about having others question the rightness or the wrongness of what we are doing...
of questioning the rightness or wrongness of what others are doing...
of judging...
of being judged...
of our liberty in Christ...
And it has been interesting.
After all these years, a Bible study topic where I don't feel like I have to literally drag participation out of these women. I keep praying that a few more of the women would show up.
About a week and 1/2 ago, we met again, to continue our discussion and I did have my "notes" all written out, but we didn't end up following them.
The Lord had shown us something during our last Saturday afternoon together: He'd shown us our own hypocrisy as we realized, each lady present, that we much prefer to be in the position of the one correcting or confronting rather than sitting in the hot seat as the one being corrected or confronted - about anything. When asked, "Why?" each person agreed that the elevated position of teacher is preferred to the lowly position of learner needing to be corrected.
The Lord had shown us something during our last Saturday afternoon together: He'd shown us our own hypocrisy as we realized, each lady present, that we much prefer to be in the position of the one correcting or confronting rather than sitting in the hot seat as the one being corrected or confronted - about anything. When asked, "Why?" each person agreed that the elevated position of teacher is preferred to the lowly position of learner needing to be corrected.
I did follow my notes long enough to ask the ladies to think about that "revelation," because it was not biblical, especially in the light of the following Scriptures. I'd been meditating on them for two weeks already...
Then, I took the ladies to 2 Samuel 12 ~ the biblical account of Nathan, sent by God, to confront David with the reality of the sin he had committed towards Uriah the Hittite (and others), helping David see just how deeply he had offended God. I told the ladies I wanted them to know this story because it gives us a Biblical picture of confrontation both done and received well.
The rest of our study was spent with me reading the Zarma Biblical account (slowly and surely, one little step after another, my Zarma language abilities make minute advances) and then clarification of the events that took place in those verses.
We finished up Bible study with two questions, the same two questions I'd like to leave with you today:
- What did Nathan do well as he confronted David with his sin?
- What did David do well as he found himself sitting in the hot seat?
And Nathan wasn't confronting just another man - he was confronting the King. I mean, it's one thing to risk offending someone; it's something else again to risk offending someone who can have you executed. He was smart to get David to agree that it was a heinous thing before he told David who had done it.
ReplyDeletenot to make small of what Nathan did, for it surely required courage - but he was sent by God and prophet personalities tended to be those not afraid of confrontation. i actually found it more surprising that he didn't come in preaching hellfire and brimstone... and instead came with a story that would penetrate the hardness of David's heart before he even realized what had happened. most of us tend to KNOW we are in the right when we head in to confront someone and don't spend enough time on how to present truth graciously, gently and in a spirit of love rather than from the back of our high horse, iykwim.
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