Face like Flint...

The words of Isaiah pierced my thoughts this morning. I’ve written about the struggles with life recently. The challenges of promotion and the resistance to forward progression over the last year. It has been challenging on so many levels and when I look back, I struggle to understand the journey I’ve been on. It has left me bruised and battered along the way. But somehow, with strength, I keep moving forward. 

There are so many translations of this verse that resonate with me and the most accurate and comforting version says this: 

For Adonai Elohim will help. This is why no insult can wound me. This is why I have set my face like flint, knowing I will not be put to shame. - Isaiah 50:7 CJB

Flint is an interesting material. Flint is a tough material that fractures like glass. When heated and cooled, it can be chipped into cutting tools and weapons, creating razor-sharp edges. Flint can also be used to start a fire if it is struck against steel. In spiritual terms, let that marinate… 

When you know the strength that you carry, you can keep moving forward even in the face of the most difficult hardships. As a believer, I’ve found myself in spaces where the sense of warfare is very tangible. When scripture says that we wrestle not against flesh and blood. I realize the opposition in front of me is not rooted in the flesh and blood standing before me, but through powers and principalities that want to destroy the work God can do through me. 

As a believer, I want to be open to the work God can do through me. I want to move and take ground for the kingdom. I want to see captives set free and blind eyes opened, hearts of stone transformed into hearts of flesh, supple and sensitive to the voice of God. My fight is not with the people in front of me, but with the spiritual forces that want to keep people blind and in bondage. Ultimately, the fight is not mine, but is the Lord’s. I am the flint-tipped arrow, I carry His word in my heart, I am the vessel, and he is the hand that holds me. The fight belongs to him. 

It’s hard to trust that things will all work out and that a breakthrough will come. But just like Jesus before the cross, the pressure and the buildup to the purpose he came to accomplish, he too suffered the weight of what he took on. There are times in our lives when we will need to be content with being the vessel, the instrument through which God chooses to accomplish his purposes. If we are truly committed to his plans, we will suffer. My prayer lately is, God, preserve my soul because it is precious to you. 

There is another side to the coin of suffering. There is a belief I need to confront. Periodically, I catch a glimpse of it, but then my focus returns to the circumstances in front of me. My focus sometimes is on the suffering, and there is this inclination to wear trials and tribulations like a badge of Christian Armor. If I’m honest, there is some bit of pride under the surface of that habit. I want to make God proud, so I choose to bear hardship. I want to be a good Christian, so I embrace suffering. If I am honest with myself, the question comes… Am I seeking suffering because I think that is the entirety of what the Christian life is supposed to be?

Many times before Jesus went to the cross, he could have been killed. He upset a lot of people when he spoke and did the things he did. He was about his father’s business and confronted a lot of things that were out of alignment with his father’s will.

In one passage in Luke 4, Jesus goes to the synagogue in Nazareth to tell the people that the proclamation from the book of Isaiah saying “The Spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” has been fulfilled. 

All the people were pleased to hear that. (Luke 4:18-22 NIV) But then he said the thing that pissed them off.  He let them know, “No prophet is accepted in his hometown.” And for that reason, God would choose to heal and set free Gentiles instead of the Jews. (Luke 4: 24-27 NIV) So what did the people do? 

28 All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this. 29 They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him off the cliff.” - Luke 4:28-29 NIV

Jesus responded to their actions like a boss, 30 “…he walked right through the crowd and went on his way.” - Luke 4:30 NIV Jesus understood the timing for his real suffering, and he did not allow the furor of the crowd to dictate the timing of the suffering he was scheduled to endure. He walked in step with the Holy Spirit and allowed himself to be guided towards and away from suffering. 

We need to ask God when we find ourselves in difficult circumstances, if it is his will for us to remain in it or if it is his will for us to walk through the crowd and go on our way. What remains true for either response is that we keep our face like flint, determined to persevere and demonstrate resilience no matter the circumstance. Coming back to this verse in Isaiah, “For Adonai Elohim will help. This is why no insult can wound me. This is why I have set my face like flint, knowing I will not be put to shame.” - Isaiah 50:7 CJB 

Ultimately, our story isn’t about us, and while yes, our story is precious to God, we are but a thread in the tapestry of time. He is the weaver and he knows what the finished work will look like. We need to remain supple, flexible and resilient in his hands or we will break in a way that God did not intend. When we lean into his guidance and set our face like flint, we will not be put to shame.