Cracks in the Wall

Our boys love to read almost as much as I do.  They have two bookshelves in their room full of all kinds of books, and just like all kids who want to prolong the bedtime routine, they try to get me to read more and more each night.  Some of their books are really good, some make me laugh, some are pretty silly, but there is one in particular that makes me cry every time I try to read it to them.  It's a children's book by Max Lucado called Because I Love You, and don't get me wrong, it's a great book, but the message touches my heart deeply, and it always brings about an emotional response no matter how many times I read the words. 

The book is a story about God's love for His children illustrated through a tale of a man named Shaddai, and the children whom he loves and who love him.  Because of his love for the children, Shaddai builds a wall around their village to protect them from the forest outside.  One day, a little boy finds a crack in the wall, a hole big enough for a child to crawl through.  The boy tells Shaddai about it, and Shaddai realizes (or has known all along) that this child was out searching for cracks in the wall.  This is what Shaddai says to him, "Listen to me.  The lands out there are not for you.  They are not for me.  A journey into the forest will hurt you.  You were not made for those lands.  Let your feet carry you to the many places you can go - not to the one place you can't.  If you leave here, you will not find the way back."
The child says, "You will fix the hole then?" 
"No," Shaddai says, "I created the hole because I love you so much...(farther down the page he says)...I want the children to stay because they want to, not because they have to."

In the story, curiosity wins out, and the boy crawls through the crack "just to take a quick look."  At first the forest looks fun and beautiful, and he wants to tell his friends that there's nothing to be scared of out there, but when he turns around to find his way back to the village, the hole is gone.  Suddenly, the forest seems scary and strange, he starts to fear, and he wonders if Shaddai will come and find him.  He calls out, "Shaddai, Shaddai!  I'm so sorry I didn't listen to you!  Please, come help me."  The book says that before the child even utters the words, Shaddai was on his way to find him;  even before the crack that the boy climbed through closed, Shaddai had opened another and crawled through to find him.  "He left the village he made and set out in search of his child."

I'm crying again...

I think it's so personal to me because I am someone who used to search for cracks in the wall;  I have always known right from wrong, but sometimes the wrong didn't look so wrong until I was in the middle of it.  Curiosity about worldly things can deceive us sometimes;  sometimes it just takes a "quick look" to get us in over our heads.  Whether its lies, or certain relationships, or alcohol, or any number of other sins the world puts a pretty face on, God's children "were not made for those lands." A journey into the world of sin will hurt you, no matter how careful you think you're being, and the thing about those journeys is that there's no way back to the safety of the presence of God...no way back, that is, apart from calling out to Him. 

I've spent much of my life in the "forest";  walking up and down the wall searching for cracks.  I've always known the One who loves me, and I have always believed in His love for me, but I'm a curious girl, not bad, just curious.  Each time that I've crawled through one of those holes though, God has been faithful to rescue me because He loves me. 

I've grown out of the searching, but every once in a while I stumble upon a hole big enough for me to crawl through;  I've found that if I'm not connected to My Father, if I'm not near Him, talking to Him, and seeking Him, my curiosity gets the better of me and soon I'm on a journey that I don't want to be on.  Why?  Let's looks to Romans 7:15-25,

"I do not understand what I do.  For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.  And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good.  As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.  I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, my sinful nature.  For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.  For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing.  Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.  So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me.  For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within the members. What a wretched man I am!  Who will rescue me from this body of death?  Thanks be to God - through Jesus Christ our Lord!"

Those verses tell me that the sinful nature is powerful, and that when I am a slave to it, when I, on my own strength, try to resist curiosity, and try to keep away from the cracks in the walls - I am powerless.  In every instance my sinful desire will win out.  So it is hopeless?  Am I a slave to sin?  Am I destined to live in the forest?  No!  By God's grace and His love for me (and you!) He sent His Son to save us.  The thing is, when we accept Him, and He builds that wall around us to protect us from a world we don't belong to, it doesn't mean that we won't occasionally find those cracks and decide to crawl through for a "quick look";  it doesn't mean we are immune to the curiosity.  He gives us the freedom to explore, and He knows what we'll do before we do it;  the beautiful thing is that He steps out to save us from ourselves before we even utter our pleas of rescue to Him.  

When the little boy in the book was stuck in the forest, and he couldn't find his way back into the village, he remembered Shaddai telling him often, "I love you so much."  The little boy wondered if Shaddai really loved him enough to come and find him;  you can be sure that no matter how long you've been in the forest, God loves you more than enough to come and find you.  You may wonder if He could forgive you for crawling through one of those cracks and exploring the land where He asked you not to go;  the answer is yes.  Our sinful nature is strong, but God's love and the saving grace of His Son, Jesus, are stronger.  Maybe you've been a believer all of your life and decided to crawl through that wall "just to see what's out there";  maybe your sin is deep, and maybe you can't find your way back into His Presence...call out to Him.  You see, even before you get the words out of your mouth, He'll be there.  He loves us enough to allow us the freedom to leave the safety of His village, and He loves us enough to rescue us when we see for ourselves that the lands beyond His village are not for us.