Forsaken

Forsaken- abandoned or deserted.

How the faithful city has become a whore, she who was full of justice!  Righteousness lodged in her, but now murders.  Your silver has become dross, your best wine mixed with water.  Your princes are rebels and companions of thieves. Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not bring justice to the fatherless, and the widow’s cause does not come to them.

Isaiah 1:21-24 ESV

  The word forsaken has a connotation or a feeling that one has been abandoned, and left alone to die.  These feelings usually come when are backs are against the wall and that we are about to be torn to shreds by our enemies or life in general.  Neither God or our friends and family are nowhere to be found have fled the scene.  As much as forsaken can have this connotation and as much as it is true, lets look at it from a different view.  Forsaken can also mean that we have gone all Darth Vader and ventured over to the dark side.  We have forgotten everything that is good and holy and have become vindictive and following a path of destruction and self righteousness.  Sometimes forsaking is making a choice of burning everything to the ground instead of building up and character development.

    My first observation about the idea of forsaken is that in order to walk away from something, we have to be apart of it.  It is hard to walk away or to forget about a relationship that we never really had to begin with.  Forsaken means that there was something great that was invested and everything was going well.  There was solid relationship that went both ways and there was plenty of give and take.  In our Scripture passage, the prophet Isaiah tells us that the city of Jerusalem was a faithful city and the people of the city had a relationship with God and obeyed His command.  In essence, they were all good with God and with their fellow man.  When we forsake something, we are taking the healthy relationships we have and we are throwing them out the window.  We can not forsake or kick to the curb what we are not a part or in a good relationship with. 

    My second observation about forsaking is that it often forgets about character development and focuses compromise.  Are we willing to compromise what is right for what is easy.  People often take the shortest or quickest way to complete their task.  It could be taking the shortest travel route to get to our vacation destination, or the new diet fad to drop the ten pounds for the up coming event, or even looking at questionable online content to meet some sort of need or fettish.  Why put in the hard work when we can skip a few steps to get to our desired goal or outcome. As Isaiah puts it, why are we watering down the good wine for something that is substandard and crap?  Is it so we can feel better about ourselves, or is it a look at me moment and getting people to notice what we have?  When we do this, our lives will often come crashing down. In essence, we become a Bernie Madoff and his Ponzi scheme. He tried to get rich quick and ended up ruining people financially and he ended up a convicted felon.

   My third observation is that forsaking is cuing up the Casting Crowns song because it is Slow Fade.  Most people don’t wake up one morning and say screw you to God, the significant people in our lives, or life in general. It often builds up over time of not checking our thoughts, attitudes and actions.  We may not be able control what happens to us, but we can always control what our response is going to be.  If we do not properly check those thoughts, attitudes and actions, they will often take us down paths that lead us to unhealthy relationships, thoughts, actions and lifestyles.  Missing a workout or meal prep isn't going to lead to heart disease or diabetes but when those actions are forgotten about how often do those extra ten pounds just sneak up on us.  its funny how a slow fade and distractions go hand in hand.  As Casting Crowns put it, it is that second glance that often gets us into trouble and where things start to take hold and change our perspective.

   My final observation is that when we forsake God and we start to live for ourselves, we essentially become a whore to our own desires and views on life. We forget everything that we have with God and we farm ourselves out to the highest bidder, whether it is our own desires or the desires of others.  These desires are usually ones of excess and justice based on our own standards.  We could care less about others or God, unless our needs our being met and we are not afraid to run people over and even ruin them to get what we want.  When we forsake God and others, they become no more than pawns in our lives to get what we want and when we are done with them, we discard them to the side of the road and leave them there.

So here are some questions to ponder:

    What are those attitudes, actions and thoughts that need to be     

        Checked in and controlled?

    Are we a whore to and for our own desires?

    Are there things that we need to walk away from to grow closer to

       God? 

    Do we care for Gods brand of justice or ours and what is the

       Difference?