my three littles, strapped in the car. Yet, why was everyone standing around, zombie-like staring, not responding, as if nothing was actually happening?
My husband saved many people over the years; his cousin drowning, the young man with Down Syndrome choking while camping.
However, my guess is, most don’t have such immediate responses to loss, trauma or tradgedy, like he does. Most freeze, like a deer in headlights, and sadly, there can be life-altering consequences as a result of it.
When we don’t respond with fight or flight, freezing can be a fatal, natural, body response.
With my window rolled down, streets lights shining, on Broadway that night, I overheard a man announcing to a stranger, “Did you see that? That car just ran right into that man.”
My worst fears imagined.. Was the man lying on the pavement dead?
Did his spirit leave him, there on the pavement, thrity-feet from me?
Something about seeing that man, not only tragically hit, but lying there as if no one even wanted to help him…
Just felt, not o.k.
Worse yet, his hands….There was just something about his hands, I told my husband, a few hours later.
His hands were straight up in the air. Why was that?
Was it the speed of the impact? Was it him motioning to the car, prior to him being laid vertically, flat on the ground for the world to see?
Then, it hit me…The surrender.
We all surrender to something, to someone. We all worship, whether we know it or even believe it’s true.
And better yet…
What we worship can often be seen by our physical posture, our motions and our words.
They took away worship in Washington. It is now illegal. People are being fined, churches assaulted with negative media and punished.
When I left Chi*a the last time, I never thought I would witness the same intimidation, here in this once free nation.
And yet, we bow, close our lips, keep our hearts silent, to “respect those who are in authority over us”.
We reject our firey furnaces and bow with the others to the mandates, supposedly, “Keeping us safe”.
My brother, his wife and my niece, all had Coronavirus. They are healthy now and back to work. Our friends had the virus, and pre-existing conditions, described the experience like this, “It wasn’t a big deal. It was just like a cold.”
Many aren’t tested. Yet, because of their symptoms, doctors are checking them off as “infected”.
And I wonder, how many of us are infected to the point that we are willing to bow. give up our rights, and play the game of turning our eyes and hearts from God, to the powers that be?
Daniel’s authority figures were self-serving. He lived under a regime that tricked the leader to outlaw praying loudly for others to hear.
Yet, Daniel kept praying, three times a day. He wouldn’t stop praying, regardles of the laws that forbid him from kneeling and talking to God.
Daniel could have prayed in his head, and called it, “Obedience”. But, he didn’t.
He prayed loudly, with his mouth open, kneeling, for all of the world to see…
Somehow Daniel knew, what his mouth says and his body demonstrates often determines what we worship.
As a result, Daniel was thrown into a den of lions. Did he fear? No! In fact, the leader of the land stayed awake all night, begging Daniel’s God to save him.
Daniel was protected that night. God spared his life because Daniel would only worship One God, and it was not the laws that forbid him not to.
I think about the man laying lifeless on the pavement that night as I drove by; hands raised, forgotten in his surrender.
And I realized, we will all, one day, be held accountable to what and who we worship.
Will we worship culture, sports, other people, or government mandates? Or will we worship the One True God…The One we’ll all bow down to, one day when we die?
“As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to Me, And every tongue shall give praise to God.” (Romans 14:11)
No one knows the day or the hour we will die. Only God knows our hearts and has pre-appointed us; every moment, every breathe, every second we live.
So, why don’t we just praise him? Throw our hands up in surrender now, while we still have breath to extoll Him?
Why don’t we give up our rights and recognize, He has redeemed us by His grace. He stands with us in the fire. He sends his angels to deliver us, from the mouths of the lions around us.
I will not fear. As others fall to my right and left, I will keep my hands lifted while I am alive…in surrender.
Surrendered to one alone. Worshipping my God, My Rock, My fortress, My King in this barren desert.
And may my mouth and my posture show it. Regardless of what it may cost.
