I was a teenager working for the state park system and it has remained very high on my list of "things I've hated doing." A young raccoon had been struck by a car right where the park road intersected a jogging path. He couldn't move but was still alive. It was very early morning and the senior citizens walking the path complained about the raccoon crying. My boss, fielding dozens of complaints promptly passed the buck, and the horrible task, to his underling, me.
Arriving at the scene in my park vehicle I instantly grasped why those cries were so off putting. A baby raccoon crying sounds so eerily human it's beyond description. I stepped from the truck into the morning chill. The track pants of seniors were swishing back and forth against the morning haze which persisted later than it should have. Planning to be as humane as possible I quickly radioed a ranger and asked for an assist, or at least a firearm. His voice came back interrupted by the crackles of his radio.
"Can't help out, I'm about 8 miles away in the woods trying to round up strays."
Great.
Had he not been crying at all, the task would have been infinitely easier. It was the crying that got to me, and it was the crying that bothered all the old timers.
What are some of the automatic and seemingly uncontrollable feelings you experience when you hear a cry?
Crying triggers such an involuntary and powerful reaction in us. I've come to realize that poignant and undeniable feeling we get in response to hearing a cry is part of God's character he's passed on to his creation.
Doctors who work the maternity ward will all tell you a baby born not crying is typically a very bad thing.
Crying.
It's literally the first thing we do.
This simple, profound, and powerful action was given to us intentionally, because it communicates so many thoughts and feelings for us that, at that moment, we're not capable of communicating.
Can anyone hear me?
Does anyone care?
Am I alone?
Will someone do something about this?
Sometimes it's even a signal that injustice is happening.
I have several friends and teachers that consider Exodus the first book of the Bible, kind of. They all technically know it's not true but their point is that Exodus is where the relationship story between God and his people begin.
"Israel" begins when God comes to get his people.
It all starts with God indtroducing himself to Moses and saying "I have heard them crying." (3:7)
And so the ball starts rolling, slowly at first, but then gaining momentum as if tumbling down a hill. Before you know it, he's taken his people out of pain and into a new life, one where they make the rules. From this point on, through the entire Old Testament narrative there's constant reminders from God.
"Remember when you were slaves, remember when I brought you out, remember when you cried."
The only way to fully understand the relationship between God and his people is to remember, and know, how he saved them. They need to remember what they've been through together.
How much is that not only the story of Israel, but the story of you and I?
How many people have began or renewed a relationship with God through crying out to him?
As God and the people make rules about the way they're going to live God says some interesting things.
"If you take your neighbors cloak as a pledge, return it by sunset, because that cloak is the only covering your neighbor has. What else can they sleep in? When they cry out to me I will hear them, for I am compassionate." (22:26-27)
God is saying, "Remember when Egypt did things to you that made you cry out to me? Now that I've saved you don't do things to other people that will make them cry out to me like you once did"
Because I'll hear them.
God's telling them that people crying out to him will get the ball rolling and cause him to respond to the crying, because that's what he does.
In Judges, the people work their way away from God over and over and over again. Each time, the cycle of redemption is begun with the people "crying out" and God "hearing them."
When they cry out, when hurt is expressed, God's ear is turned toward them.
A fundamental problem is revealed over the years and years of this cycle. The crying always comes back. Israel doesn't stay happy forever and will eventually err again. When that happens their sin forces God away from them. When God is forced away from them they fall into all the same problems of oppression, slavery, foreign armies, famine, disaster, lust, greed, and murder, just to name a few.
The only way this cycle can be repaired is if their sin can somehow be covered, for all time, forever, so that God can stay in the relationship no matter what. Even when we sin.
That's the kind of crying that goes away forever.
Notes:
To go deeper in the study of God's interactions with people who "cry out" head to Psalm 34:17 - Hosea 7:14 - Job 35:12 and most of Lamentations. As you can see, the focus of this writing is on sincere crying, insincere crying out is different.
Many thanks to the Sampson family for patiently waiting for their child to become fussy to snap a pic for me!
Buddy!!
ReplyDelete