5You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me,
While my best friend and I were walking through our ‘talk it out’ path when we were pre-teens, Patty told me she went to a party with her friend Ellie-without me! I mean not only did she go without me but, she knew I was not even invited! I was jealous! So much so that I gave her a shove at just the right (or wrong) moment and she fell into a mud puddle. I felt really bad, and a little vindicated! Well, she was a very forgiving friend. We made up, and went on to be great friends throughout the rest of our school careers.
Years later, I gave birth to a perfect little boy. He was exactly 7 pounds of boy joy! That child stole my heart. Each day I thought he could not get any cuter. Guess what? The next day he did! I contemplated going back to work, but how could I? I might not be the one to see his first smile, or hear his first chuckle. I might miss that totally perfect photo I had been waiting for all day. I might miss him stretching up to reach me, or touching grass for the first time. Someone else would see what was rightfully mine! I became jealous! Baby Aaron was only 6 weeks old and my husband and I decided I would stay home to raise our child.
See, I was the one who carried him inside for nine (long) months. I sang to him and read to him inside my womb. I was the one who endured the pain of his birth, stayed with him in sickness, listened to his friend fights, and his accomplishments. He knew my voice, and I knew his. In fact, it was just my voice that stopped him from running out in the street. My voice that celebrated with him when he graduated. Then, one day I was the one who danced the Mom-groom dance with him at his wedding, then released a grown man into the capable arms of his Bride. By the way, I had the same reaction with perfect baby boy #2, Eliot!
That is when I began to understand how our God could be a jealous God. God is jealous for me. He knit me together in my Mother’s womb and He still sings over me. (Zephaniah3:17) He spent so much thought just designing me, then creating me. He taught me about Himself and smiled when I got it. I look like him, I talk like him, I have deep emotions like him. He knows my voice, and i know His! When I spend time with someone or something I shouldn’t, yes, he becomes jealous! Jealous because I am set aside for him and his pleasure, and I placed my interest elsewhere. We can understand his feeling of jealousy if we have experienced that parental attachment with our children. That attachment does not change, even as they change. Our hearts are connected in indescribable ways, just like God’s heart to ours.
Don’t make God jealous by going after strange things that don’t belong in your wheelhouse. There is plenty in life to learn and do that would be pleasing to him. We have the entire world to explore and to learn about, and since he created it, I believe he is pleases when we take an interest in it. But, more importantly, when we take an interest in Him, he delights!
Psalm 37:4 says, “Delight yourself also in the LORD and He shall give you the desires of your heart.”
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