The Jesse Tree Journals

Lectio Divina from the Jesse Tree
A SLING, A TORCH 🔥, A CHARIOT, AND A LION 🦁- Days 15-18
1 Samuel 17:1,4,8-11,32-37,40-51
1 Kings 3:5-28; 2 Kings 2:1-13; Daniel 6:4-5,7-13,17-28

“Only a youth.”

I shared a dream once with an elder brother, in it lay the depths of truth and I wondered at why the Lord would have me share it with him when surely one as wise and mature as an elder would know such truth. With a “listening heart,” I watched as my elder brother conveyed his delight in receiving my dream. It seemed to please him greatly that one as youthful in the ways of the Lord as I would be given such a dream, which is why he felt an unction to issue me a warning: “I fear many will make you a Joseph and seek to see you murdered.” It became clear to me in that moment how little understanding he had been given, even as an elder, he did not hear the Lord with a “listening heart” and so he discerned wrongly the Will of the Lord over me. Indeed, I am a Joseph. And I am not afraid to be crucified. “For the Lord has intended it all for good.”

It is interesting how much youthfulness plays a significant part in the grandfathers of Jesus. From Samuel to David to Solomon to Elijah and even to Daniel and to Jonah and later Jesus himself, there is a truth unfolding before those who have a “listening heart” to discern and to judge rightly. God loves a youthful servant.

And, He uses them to confound the wise and the aged.

David’s youthfulness and good looks surprised the Philistine Goliath, who himself had been “a warrior from his youth.” And though master he was, it was a sling shot that took the giant out. Not a swordsman with a sword, but a boy with a toy.

Solomon was wise to see the way the Lord loved his father, David. And from his youth, he asked rightly for a “listening heart”, having seen it was not David’s long life that made him worthy but his youthful surrender. For only a youth has a “listening heart” unscathed and without cynicism brought by age. With the torch of wisdom, Solomon become the youngest and the greatest wisemen of all time.

Elisha too was indebted to his elder, but youthful zeal would overcome even the wisdom of the master. When Elijah bid the younger to leave him, Elisha heard his elder brother with a “listening heart” and perceived it was better to remain. His youthful expectation led his eyes to behold a chariot of heaven’s fire and a double portion of the elder’s spirit.

What if “Age before beauty” is the lie we’ve been fed to keep us from moving in the fullness of truth. What if David had believed that lie and listened to his elder brother Saul? What if Solomon had listened to the ancient world and asked only for gold? What if Elisha had gone home and let the big boys in the prophetic guild run things instead? What if Daniel refused to kneel and pray bowing down to political pressure rather than doing the just thing? What if Joseph never dreamed again out of fear his brothers would turn on him and let them all starve? What if Jesus had decided not to carry his cross but to get married and die of old age.

It’s said that “wisdom is wasted on the youth,’ or is that a lie too?

Like Daniel in the den, God is jealous over his children. Those who remain with “listening hearts” to the Will of the Lord in-spite of the “good intentions” of others, older and wiser. To these little ones, he gives them the weapons to overcome the decay of age: a sling with five stones as Our Lady tells us in Medjugorje, a torch to guide us called the Holy Spirit, a chariot of fire to reward our senses when our flesh beckons us to sleep and lose sight of our hope, and a lion from Judah for who could shut the mouths of other lions from devouring us except the King of Lions – Christ the King of Kings!

Perhaps, this is why Jesus preferred to come to us as a little child. To remind us that it’s not age that gives a man power but a youthful “listening heart” that can receive the One who holds it without age, from Age to Age.

Maybe what this world needs now is to stop living like it’s dying and instead to embrace its youth. If we all bend low to hear with “listening hearts” we might all get some world peace too.

“For unto us a child is born.”