Don’t Test the Wind

Pretty much every morning I am home on the Bill Rice Ranch I drive about a half mile up to the campground, park my car, and see a couple of friends. Those friends are dear friends; they are actually deer. They occupy the meadow and even the parking lot where I start my day. Oftentimes when you are observing deer, you see them with their noses up in the wind. Sometimes you observe them observing you. Maybe they haven’t yet seen you, but they smell you. My dog does the same thing. Every quick trip to the backyard for an easy task becomes a fifteen-minute adventure of my dog sniffing everything.

People do the same thing too. They don’t go around smelling everything, but they test the wind. They want to know who is on the ascendency or descendancy, who is going to be powerful or helpful. It is interesting to watch this play out when someone arrives at some kind of organization. They think a certain person is in charge, and you can see their attitude change as they become convinced that the power is really with someone else. In Washington D.C. since the election, it has been amazing to see the quick reactions of both friend and foe to the President elect. These are people who are testing the wind.

Testing the wind is a dangerous supposition. Why? Before we give the answer, let us consider Jeremiah 39 where you find what happened after the Babylonian captivity of Jerusalem. You find out what happened to King Zedekiah, Jeremiah, and a nearly unknown man named Ebed-melech, whose name means “servant of the king,” so that may not even be his actual name.

What happened to these men? When it comes to the king, Jeremiah 39:1 says, “In the ninth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the tenth month, came Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and all his army against Jerusalem, and they besieged it.” The city was broken up, and the king was bound with chains and carried to Babylon along with many of the people. King Zedekiah had heard the truth, but had walked by sight. He thought that what he saw was more reliable than what God said. Ironically, the last thing the king saw before his eyes were gouged out by the conquering Babylonians was his sons murdered. He walked by sight and then lost it.

What of Jeremiah? Verse 12 tells us what happened to him at this point. Nebuchadnezzar told his men, “Take him, and look well to him, and do him no harm; but do unto him even as he shall say unto thee.” Had Zedekiah said that? No, he had ignored Jeremiah. Ignored Jeremiah is now heard. The tables had turned.

What about Ebed-melech? Who was he? In Jeremiah 38 we find he was a man who at some personal risk went to the king and said, “It is not right that Jeremiah is in prison. We shouldn’t do this.” He was just a servant, but he had the courage to say what he thought to be true even when it wasn’t safe to do so.  This Ethiopian servant, an outsider, became the ultimate insider. Indeed, in verse 18 God says to him, “For I will surely deliver thee, and thou shalt not fall by the sword, but thy life shall be for a prey unto thee.” He was saying, “Regardless of the fact that the Babylonians are in control and the tables have turned, I am going to take care of you because you have trusted in the Lord.” So, both when Zedekiah was in charge and when Nebuchadnezzar was in charge, Ebed-melech trusted the Lord. He was not testing the wind.

King Zedekiah, Jeremiah, and Ebed-melech all realized that nothing was static except for the God of Israel. So, don’t test the wind. First, your lot will change. For good or for bad, nothing is fixed or constant. Haven’t you noticed how people who retire from some position of power, whether in the church, business, or socially, are regarded and treated? Sometimes they are honored, but I have seen people who had great power for decades retire and it is almost as if they meant nothing anymore, like they no longer exist. It is naïve to see yourself fixed as to your position and power. Your power will either wax or wain.

When I was twenty, I was a son. When I was twenty-two, I was a husband. Then I was a father and thought I was really getting old. You see yourself in these fixed positions. Now I am a grandfather and father-in-law. I become the people I thought were in a position of power. What goes around comes around. The way you treat your in-laws is the way you are going to be treated as an in-law. The way you treat your parents or grandparents is the way you will be treated as a parent or grandparent. Your lot will change. Don’t test the wind. See what God says and live accordingly.

Think about Jeremiah. Many prophets had been martyred, but that does not diminish the ultimate truth of an ultimate unchanging being, God. Your lot will change. Don’t test the wind because your view is limited. What did King Zedekiah see? Not what he thought he saw. He saw the Babylonians beyond the wall, but didn’t see the future even though Jeremiah had given him the truth over and again. In Jeremiah 40:3 when Nebuchadnezzar took control, one of his men said to Jeremiah, “Now the LORD hath brought it, and done according as he hath said.” That was easy to say because he was speaking of history, things he had already seen. Jeremiah had said the same things before they happened because God had told him what would happen. The only way to have an inkling of the future is to know what has not changed, God and His Word.

So, your lot will change, your view is limited, and your God is unchanging. Where does a stable, consistent life come from? It comes from not testing the wind to see who is in power. It comes from knowing what God has said and following His Word with the conviction that God will win. Everything else you see will crumble. Everyone else you know will die. Every power you conceive of will diminish in time, but not God. Don’t test the wind. The lot of the king, the prophet, and the servant all changed. Yours will as well, but God’s never will.