William C. Turner, Jr. - "The Twist of Divine Knowledge" (June 25, 1989)
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| Good | 0:03 | |
| morning. | 0:03 | |
| I give thanks to my | 0:06 | |
| God for being in this place again and | 0:09 | |
| all of you | 0:13 | |
| who are here. I give thanks | 0:16 | |
| as well on this morning | 0:19 | |
| of worship for | 0:22 | |
| all the beautiful preparation for the word, for | 0:24 | |
| the experience of worship into which we have been led | 0:30 | |
| by Rosetta Breeze. Her singing is always a treat and | 0:35 | |
| by those who have led in | 0:42 | |
| the worship today. "And | 0:46 | |
| after the earthquake, a | 0:49 | |
| fire. But the Lord was not | 0:55 | |
| in the fire. After the fire, a | 0:59 | |
| still small | 1:05 | |
| voice. And it was so when Elijah heard it, that | 1:08 | |
| he wrapped his face in his mantle went out and stood | 1:12 | |
| in the entering of the cave. And | 1:18 | |
| behold, there came a voice unto him and said, What doeth thou | 1:22 | |
| here, Elijah?" | 1:27 | |
| The twist of divine logic. | 1:31 | |
| Twisting is | 1:38 | |
| an unpredictable action that | 1:42 | |
| is exceedingly effective when it | 1:46 | |
| produces | 1:52 | |
| motion. A twist is a force that | 1:52 | |
| involves rotation. It may be done by the hand or | 1:57 | |
| some other tool. The energy measure involved is | 2:01 | |
| the | 2:07 | |
| torque, and it is directly proportional to the distance | 2:09 | |
| between the force and the point at which it is | 2:12 | |
| applied to a certain object. | 2:17 | |
| Often one does not | 2:21 | |
| know the amount of torque that | 2:23 | |
| is necessary to produce | 2:26 | |
| motion. I think all of us have had the experience of trying to twist a | 2:29 | |
| lid off a | 2:34 | |
| jar that would not | 2:36 | |
| turn, or we've experience the frustration of leaning and | 2:38 | |
| pressing on the wrench to turn the lugs to unscrew them and remove a | 2:43 | |
| wheel and the lugs are so tight, we just didn't have enough torque to | 2:48 | |
| make it | 2:54 | |
| turn. Well, our God is far | 2:56 | |
| more effective with those who yield to him. | 3:00 | |
| In our faithfulness we | 3:05 | |
| become subjects of the twist in divine | 3:07 | |
| logic. There's another sense in which the twist may | 3:12 | |
| be understood, it may refer to the | 3:17 | |
| shift, the course of a path, or an argument, may | 3:19 | |
| refer to the next step that does not follow all the turns in the | 3:24 | |
| route that must be traveled. Twists appear all | 3:29 | |
| over the place when with our | 3:34 | |
| feeble logic, we attempt to anticipate | 3:37 | |
| or make | 3:42 | |
| transparent the ways of our Lord. Without a doubt, the | 3:44 | |
| image of twisting stands out most prominently in my | 3:50 | |
| mind is the twisting of the tornado. You see, just a few | 3:56 | |
| weeks ago, I had one to twist through my yard, took down | 4:00 | |
| three trees, left one on the roof. | 4:05 | |
| I | 4:10 | |
| could discern no pattern to the twisting of the tornado. It | 4:10 | |
| hit one place, then it hit another | 4:15 | |
| place. Then on last Friday, I was traveling to Burlington. The weather was fine | 4:18 | |
| in Durham but just as I approached Burlington, a | 4:22 | |
| twister came. And somehow that twister packed enough wind | 4:26 | |
| to take a small sliver of wood and | 4:31 | |
| fire it through the side wall of a steel | 4:35 | |
| belted tire. It landed in the casing like it had been shot from | 4:38 | |
| an arrow. That's the nature of the | 4:43 | |
| twister in this state that has become tornado capital for | 4:47 | |
| the nation, a dubious distinction. Not so long ago, I was speaking with a man who's from | 4:51 | |
| California, and telling him how afraid I was of earthquakes. He told me, he said, "I live right over the San Andreas | 4:56 | |
| fault," I said, "how can you live there?" He looked at me, he said, "How can you live in North | 5:01 | |
| Carolina? Every time we turn around, we're worried about | 5:06 | |
| our relatives there, wondering | 5:10 | |
| whether another twister has home." One occasion, the | 5:13 | |
| weather forecaster, the meteorologist said that "If we had just | 5:18 | |
| had our radar | 5:21 | |
| working, we could have given a better | 5:23 | |
| report." But lo and behold, when the radar was working well, | 5:26 | |
| their reports didn't help us very much. The | 5:30 | |
| twister, a funnel of | 5:35 | |
| wind, blows where it will and nobody knows its course. | 5:37 | |
| So it is with our | 5:42 | |
| God. Like the twister, we do not know God's ways. | 5:44 | |
| God's ways have a logic of | 5:50 | |
| their own. | 5:54 | |
| The setting of this text is following the great contest | 5:56 | |
| on Carmel, between the prophets of Baal, prophets of the Lord | 5:59 | |
| of Israel. The God of Israel answered by | 6:04 | |
| fire and the people were compelled to confess | 6:08 | |
| their Lord. | 6:12 | |
| Prophets of Baal were ordered slain and God sent rain to relieve | 6:14 | |
| the | 6:19 | |
| drought that had been upon the land. Jezebel | 6:20 | |
| was | 6:24 | |
| not through with Elijah. | 6:24 | |
| Her prayer was for the gods to do more to | 6:28 | |
| her than had befallen the prophets if she did not | 6:32 | |
| take Elijah's | 6:36 | |
| life within one day. So Elijah | 6:37 | |
| fled into the wilderness, lodged under a juniper | 6:42 | |
| tree, where he received the ministry of angels. | 6:47 | |
| Out of the cave, the Lord called his | 6:51 | |
| servant, let him know that he had not forsaken | 6:54 | |
| him, that he had not left | 6:58 | |
| him alone. Even following dramatic success, there | 7:00 | |
| remained unfinished business for the Lord's servant. | 7:06 | |
| There is a twist in divine | 7:10 | |
| logic that turns us towards | 7:15 | |
| heaven's program when we are yielded to our | 7:19 | |
| God. Twist number | 7:23 | |
| one is that you are | 7:28 | |
| not | 7:33 | |
| forsaken, even when you | 7:34 | |
| feel all alone. Here the prophet had | 7:36 | |
| escaped from that wicked woman with his knife, leaving | 7:40 | |
| in haste, | 7:44 | |
| as he was bound to do, he made no provisions for the journey. | 7:46 | |
| No bread, no meat, no pillow for his head. He was left | 7:52 | |
| to rely totally and | 7:56 | |
| completely on the mercy of | 7:59 | |
| God and no doubt he felt forsaken. How | 8:02 | |
| ironic but how true that, so often in those | 8:07 | |
| moments when we ought to feel the safest, that is, by our | 8:12 | |
| confession, those | 8:17 | |
| are the moments when we are | 8:19 | |
| most afraid. You are like Elijah, you are like me, most | 8:22 | |
| of you are. We don't want to be left alone completely on the | 8:26 | |
| mercy of God. We don't prefer to rely on God in | 8:31 | |
| that radical sense. We would prefer to | 8:36 | |
| know where our meal is coming from when | 8:40 | |
| we leave this place. There are not many of us who would like to leave this place, not | 8:43 | |
| knowing how we're going to eat today or tomorrow. We don't really want to trust | 8:48 | |
| God that way, we'd prefer | 8:54 | |
| to have some measure of | 8:56 | |
| control over our situation. We really don't want | 8:59 | |
| that unbuffered encounter with God. | 9:03 | |
| We don't want it any more than we want to stand in the presence of a tornado, a | 9:08 | |
| twister that we don't understand and whose pattern we | 9:14 | |
| cannot predict. | 9:20 | |
| Oh, that direct encounter with God leaves us out of control; we must | 9:21 | |
| rely on God in a radical way. | 9:27 | |
| It's quite a twist when we are caught in that situation, where we are helpless with | 9:31 | |
| all of our knowledge, totally | 9:38 | |
| dependent and | 9:41 | |
| reliant on God. In that state of | 9:43 | |
| semi-consciousness, dazed by the danger of | 9:48 | |
| the ordeal, exhausted by the exacting trials of | 9:53 | |
| his escape route, prophet | 9:58 | |
| probably did not know whether he was | 10:01 | |
| awake or whether he was asleep. But in such a condition, he | 10:05 | |
| was awakened by the angel's touch and | 10:10 | |
| fed with ministrations from the God who loved him and | 10:15 | |
| who said through such ministrations, "I have | 10:20 | |
| not forsaken you. | 10:25 | |
| I have not left you alone." | 10:27 | |
| Now this twist may be somewhat difficult to | 10:32 | |
| fathom fully. We have never | 10:36 | |
| been on the run for our convictions but I | 10:39 | |
| tell you people literally live in our time like Elijah, running | 10:43 | |
| for their life because they dare | 10:49 | |
| to stand for their conviction. Four young men | 10:55 | |
| were killed not | 10:59 | |
| so long ago in Philadelphia, Mississippi. | 11:01 | |
| We count the years and the numbers seem large, but that wasn't so long | 11:06 | |
| ago when they died, because they dared to break | 11:11 | |
| the back of Jim Crow in the | 11:14 | |
| south through their witness, through their efforts. Workers | 11:17 | |
| and priests are tortured and | 11:22 | |
| killed in Central and South America constantly for | 11:26 | |
| challenging injustice | 11:30 | |
| and oppression. In | 11:32 | |
| South Africa, Mandela remains in manacles just | 11:34 | |
| because he wants to be a man. In China, students | 11:39 | |
| were crushed by tanks because they called for | 11:44 | |
| democracy and | 11:49 | |
| reform. Workers have been executed with a bullet through | 11:50 | |
| the back of their head and the bill for the bullet sent to their | 11:54 | |
| parents simply | 11:59 | |
| because they wanted to express the yearning in | 12:02 | |
| their soul. On our | 12:06 | |
| job, among our friends, in | 12:08 | |
| moments of unpublicized witness, we often need | 12:12 | |
| the | 12:17 | |
| experience of this twist in the divine logic | 12:19 | |
| that lets us know that we have not been forsaken. | 12:22 | |
| Every indication but the direct ministrations of the Lord, say | 12:28 | |
| to | 12:33 | |
| us that everything has been | 12:35 | |
| lost. Twist number | 12:39 | |
| two is you can't predict the | 12:41 | |
| mode of God's sustaining presence. Eijah was | 12:44 | |
| one who was familiar with the mighty workings of the | 12:51 | |
| Lord through his tenure as | 12:54 | |
| a prophet. Lord had shown him power, | 12:56 | |
| might, and strength. God had used this | 13:01 | |
| prophet to give signs to the people. This is the | 13:05 | |
| same prophet whom | 13:10 | |
| God used to stretch the meal | 13:11 | |
| and the oil for a widow who was | 13:15 | |
| caught in the midst of a famine in a sin-sick land. | 13:18 | |
| This is the | 13:23 | |
| same prophet that God had used in a manner that was so effective 'til | 13:24 | |
| the king of Syria believed there was a spy in the camp. | 13:29 | |
| When the King sent his hosts to flush him out of the mountains of Dothan, God | 13:35 | |
| struck them with blindness. This is the | 13:41 | |
| prophet who shut the heavens with the word of his | 13:45 | |
| mouth, with his prayer called down | 13:49 | |
| fire from heaven. He was familiar with the God who shakes | 13:52 | |
| the foundations of the earth. There is another, those | 13:57 | |
| marvelous twists in | 14:01 | |
| divine | 14:06 | |
| logic that we see in our text. For the Lord does not answer in | 14:06 | |
| either of those magnificent modes | 14:12 | |
| available for divine communication. No, the answer | 14:16 | |
| comes in a still, small | 14:21 | |
| voice. There can be no question from the record of sacred | 14:26 | |
| Scripture and the witness of countless generations that God is a worker | 14:30 | |
| of | 14:36 | |
| wonders. God is | 14:38 | |
| free to choose those | 14:40 | |
| less.... means for giving confidence to | 14:42 | |
| those who | 15:02 | |
| trust and serve him. It is not | 15:08 | |
| as | 15:11 | |
| though there is some divine opposition to | 15:12 | |
| spectacular modes of communication. | 15:17 | |
| But the main object of the | 15:19 | |
| Almighty is to get our attention, leave | 15:23 | |
| us with no | 15:26 | |
| question that God is worthy | 15:29 | |
| of our trust. Here it is that | 15:31 | |
| the still small voice got the attention of | 15:35 | |
| the | 15:40 | |
| prophet in the midst of his anxieties. A | 15:41 | |
| still small voice requires | 15:47 | |
| a special | 15:53 | |
| sort of attention. It does not compete with | 15:55 | |
| other sounds in order to get our ear. That's the way | 16:00 | |
| God speaks sometimes, only when our full attention | 16:05 | |
| is given. Not only are we forced to | 16:10 | |
| stop by its stillness, but we are quietened | 16:14 | |
| by its smallness, soothed by | 16:19 | |
| its serenity, consoled by its power. As | 16:23 | |
| we walk with the Lord, we learn to be thankful for this | 16:28 | |
| twist in divine logic. God | 16:33 | |
| will not always compete with | 16:37 | |
| the sounds that boom in our universe. | 16:40 | |
| Don't make the mistake of insisting | 16:46 | |
| that God always vindicate the promise with | 16:51 | |
| trouncing defeats of the enemy, with trouncing | 16:55 | |
| defeats of those who supply opposition to | 17:00 | |
| our efforts. | 17:05 | |
| Do not demand financial success, a body | 17:07 | |
| free of pain, a mind free of worry | 17:11 | |
| and of anxiety. We stand to miss some of | 17:16 | |
| the most precious assurances. We can only hear the | 17:20 | |
| earthquake, the wind, the crackling of | 17:25 | |
| the fire. | 17:30 | |
| There is confidence and quietness that bears us up into the | 17:32 | |
| presence of the Lord. | 17:38 | |
| On some occasions, the divine logic twists and | 17:40 | |
| demand that we be still and know our God. | 17:45 | |
| Twist number | 17:50 | |
| three is that you are not finished when | 17:53 | |
| you think you | 17:58 | |
| are. Surely the | 18:01 | |
| prophet wanted to take a rest, following | 18:02 | |
| that ordeal | 18:06 | |
| on Carmel, following his running from that wicked | 18:07 | |
| woman named Jezebel, just so much pushing | 18:12 | |
| around, we've had enough. | 18:15 | |
| I think I know my limit, every once in a while, I feel it. Now, I just don't want to | 18:18 | |
| be pushed anymore. | 18:23 | |
| I don't feel like standing in the attack mode or in | 18:25 | |
| the fleeing mode all the time. | 18:30 | |
| Sometimes I want to be free. | 18:34 | |
| Sometimes I just want to rest. Sometimes I | 18:39 | |
| want to relax. But alas, just at | 18:43 | |
| the time we're ready to settle | 18:48 | |
| down, relax, the announcement comes, followed | 18:53 | |
| by the summons: "You are not finished yet. | 18:57 | |
| There is more | 19:03 | |
| work to do." All who have been faithful | 19:05 | |
| to the | 19:09 | |
| Lord have had or will have those | 19:11 | |
| moments when we would | 19:15 | |
| prefer no more assignments, no | 19:16 | |
| more appointments to committees, no more | 19:21 | |
| task force, no more trips to the school board, no | 19:26 | |
| more visits to the classroom, no | 19:31 | |
| more of those taxing and trying meetings when | 19:35 | |
| we try to persuade someone to change the | 19:39 | |
| method of their madness. So | 19:44 | |
| many times, we'd prefer to just leave the government alone and let the running of | 19:48 | |
| the city or the nation fall into the | 19:52 | |
| hands of the elected officials, persons who are paid to safeguard the | 19:56 | |
| public interest and we could spend our time in | 20:00 | |
| the suburbs on vacations in the mountains, down at | 20:05 | |
| the beach. | 20:09 | |
| Don't you ever get to that place where you just don't | 20:11 | |
| want any more assignments? No more telephone calls, nobody | 20:14 | |
| bothering | 20:20 | |
| you. No one requesting your | 20:22 | |
| effort or your labor. Those of my generation are quick to | 20:24 | |
| recall how much time and energy we put into the Civil Rights movement, protest | 20:29 | |
| against the Vietnam | 20:35 | |
| war, so many other causes that claimed our | 20:37 | |
| attention along the way. But alas, there is | 20:42 | |
| the | 20:46 | |
| presence of persisting and pernicious | 20:47 | |
| poverty in our land. | 20:52 | |
| There are the threats that our atmosphere and that our water | 20:54 | |
| and our land will be poisoned. | 20:59 | |
| When we look around us, there is trouble from every | 21:01 | |
| side. The hopeless condition of the homeless. | 21:06 | |
| The depravity of drug traffic with its wars and its addiction. | 21:11 | |
| Generation around us being ushered into the | 21:18 | |
| ignorance and valuelessness that just may be | 21:22 | |
| the greatest threat to our culture. | 21:26 | |
| What else could God possibly ask following | 21:30 | |
| this ordeal on Carmel and | 21:35 | |
| this chase by Jezebel? | 21:38 | |
| That's the logical question to ask, this | 21:41 | |
| point where | 21:46 | |
| Elijah is being sent forth. And so help me, | 21:48 | |
| I have tremendous sympathy for the prophet when | 21:53 | |
| I read this account. There's only so | 21:57 | |
| much that can be asked in a | 22:03 | |
| reasonable manner. | 22:07 | |
| Ah, that the twist of divine logic. Even | 22:09 | |
| though the prophet felt like taking a rest, the | 22:14 | |
| moment that God sent | 22:20 | |
| him was the time to anoint a new king in Syria, new | 22:22 | |
| commander over the people of God, and | 22:29 | |
| a prophet in the land of Israel. | 22:31 | |
| Through the anointing of Hazael, Jehu and | 22:36 | |
| Elisha, vengeance would be visited upon | 22:38 | |
| the house of Om | 22:44 | |
| ri and the sordid acts of Jezebel would be | 22:46 | |
| brought to an end. | 22:49 | |
| Tired, rest broken, weary, feeling that we have | 22:53 | |
| no more to | 22:57 | |
| give, God says to us, "There | 22:58 | |
| is | 23:02 | |
| another act that I require of you," and | 23:03 | |
| who in the hand of | 23:09 | |
| God can say no? | 23:11 | |
| Finally, there's the fourth twist and this is perhaps the most frustrating one of | 23:15 | |
| all. For this one is the divine logic which | 23:20 | |
| informs the prophet at the end of the ordeal that | 23:25 | |
| he's not the only faithful one left. What a | 23:29 | |
| twist. | 23:33 | |
| Put yourself in Elijah's place, I can imagine myself thinking, if | 23:34 | |
| not | 23:40 | |
| saying, "Well, thank you God for telling me, | 23:41 | |
| now, that I'm not the only one. And that there | 23:46 | |
| are seven thousand of those who are faithful. | 23:50 | |
| Seven thousand, why, I could have used some help | 23:53 | |
| on Mt. Carmel. I could have used some help | 23:57 | |
| when I was running from Jezebel. Thank you, like thank you for telling me | 24:01 | |
| now that I'm not the only | 24:07 | |
| one. | 24:11 | |
| Thank you for telling me now. | 24:13 | |
| But, but, but, but, but, why send me when you've | 24:15 | |
| got seven thousand more? Send one up | 24:19 | |
| to Damascus to anoint Hazael. Send another over | 24:23 | |
| to Jehu, to | 24:28 | |
| anoint another commander. I | 24:30 | |
| don't mind going over to to Abelmeholah to anoin | 24:32 | |
| t Elisha to be my successor, I kind of like the son of Shaphat, | 24:37 | |
| I wouldn't mind doing that | 24:42 | |
| but why can't you let somebody else go | 24:43 | |
| to that dangerous | 24:48 | |
| city of Damascus? Now you tell me after | 24:50 | |
| all my | 24:56 | |
| trouble that there are seven thousand have not bowed | 24:57 | |
| a knee to Baal and who have not kissed | 25:02 | |
| him." But I tell you, that's the twist in | 25:07 | |
| divine logic. | 25:13 | |
| Lord only tells the prophet of the | 25:17 | |
| others who are faithful, after | 25:21 | |
| reinforcing Elijah's own faith. | 25:25 | |
| Only after drawing a "Yes" from his lips and | 25:31 | |
| from his heart does God let him know that he is | 25:37 | |
| not alone. Can't you see the Spirit twisting a "Yes" out | 25:42 | |
| of his soul? | 25:48 | |
| Have you ever felt the Spirit twisting a | 25:52 | |
| Yes out of your | 25:57 | |
| soul? Compelling a "Yes" before | 25:58 | |
| informing | 26:03 | |
| you of the support you have around you? Look | 26:04 | |
| at the way the Lord does business. He feeds the | 26:09 | |
| prophet with angel food, sends | 26:15 | |
| an angel to touch him. | 26:16 | |
| God speaks in a still small voice, letting | 26:22 | |
| him know that he is not forsaken, that he is not | 26:26 | |
| alone, and from the bottom of | 26:32 | |
| his heart to the depths of his soul, the | 26:35 | |
| Spirit commands and yes, even twists a "Yes" | 26:40 | |
| from him. | 26:44 | |
| Then the announcement, "I have not left you alone." No, | 26:48 | |
| this final twist. All of the | 26:56 | |
| evidence is arrayed to tell | 27:00 | |
| us that we are the only ones who | 27:02 | |
| are left, we need to expect seven thousand have | 27:06 | |
| not bowed their knee or kissed Baal. Let Baal be | 27:12 | |
| disappointed again. Be one in | 27:21 | |
| that faithful number. All the | 27:25 | |
| children are not doing drugs, throwing their | 27:29 | |
| lives away. Everybody isn't dealing | 27:33 | |
| dirty and living crooked. Oh that the | 27:39 | |
| seven | 27:43 | |
| thousand who have not bowed would | 27:44 | |
| rise up and obey the command of | 27:48 | |
| the Lord, not | 27:53 | |
| leaving the handful to feel that they have | 27:55 | |
| been left alone. Let the divine logic twist | 28:00 | |
| on in your | 28:07 | |
| life. | 28:21 |