Absentee man

Isaiah 50:1-5

How often have you been ask a question and it was clear the person asking knew the answer 

before asking the question?  Mothers are good at asking questions they know the answers to, 

and so are teachers and bosses, but has God ever ask you a question?  Well, He ask Israel 

this question: “Thus says the LORD: “Where is your mother's certificate of divorce, with which 

I sent her away? Or which of my creditors is it to whom I have sold you? Behold, for your 

iniquities you were sold, and for your transgressions your mother was sent away. (Isaiah 50:1) 

 It is clear God not only ask the question, but also gave a precise answer to the questions 

He ask.  And without waiting for a reply God ask these questions: “Why, when I came, was 

there no man; why, when I called, was there no one to answer? Is my hand shortened, that 

it cannot redeem? Or have I no power to deliver? Behold, by my rebuke I dry up the sea, I 

make the rivers a desert; their fish stink for lack of water and die of thirst.” (Isaiah 50:2 ESV)

I may be reading something into this, but it seems the absentee man was and is the problem 

then and today.  Do you recall that rascal Adam, where was he when his lady needed him, 

and the answer is standing right next to her?  But he was not her protector, Adam went 

passive, he was the example of many a man in the church today, present in body but absent 

when it comes to being the man, the provider and protector.  It seems Adam’s model was 

being followed by the men of Israel much like it is today, men posing as husbands and dads, 

but when it comes to leading, the question is asked, were is the man?

If you examine yourself and the title absentee man fits you God has a clear plan of what is needed to make you into a good servant, a follower of Christ, and someone who will lead as a husband and dad.  As we look into this ask the Holy Spirit to give you the eyes to see, the ears to hear, and the teacher to guide you into truth.  The good servant shares these truths with us of what is needed; “The Lord God has given me the tongue of those who are taught, that I may know how to sustain with a word him who is weary. Morning by morning he awakens; he awakens my ear to hear as those who are taught.  The Lord God has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious; I turned not backward.”  (Isaiah 50:4-5)

A brother in Christ asked me how he could live the Christian life?  It seems I often do what 

I do not want to do, and my answer is what great company you find yourself in.  For the 

apostle Paul said the same thing, it’s the defeated Christian chapter of Romans seven, but 

we also learn the solution is found in acting like Jesus tells the truth, for in doing so you allow 

the Spirit to live out Christ in you, and that is the hope of glory.  “For through the law I died to 

the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, 

but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, 

who loved me and gave himself for me.”   The brother who asked me this question had come 

to Christ in his fifties and did not understand that for fifty years he had gotten his needs met 

outside of Christ.  He, like you and I, must put to death those patterns of depending on self, 

and act on what Jesus is telling us, to walk by the Spirit and not to give the flesh any 

opportunity.

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice