and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.
~ Hebrews 10:38
Time for a touch of word study. Who is a "righteous one?"
By checking the lexicon, we see the original Greek work is dikaios. The righteous one is a person who is upright, virtuous, keeping the commands of God, whose actions are conformed to the will of God, and therefore is acceptable of God.
Even secular history books sometimes cover the first phrase in Hebrews 10:38 because the idea that the just shall live by faith was so radically pivotal to Martin Luther. His epiphany of that one truth sparked the Protestant Reformation, which divided European governments and inspired colonization of North America.
But our runaway bride did not conform her actions to the plan that the Lord revealed to her on New Year's Day. She shrank back from it. The second phrase in the verse speaks to the act of shrinking back. Our Greek lexicon tells us the original word is hypostellō, which means to draw back, to withdraw one's self, to shrink from declaring. It is a non-action rooted in timidity. The consequence of this behavior is that God's soul has no pleasure in it.
It's pretty easy to find biblical accounts of people who displeased God. In each case, they were shrinking back and not believing what He said. One of the more dramatic examples plays out in the 13th and 14th chapter of the Book of Numbers when the spies spent 40 days checking out the land the Lord had given them. Forty days was all it took for then to start looking at the giants and begin feeling insecure.
They said, "The land devours its inhabitants; we are like grasshoppers." And that is essentially the same thing that Katie did. She saw herself as a grasshopper, she did. Have you seen a picture of a Katydid?
Yes, it is a lot like a grasshopper.
In just a few days, the same men who just two-and-a-half years earlier had seen deliverance from Egypt and personally crossed the Red Sea while the water stood aside, who had been sustained on manna, who saw the water purified at Marah, who felt the ground shake and witnessed the thunderings and lightnings on the Holy Mountain in Sinai, who accepted the Ten Commandments (on the second go-round), who participated in the building of the Tabernacle; these same men lost all confidence in what God had told them in less than forty days! They saw themselves as grasshoppers. Their self-esteem as a servant of the Lord had plummeted. God's soul found no pleasure in their lack of faith. He essentially told them they could spend the next forty years pounding sand.
Faith without deeds is useless. "What use is it if someone claims to have faith, but has no deeds? Is that faith able to save him?" asks James 2:14. Trusting the Lord's plan for one's life takes more than reading a book and talking about it. It is a work of the heart, the soul, and the body that exhibits a living faith. "Living Faith" will step up and act on what God says. It won't run and hide and pull the plug on all further communication.
It is bad enough for a person to shrink back on his or her own. It is worse when a second person actively encourages the the drawing back. But when shrinking away from God becomes the advice and consolation offered by an authority figure under the guise of loving concern and wisdom, that is the worst.
The evidence seems to point to KatieLyn having grasshopper syndrome. During the courtship, she would sometimes say things that indicated that she was seeing herself as small, powerless, and unworthy, as if finding Joe was almost too good to be true. I know some people will say things to belittle themselves on purpose just so that those around them will exclaim "No!" and make an appropriate contradictory remark of felicitation. But I never got the impression that KatieLyn was fishing for a compliment; she seemed to see herself as a grasshopper in some areas.
Joe is of the opinion, and I am inclined to concur, that KatieLyn's mother manipulates KatieLyn's "grasshopper syndrome." That is, she does and says things that will undermine KatieLyn's self-confidence and then, once KatieLyn is second-guessing herself, the mother pulls back and rather gratuitously "lets KatieLyn make her own decisions." It is insidious. If KatieLyn ever regrets that decision later on, her mother will be right there to tell Katie that she did that all on her own, that was what Katie said she wanted. That is what happened leading up to the flight of the runaway bride, and of course, the mother was there to support her in whatever "she" wanted, even support for running away from the Lord.
The Lesson
Hebrews 10:38 — My righteous one will live by faith; and if he might shrink back, my soul does not take pleasure in him. In light of this truth, one cannot honestly argue that the Israelites were wise to shrink back from the land the Lord had given them. God was not oblivious to the giants' presence in thin land. The Israelites should have realized that God would not task them with the impossible. They could have taken the attitude, "We can do this! God gave it to us." God wanted the Israelites to step out as a show of faith, as an act of trust in the Lord. Their doubts did not bring them wisdom. Their doubts defeated them. KatieLyn's doubts defeated her too.
The Israelites were not defeated by the giants in the land; they were defeated by the grasshoppers in their minds. Shrinking back is the opposite is stepping out. Without faith, it is impossible to step out and walk the down the aisle to the Lord's chosen destiny.
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