Surprise!: God's Unexpected Measures, Our Opportunity to Grow

One of the things that I adore about God is His ability to surprise. Really, what do humans know? And yet we form expectations about the way that things ought to work. In our search for understanding, we are wired and encouraged to notice patterns and learn from our experiences, then respond accordingly. We often need to put aside what we think we know (collective and personal histories, assumptions, gut instincts, etc.) in order to truly learn. When we're caught off guard and admit wrongness, we learn the deepest and most convicting lessons.

That means allowing ourselves to be surprised and not run away from the opportunity that it presents to scrutinize, reflect, and grow.

God overflows with surprises that guides us to participate in this learning. He moves in subversive, juxtaposed, and counter-expectational ways! Jesus is an obvious example of this -- eating with tax collectors, washing feet, carrying nothing with him, dying on the cross. The Jews anticipated the Messiah would come with engines blazing, but instead Jesus offered an even better vision than instantaneous conquest. There's so much goodness within the shock that breaks people away from assumptions and into reality.

I find it so fascinating that even the Bible is written to send anyone who reads it reeling. Bible stories have skillful designs, clearly displaying God's character in each passage. The unexpected comes to life through its composition as much as its content, and, as I found this past week, both walk hand-in-hand vividly in Joshua 22.

Here's the background for this chapter: Israel crossed over the Jordan under the leadership of Joshua. After conquering the land and splitting it up among the people, a few of the tribes chose to go back to where they were in Moses's time to claim the land that he'd given them. Joshua blesses them, also warning them in verse 5, "But be very careful to keep the commandment and the law that Moses the servant of the Lord gave you: to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, to keep his commands, to hold fast to him and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul." The first time I read through this verse, my first reaction was: This seems like foreshadowing for disaster. Israel doesn't have a shining resume when it comes to remaining faithful. From all of my studying of literature and the Bible, my brain readied itself for a story of infidelity and falling away.

Which is exactly what the rest of the Israelites expected, too! When those who stayed in the land conquered by the Lord heard that the tribes who'd gone away had built an altar, they sent Phinehas the priest, along with a collection of other leaders, to confront what they presumed to be a sinful behavior. Phinehas said to those tribes in verses 16-18: "The whole assembly of the Lord says this: 'How could you break faith with the God of Israel like this? How could you turn away from the Lord and build yourselves an altar in rebellion against him now? Was not the sin of Peor enough for us? Up to this very day we have not cleansed ourselves from that sin, even though a plague fell on the community of the Lord! And are you now turning away from the Lord?'"

Classic! While the leader's out of frame, the sinners play, right?

Wrong. As it turns out, the altar that those tribes built must have been more of an artistic and architectural tribute -- what they called a witness -- to their relationship with God. And after Phinehas and all the other leaders with him understand it as such, they change their attitudes from displeasure into praise. The thoughts of waging war against those tribes dissolves immediately. They are caught off guard and gladdened by it.

We can learn a few essential lessons from this regarding how to approach one another in times of (suspected) sin, including the need for prompt confrontation, sincerity and transparency, listening, and right judgment. You should definitely read this chapter in its entirety to learn from its example! But what I'm most interested in right now is the fact that the very structure and storytelling of Joshua 22 intends to catch us by surprise. I know that my first impulse was to condemn the tribes of Israel who'd built the altar. I see myself in Phinehas and the members of Israel ready to go to war against the sins of their brothers. They had their expectations, made a judgment, then went out to set things straight. Only, when the altar was accepted by them as a testament to faith, it took some extra time for me to wrestle with my usurped expectations. The passage brought me true and utter surprise.

As we go through life, we build banks of expectations and experiences, but they are not secure unless we leave space for the uncomfortable task of reconsideration. Whether we are watching God work in our own lives or reading about His works in the Bible, it's not for us to decide right and wrong, fair and unfair, sense and nonsense. We are instead supposed to learn and dig into the things that surprise us. That's where and how we learn! And, when God rocks the boat to reveal to us different truths, choices, and perspectives, we should always brush against our shock in order to come out on the other side wiser, humbler, and in closer agreement with Him.

That's the start of the scrutiny of our own ways, as well as the path to discernment and conformity to God. Then, as we live our daily lives, we can surprise others around us, welcoming them into the same growth we seek for ourselves.