Jesus Isn't Decaf (By Naomi Meyers)

They were in an incredible mess. The worst of times their short memories could recall. Repeatedly defeated on the battlefield. Frequently raided and plundered. Defenseless against their enemies. It was truly the worst of times. At least the worst time they could remember. And they couldn’t figure out why. Why did victory continually elude them? Why were they constantly being targeted? Why were things no longer working out the way they had when Joshua and his fellow elders had been alive?  

With Joshua leading them, defeat was a foreign word. They were largely unfamiliar with the feeling. They knew how to inflict it, but not how to endure it. From the moment Jericho had collapsed at their shouts, they’d been on a winning streak. Even Ai had been destroyed. Eventually. After the whole Achan debacle. Some of them had watched as Joshua, by God’s power, held the sun at a standstill, bringing victory at Gibeon. They’d seen the five Amorite kings defeated, the Northern kings defeated. The list of victories over kings and kingdoms was nearly too long to name. They had lived in a time of prosperity and victory under Joshua and the elders of his day. Now that generation was gone. They had passed to their eternal reward. It seemed the victories were gone as well. And the people had no idea why. (Joshua 10:1-27)

Gathering together, their heads bowed over battle plans, brows furrowed in thought, they simply couldn’t comprehend what they were doing wrong. The safety of their families was in jeopardy. Their lives hung in the balance. The next battle had every possibility of wiping them out entirely. Their minds were exhausted with the effort of attempting to devise a winning battle strategy. They were clearly forgetting something Joshua had done. What it was they didn’t know. Couldn’t know. Because they had never been told. Their parents hadn’t passed the stories down like Moses told them to. Their ancestors hadn’t kept up the generational warnings. They couldn’t win because they were living fundamentally wrong. 

No one knows when the slide actually began. Perhaps a handful of people started before Joshua passed away. Maybe the grassroots organization gained momentum as one by one the elders of Joshua’s generation followed him in death. Perhaps the pull of something new and strange, the allure of the surrounding nations got in their heads. Whatever the case, the people of that day had completely abandoned the ways of God and given themselves over to following Baal. They didn’t seem to know better. It was as if they had never been warned of the consequences, never been counseled about continual adherence to the true way, never been told the requirements set forth by God. Because they hadn’t.

In stark verbiage leaving nothing open to interpretation, Judges 2:10 states the people had no idea how to live because no one had told them. They weren’t raised knowing God. Had no clue what His requirements were. Remained stymied when it came to the far-reaching effects of failure to follow. They didn’t know about all the things He’d done for Israel in the generations before them. The Egypt rescue. The wilderness journeys. The victorious battles when Moses was still alive. They simply hadn’t been told those things. They hadn’t been told the other things, either. How the people grumbled and complained, strayed and rebelled. They hadn’t heard about the consequences. Plagues. Death. Defeat. Their parents hadn’t told them. Their grandparents hadn’t said anything. The elders of the community had remained mum. One wonders why.

Knowing that adherence to God’s ways and commands was integral to victory, why would the parents and grandparents of the rising generation not share with their children the path to success? For life and battle alike. Why would they not instill in their children the ways of the God who had delivered and sustained them through every moment of their lives? Why did they not simply tell them the importance of following God in words easy to understand yet difficult to forget? Why did they leave them to figure it out the hard way? Perhaps the parents thought it would be instilled by observation, learned through osmosis. Maybe they believed each person needed to find their own way. Perhaps they didn’t want to look at their children and admit they or their parents had once been those people who had abandoned God and His ways, only to end up needing His rescuing. Maybe they didn’t want their children to know who they had been before Jesus found them, even if it was the only way to steer them in the right direction. Whatever the truth, their lack of sharing with their children had a disastrous result. 

In spite of the judges God raised up, the new generation of Israelites continually chose their idols. More and more corrupt they became, loving their evil practices and stubborn ways more than they loved the peace God gave them through the judges. They didn’t care, or possibly didn’t even know, that the covenant with God lay in shreds at their feet. They weren’t interested in following Him. Didn’t want to know Him. Thought they were just fine on their own, doing their own thing, walking in their own ways. They still wanted the blessings and victories of Joshua’s day, but they weren’t interested in living the alleged antiquated standards and principles Joshua lived. They’d never had to do so. No one had encouraged it, enforced it, impressed on them the importance of keeping their covenant with God. It was their hope, their help, their rescue. He would be their God. If they would choose to be His people. On their behalf, I wish their parents would have told them. (Deuteronomy 4:9-10; 11:19)

The story would surely read much differently if they had. If the parents had told their children the stories of their lives, both tragedies and triumphs, they would certainly have been in a much better position to make decisions about their own lives. Had they known the hand of God was there both for deliverance and discipline, it would most assuredly have impacted their choices. If they had taken proper responsibility for their own sins, boldly shared the incidents of treachery and disobedience even when it didn’t cast themselves in the best light, it is possible that this new generation would not have wholeheartedly abandoned God and run selfishly after idols. If only the children had known. (Judges 2:8-23; Psalm 107:2-43)

Humanity has changed so little over the intervening centuries from then to now. We are in no less of a predicament. The newest generation of humans is farther from the truths of God than any previous generation has been. Morally lackadaisical and spiritually complacent, those who should be sharing the power and might, rules and requirements of God have ceased to speak those things. Not in the morning. Not in the evening. Not to their families or friends. Not to their children. Parents, either in hiding their own shady pasts or in allegedly allowing their children to choose their own paths, have failed to tell the true stories of God in their lives. They haven’t shared the necessity of strict adherence to His commands. They haven’t highlighted the consequences of falling away. Instead, they have allowed caveats. Remained silent as good is called evil and evil is called good. They have acquiesced to Jesus lite, diet God, decaf Christianity. And it is costing. Costing us our children, our society, our nation. Costing our children their souls. (Deuteronomy 6:6-8; Joel 1:3; Proverbs 22:6; Psalm 78:4) 

Somehow, I wonder how our society would look if we were honest with our children about ourselves, our lives, our past. What if we quit acting like we have lived perfect lives of absolute holiness with no hidden sins, no twists of envy, no surges of anger? What if we owned our mistakes, our indiscretions, our sins? Past and present. What if we admitted the wayward shenanigans of our youth and told the stories of how God rescued us when we came to Him in repentance and contrition? What if we stopped hiding our past, painting ourselves as perfect, and just owned the mess we were (and sometimes still are) when God’s grace rescued us? What if our children heard and knew the truth about God? That He is a God of unfailing love, unending grace, and unfathomable mercy who saves us from ourselves. What if we told them personal accounts of how that worked? What if we taught them, from personal experience, that the rules and commands and expectations of God are for our good? He never seeks to make us miserable or punish us, but puts those requirements in place to protect and preserve us from soul-killing evil. What if our children knew we were simply sinners saved by grace, the same as them? How would society look, how would our world be different, if only our children knew? (Romans 3:10-12, 23-26; Acts 17:30; I John 1:9; Romans 5:8; Psalm 13:5-6; Ephesians 2:4-5; I John 2:15-29; I Chronicles 16:11; Psalm 121:7; Deuteronomy 5:33; Isaiah 54:13; Psalm 78:5-7)