Crusts of Hearsay 

 Crumbs of Rumor

I like food and I am already dreaming about Thanksgiving dinner. I love the smell of turkey roasting in the oven lofting through the entire house almost as much as the real turkey - almost. I am looking forward to real mashed potatoes with homemade gravy and sweet potatoes covered with lightly toasted marshmallows.  Then, of course, there will be the traditional green bean casserole and salads and bread and pumpkin and pecan pie with lots of whipped cream.  I need to move on before I quit writing and go raid the kitchen.  You get the point that I really do love rich, good tasting, fattening food.  Everything was good until I hit 40.  Up until then I could eat anything I wanted and if I gained a few pounds, I would just take a week or two and exercise a little more and off would come the weight.  Then when I hit 40, it was like I had passed through the wardrobe door with Lucy in the Chronicles of Narnia into a strange and unknown land.  Suddenly the pounds came, unpacked their bags, and took up residence. They settled on my hips and refused to leave. I exercised but the extra weight would not budge. It was then I had to say goodbye to anything fried, farewell to all types of gravy, and adios to luscious desserts.  I entered the sparse land of crusts and crumbs and so I was taken completely by surprise when I found a friend in Job. 

I was reading through the book of Job, not so much for pleasure, but because it was what I was suppose to read in my Through the Bible in One Year.  In the past, reading Job has been like taking really nasty medicine.  Nowadays, kids get cherry flavored or maybe even bubble gum flavored medicine, but back in my day it was just straight old yucky tasting.  You know where you hold your nose and gulp it down quick.  Job was not my favorite book and I was not really expecting anything really good to show up, when I was accosted by this phrase in the Message Bible, “I'll never again live on crusts of hearsay, crumbs of rumor.”  Wait just a minute.  How could Job compare his life to crumbs and crust?   Remember how the book of Job begins?  I did because I read through the whole book in one sitting.  I had applied my hold your nose and gulp method.

Job 1:1-3 (MSG) Job was a man who lived in Uz. He was honest inside and out, a man of his word, who was totally devoted to God and hated evil with a passion. He had seven sons and three daughters. He was also very wealthy—seven thousand head of sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred teams of oxen, five hundred donkeys, and a huge staff of servants—the most influential man in all the East!

That wasn’t just Job’s opinion.  Listen to what God said about Job.

God said to Satan, "Have you noticed my friend Job? There's no one quite like him—honest and true to his word, totally devoted to God and hating evil."

Then when you keep on reading really fast you come to chapter 42 where you read…

Job 42 1-6 Job answered God: "I'm convinced: You can do anything and everything.   Nothing and no one can upset your plans.  You asked, 'Who is this muddying the water,  ignorantly confusing the issue, second-guessing my purposes?'  I admit it. I was the one. I babbled on about things far beyond me, made small talk about wonders way over my head.  You told me, 'Listen, and let me do the talking.  Let me ask the questions. You give the answers.' I admit I once lived by rumors of you;    now I have it all firsthand—from my own eyes and ears!  I'm sorry—forgive me. I'll never do that again, I promise! I'll never again live on crusts of hearsay, crumbs of rumor."

There it is.  Job compared his honest, totally devoted to God, hated evil with a passion, and lived under God’s favor and blessings life, to crumbs and crust.  I would think that his honest, totally devoted to God, hated evil with a passion, and lived under God’s favor and blessings life, would be compared to dining on the full Thanksgiving feast.  It certainly does not sound like crumbs and crust.  Job’s amazing testimony is that God used his trials to take him from a relationship that was based on rumors and hearsay, to one that was up close and personal.

We have all faced trials or are going through some right now.  God means to use them for our good.  God invites you and me personally to His banqueting table every day of our lives not just on Thanksgiving. We have a personal invitation to come and dine face to face with the Master in good times and bad.  No more crusts of hearsay and crumbs of rumor for me.  Like Job, I want to know God firsthand.  I will not be satisfied with anything less than my own personal, one-on-one relationship with God.

I stand with (my now good friend and one of my favorite books in the Bible) Job today and declare –

I'll never again live on crusts of hearsay, crumbs of rumor.

I pray you are feasting today on more than turkey.