Willing to be Dumb
Baby Girl,
Who fought the battle of Jericho?
Daddy… thank you for waking me up! I so wanted to hear from You tonight!
Who fought the battle of Jericho, Little One?
Joshua. Joshua fought the battle of Jericho.
What was his weapon of choice?
Umm… this feels like a trick question. I know that he put the armed men at the front of the pack, so there were weapons, and they did have to use them once the walls came down.
Sing Me the song.
Joshua fought the battle of Jericho, Jericho, Jericho, Joshua fought the battle of Jericho and the walls came tumbling down.
So Joshua fought and that is what brought the walls down?
No. Joshua had the Israelite army walk around the walls of Jericho in silence for six days, one time per day and on the seventh day, they walked around the walls seven times then they blew the rams horn trumpets and shouted and the walls fell down. I know I’ve read the story several times recently but I feel like there were glass jars they threw down and broke?
Sing Me the first verse of the song…
You may talk about the Kings of Gideon…
What does that mean?
I didn’t know Gideon’s name was actually Jerubbaal? Well, obviously at some point in my life I did because I’ve read the whole Bible, but I forgot all about Gideon and his 300 men.
The Bible is a Lamp… read it and read it and read it again. When you LIVE in the Word, your path will stay bright. Read it so frequently with the understanding that it is a Lamp that everything in your life begins to feel like an echo of the stories within.
Tell Me about Judges 7 since you pulled that up.
Judges 7 talks about when You called Gideon to take the camp of the Midianites. You told him there were too many in his army for him to go up against the Midianites. If He took his 32,000 men, they might think they won the battle in their own strength. He sent home those who were fearful and only ten thousand remained. You had Gideon take the men down to the water to get a drink, and You only let him keep the three hundred men who lapped up water with his tongue like a dog.
Is it just me or did You leave him with 300 of the dumbest men in Israel? What kind of a person laps water up with his tongue like a dog? That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. I mean, at a water fountain some people stick their tongues out to drink which I always thought looked really dumb, and gross… kids would lick the water fountain…
Dumb = temporarily unable or unwilling to speak
Really… that’s what dumb means? I was just curious because I kept talking about how dumb they were and I wanted to make sure it wasn’t offensive like when people use the R-word. If dumb means unable or unwilling to speak, why do we call people who do stupid things dumb?
Google said that when we call a person dumb, we are essentially calling them stupid or lacking intelligence. I guess it would be more fitting to say people look stupid when they lick the water at the water fountain with their tongue.
Little One, our time is limited. Gideon; what happened when he took the 300 men to the camp of the Midianites?
There were people in the valley as numerous as locusts with camels as numerous as the sand by the seashore. There was a man who had a dream about a loaf of bread rolling into the camp and it was interpreted that they would win, so Gideon worshiped God and knew the LORD would give him the victory.
Because of a dream about a rolling loaf of bread?
I didn’t make this story up, You did!
What is that verse that just came to mind?
1 Corinthians 1:18-25 “…the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent… because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”
Little One, are you willing to be dumb?
That is the oddest thing You’ve ever asked me. You asked me if I was willing to go into obscurity and that felt weird, but now You’re asking me to be dumb?
I’m talking about the dictionary definition, not popular understanding. I’m not asking you to be stupid or lacking intelligence; although, if you truly become dumb with godly indifference, you may appear to be lacking intelligence…
Godly indifference… I don’t even remember what You revealed to me about godly indifference. I know I made a word art about it.
- 10 MINUTES LATER -
Wow. This word art really is an incredible treasury of lessons you have taught me. I found myself getting lost in the memory of lessons learned. I found the one for Godly Indifference.
Romans 14:17 “For the Kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.” Established in righteousness – Hidden in Christ – Permission to not carry burdens – Nothing can get on you unless you agree with it.
End of condemnation. No more fear. No more lack. End of anger. Strife doesn’t belong to you. End of offense. Natural disasters can’t rattle you. Jesus carried our infirmity. Death isn’t unsettling. Not afraid to stand alone.
Little One…
You’re calling me that a lot tonight it feels like…
Do you remember yesterday?
Unfortunately, yes. I was spinning emotionally. I was looking at myself and my failures, and I felt a little bit like I was in quicksand somewhere up to my chin and I felt like I would be consumed.
You came to Me because you knew intellectually that was the right thing to do, not because you trusted Me to work in the situation.
When you work, YOU work. When you pray, I WORK.
You weren’t praying. You were mentally processing everything and working yourself up into a tizzy. I call you “Little One” because you need reminding that you are, and always will be, My Little One. I will never tire of you coming to Me when you understand your dependence on Me.
If you need to chop a dozen onions, you can stick them in the food processor, or you can spend hours with a knife and a cutting board tediously chopping those onions and crying like a baby.
That’s funny. I asked that lady yesterday in the cafeteria if cutting onions made her cry because cutting onions always makes me cry.
Godly indifference is like putting the onions of life in the food processor, giving them to Me, and letting Me quickly do work that would be labor intensive and bring you to tears.
I don’t know if I’ll ever cut an onion again without thinking of this conversation.
That’s the point of a parable, Little One.
Look at you bringing us back to the story!
Well, I’m tired and I only have a few more minutes of our hour… I think I get your point.
Gideon and his 300 dog-lapping, water-drinking men only had to blow their trumpets, break glass pitchers and shout, ‘the sword of the LORD and of Gideon” and You made the other army turn their swords on each other and they defeated themselves and the men of Gideon didn’t even have to lift a sword. And I already know that Joshua’s men just had to walk around the city for days and you brought the wall down.
For a few days now, I’ve been contemplating the idea of a verbal fast. Giving up my excessive talking for a time because recently, speaking impulsively or texting without really thinking a situation through ended up making a big mess for me socially.
I don’t want you to consider this a verbal fast because fasts are temporary. I want you to consider becoming dumb. Having VERY little to say in this life and allowing Me the space to speak to and through you.
I have changed a lot in the last year and a half. If I were to intentionally become dumb, I would be radically different than I am now.
No. You would be who you are now in Me, only purely.
Pure = not mixed or adulterated with any other substance or material. Without any extraneous and unnecessary elements. Free of contamination.
You’re right, Little One. If you lived as who you are in Me with godly indifference, you would be often misunderstood but you would have no desire to correct how people experience you. The Peace you would carry in this world would shine SO brightly that, like moths to the fire, you would become a magnet; but, as they were drawn, your quietness would speak louder than your words ever have.
Can you imagine a life where you had nothing to say about thoughts of condemnation, fear, lack, anger, strife, offense, natural disasters, illness, death, or loneliness?
When those things happen, if I say nothing, what do I do?
I didn’t ask if you were willing to become mute. I asked if you were willing to be dumb. There is a difference.
Mute = refraining from speech or temporarily speechless
Dumb = temporarily unable or unwilling to speak
I do NOT see a difference between mute and dumb.
When you are mute, you have something you WANT to say but you are refraining from saying it. When you have something you WANT to say, your soul is longing to release soulish drivel.
When you are dumb, you are unable or unwilling to speak. When you are dumb for the sake of righteousness, you are unwilling to speak those things which your soul longs to say because you are ONLY willing to speak from the mind of Christ. So when you do speak, and you will, it will be My words and My thoughts alone.
I want to be dumb, but I don’t know how. I’m mentally picturing You walking next to me with Your left hand covering my mouth and both of us smiling and nodding at people walking past us.
That doesn’t sound so bad, does it?
If You could make being dumb that simple for me, I’d be happy to be dumb the rest of my life!
Being dumb for the sake of righteousness is a skill you will learn. If I needed to spend your entire life walking beside you with My hand covering your mouth, that would mean that you would be spending the rest of your life biting your tongue and refraining from speaking the soulish drivel that currently gets you in so much trouble. Is that really what you want?
No. I want to renew my mind so there is no soulish drivel to bite my tongue about.
Attagirl! Back to bed, Little One.
Love You.
LOVE you, too.
Daddy
John 12:49