Stubbornness


"Oh what a day of crushing defeat! ... Judah's defenses have been stripped away. You run to the armory for your weapons. You inspect the walls of Jerusalem. You store up water in the lower pool. ... But you never ask for help from the One who did all this. You never considered the One who planned this long ago." Isaiah 22:5-11

Too many times I've sat across the table from my sweetheart in silence. We've walked passed one another speaking only perfunctory comments. We've lay in bed in the darkness wide awake with a thick tension between us. Who will be the first to apologize? Who will be willing to at least own their part of the ugly? Stubbornness is a relational jackhammer that attacks the sacred bonds of marriage and all other relationships for that matter.

Over and over again in the Bible, as in our scripture for today, God confronts stubbornness. Specifically, his people's stubbornness as it related to his instruction and will for them. They tried anything and everything to solve their own problems except cry out to him for mercy. Even in the face of his prophets telling them to stop and turn to him, they resisted and persisted in their stubbornness. 

Today, too many people are stuck in their stubbornness. They are so convinced of their understanding of the situation that they are simply unwilling to even have a conversation with others. Regardless of where it is found, stubbornness steals. It takes the life out of all that is to be life-giving particularly a relationship with Jesus. Is there some stubbornness in your heart that needs to be rooted out?

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