As if I need more reasons to run away from social media and never come back, lately, my scrolling adventures have led me to spoiler after spoiler.
It’s my own fault, of course. As a member of the DVR generation, I never watch TV shows when they are actually on TV (I like being able to fast-forward through commercials).
This leaves me vulnerable to Facebook somehow knowing what shows I watch and posting articles on my feed from pages I don’t even follow about what happened on an episode from two days prior.
D’oh! The surprise is gone. Any shock and happiness I may have felt upon seeing said episode’s moment in real-time is gone forever.
These are the modern-day first-world problems we deal with every day.
Getting the message
How many times in life do we pray for a “spoiler alert” from God?
Yet, how many times do we not want to know what’s going to happen next?
Which is it: To spoil or not to spoil?
How would the remaining Apostles in the Upper Room have felt if they knew what was going to happen on Sunday?
Would they have been a lot less sad and fearful?
Of course . . . “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up” (John 2:19).
Had everyone who was listening understood, they would have known what was coming next.
Maybe God is telling us all the time what’s next, we’re not just understanding or listening. That would be just like us, wouldn’t it?
How about another one?
How about . . . “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me” (Matthew 16:24).
This passage always fascinates me.
It’s easy for us to read it now and know exactly what’s going on — we know Christ will be crucified on Good Friday.
His followers didn’t know that.
While crucifixion was certainly a Roman Empire method of capital punishment going on at the time, it’s sort of an odd thing to say out of context.
You never would have been likely to hear someone say “Sit in your electric chair and follow me”.
Yet, there it is.
For the super Scripture scholars out there at that time, the Word was loaded with “spoilers,” but very few had the faith to listen, read, or understand.
How many messages from God do we have on our hearts or right in front of our faces, but we don’t take them seriously or believe them?
I don’t want to know
Perhaps there is virtue in not knowing what’s to come.
Do you really want to know what day you will die (yeah, I went there, right away)?
Do you want to know what your future holds five years from now? Ten years from now? Twenty?
I’m really not an “enjoy the ride” or “enjoy the journey” kind of person because I like to know the bad things that could be ahead of me and if I can potentially change the outcome or do better, but some things are better lived than known.
The summer of 2021 wouldn’t have been as fun had I known several months earlier that the Bucks were going to win the NBA Finals.
That being said, I wouldn’t have minded a hint or two that I would be meeting my wife someday after dealing with numerous heartbreaks.
We’d love some spoilers for those really painful times in our lives when enjoying the ride is quite exhausting.
When we can’t hear or feel what God is saying to us, we have faith to get us through.
SPOILER ALERT: God knows what’s coming next.
We might not like it, but He’s with us.
Thank you for reading.
I’m praying for you.
Have a blessed Easter!