Dear Friends:

I am writing this week about rebellion against God, the kind we expect and criticize and the subtler kind we try to deny and explain away. Both bring us to the same place–opposition to God and obstruction of his plans for us. There is thread that runs through the seemingly unrelated stories of King Uzziah of Judah recorded in 2 Chronicles 15 and Jesus’ feeding of the 5,000 on a Galilean mountainside recorded in John 6:1-15. If we follow that thread we will find it leads directly to our hearts.

King Uzziah was one of the greatest kings of Judah. A skilled and devout reformer, he expanded the territory of the nation, was victorious in war, rebuilt towns and infrastructure, and amassed a large well-equipped army. “His fame spread far, for he was marvelously helped until he became strong” (2 Chron 26:15).

An unguarded strength is our greatest weakness. The Chronicler wrote this of Uzziah, “But when he had become strong, he grew proud, to his destruction for he was false to the Lord his God, and entered the temple of the Lord to make offering on the altar of incense” (2 Chron 26:16). Having consolidated his kingdom and his power, Uzziah overreached by rejecting God’s authority and assuming the priestly prerogative to enter the sanctuary with incense.

It ended badly. The priests took a stand against Uzziah’s blasphemy. He compounded his sin of pride with anger. Immediately, Uzziah’s skin broke out in the lesions of leprosy. The priests hurried him out of the sanctuary struggling to keep up with him running out in fear and shame.

Uzziah lived the rest of his life and died in exclusion from his nation and the house of God. His epitaph was “He is leprous” (2 Chron 26:17-23).

This is truly a cautionary tale, but of what? Uzziah was not the first nor the last political leader to presume God-like power and to fall in hubris.

What does Uzziah’s rise and fall to shame speak to us? What message does this carry for us for living.

We are fond of blaming our leaders and celebrities for their peccadilloes. The sermon is preached and we shake our heads and say, “Amen” to the thought that great men and women should not trust in their greatness. We pick up a People magazine and read of their excess and mistakes the way drivers slow for wrecks on the opposite side of the freeway. We are glad that it’s them and not us.

We deceive ourselves because in every one of our hearts is the stronghold of a rebel. We surrender that stronghold to the Lord only on the condition that we can keep our weapons and supplies for another fight to come.

Too often what we turn over to God looks like a month-to-month tenancy rather than a surrender. “Who knows?” we think. “We might have to move back in again if this doesn’t work for us.”

More than that, we justify clinging to the best of our thoughts and abilities in the vain thought that we may need them in the future to take our stand for God. We sing out loud and proud–

Stand up, stand up for Jesus,

Ye soldier’s of the cross.

Lift high His royal banner,

It must not suffer loss.

It’s easy to get the equation wrong. Do we give God the benefit of our abilities, strength and resources, or do we surrender everything to him so that he can be everything for us? “If we had Uzziah’s advantages of fame, power and influence,” we think to ourselves, “we’d use them for God,” neglecting to listen to see if he has another plan for us that involves empty hands, a broken spirit and a contrite heart (Ps 51:17).

There comes the day when everything is going well. The signs are auspicious. The crowds are large and eager. We are on top of the mountain with Jesus (Jn 6:1-2)

But success has its price. The people are hungry and we begin to realize that we are inadequate to meet their needs. Jesus stirs that recognition, when he tests us. “How are you going to feed them?” he asks.

He knows what he is going to do. He always does. He has a plan and a will to see it done.

We look for a miracle, but he does not always perform them. He does not always feed the crowd from nothing. Why should he when we think we can do it ourselves? When we, in Oswald Chamber’s inimitable phrase, see ourselves as “amateur providences.”

Jesus accepted money from his friends to buy bread (Lk 8:3). He allowed the disciples to go off and buy bread even though they still had a long journey ahead of them (Jn 4:8). He does not waste his miracles on making us feel better about ourselves.

It is his glad will to perform a miracle when genuine need is present, but his priority is to quell our rebellion that always takes on new strength in the enticement of “a good cause.” He wishes us to see our futility and helplessness before he intervenes for our need, and not our goodness lest any one of us should boast that we merit his intervention (Eph 2:8-9).

We have five thousand people and more out here in the wilderness and he is asking us how we are going to feed them?

Our best calculation tells us what it will take, but we despair that we do not have it on hand. “The glass is half empty.”

We come up with the equivalent of a kid’s “happy meal” and some hopeful speculation, but the reality of what is really needed wipes the smile off our face. “The glass is half full.”

Either way, we have no answer to his question that has stretched us to the limits of our inadequate capacity and shows our pride to be worthy only of contempt.

It is not until we agree with Jesus that we are helpless in resolving the problem confronting us that he intervenes. Our surrender must be complete before he steps in with his plan with which we were interfering and delaying for so long as we insisted on our “best” efforts and solutions.

Whatever the doubts that plague us, the conundrums that we cannot solve, the misfortunes that we lack the strength to overcome, the darkness which our meager wisdom is not enough to see us through, Jesus knows what he will do for us when we are ready for him to do it. We are ready when our wits and muscle are totally exhausted.

“Make the people sit down,” he says. “Take a load off your feet and rest a while.” Then with whatever is in hand and a prayer of thanks to the Father, he works the miracle. He asks even his most earnest disciples to sit down and enjoy his providence. Note in the text that Jesus takes upon himself the task of distribution of the food and does not ask the disciples for help until it comes time to pick up the bountiful leftovers (Jn 6:11-12). His only requirement for the blessing is that the recipients must sit at ease in his gracious hospitality.

If we lose Jesus after such a wonderful experience, if he withdraws from us, it is only because we are so quick to turn away from his grace to force him to perform to our expectation (Jn 6:15). We find it so hard to let go.

Like Uzziah, we mistake his “marvelous help” to be our just due, rather than the grace that it is. This attitude is exactly the pride and arrogance that caused Adam and Eve to attempt to “be like God,” instead of depending upon God (Gen 3:4-7). The smoldering rebellion that is intrinsic to our human nature quickly flames up again when we reach our own conclusions and think that we really know the right thing to do without his help. Complete and utter dependence on Christ is ever and only the right thing to do.

The quick return to our best efforts are really an attempted coup de’ tat against his rule and reign in our hearts as we seek to supplant his will with our own in our selfish ingratitude. Our overreaching only leads to our defeat and leprous shame when we claim in the style of Uzziah that, “I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing” (Rev 3:17a).

The good news for our failed, defeated, sin-sick souls is that Jesus Christ heals lepers who ask him to do so without condition and who go from the moment and place of their healing in obedience to his command (Lk 5:13-14). He waits to feed, clothe, and give insight to us, if we will only confess that we are “wretched, pitiable, poor, blind and naked” and need his grace (Rev 3:17b-20).

When Jesus asks us, “Where are we to buy bread for the people to eat?” He is really asking, “Are you like Uzziah, insisting on your strength and your riches only to become angry when they aren’t acceptable or adequate? Or, are you willing to let me be your Source and Supply in fulfilling the plan that I have for you? Every question in our mind and every need of our heart should turn us toward us toward Christ in which all the promises of God find their “Yes” (2 Cor 1:20).

“O taste and see that the Lord is good. Happy are those who take refuge in him” (Ps 34:8)

Under the mercy of Christ,

Kent

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Please note that the content and viewpoints of Mr. Hansen are his own and are not necessarily those of the C.S. Lewis Foundation. We have not edited his writing in any substantial way and have permission from him to post his content.

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Kent Hansen is a Christian attorney, author and speaker. He practices corporate law and is the managing attorney of the firm of Clayson, Mann, Yaeger & Hansen in Corona, California. Kent also serves as the general counsel of Loma Linda University and Medical Center in Loma Linda, California.

Finding God’s grace revealed in the ordinary experiences of life, spiritual renewal in Christ and prayer are Kent’s passions. He has written two books, Grace at 30,000 Feet and Other Unexpected Places published by Review & Herald in 2002 and Cleansing Fire, Healing Streams: Experiencing God’s Love Through Prayer, published by Pacific Press in spring 2007. Many of his stories and essays about God’s encompassing love have been published in magazines and journals. Kent is often found on the hiking trails of the southern California mountains, following major league baseball, playing the piano or writing his weekly email devotional, “A Word of Grace for Your Monday” that is read by men and women from Alaska to Zimbabwe.

Kent and his beloved Patricia are enjoying their 31st year of marriage. They are the proud parents of Andrew, a college student.