Off Road Vehicles, Off Road Tires Scream, “adventure” our hearts long for High Mountain adventure we were made for it. A vehicle can get you there in the physical, but it needs traction and ground clearance, Four Wheel Drive a narrow short wheel base to navigate narrow roads and switch back turns, yet balance is critical too, not too top heavy. ALL that is surely needed both in the physical and the spiritual, but staying with the physical for a minute tires need a cleft.

Hydroplaning is a scary thing my son in his first rain storm experienced how quick you can lose traction and slide off the road, I’ll never forget that call. He was OK, but his Jeep was in the ditch. For tires that cleft channels out water.

Knobby is an attempt to get some tire surface on that gravel or rock, mud or snow. so their all kinds of tires for all kinds of adventure and the amazing thing is they are also a report card on your vehicle as I wrote a few years ago http://christiancarguy.com/tire-report-card/ and http://christiancarguy.com/getting-it-straight/. How amazing is it that God’s way of seeing our alignment, balance, our steering, our control arms is in our tires/our feet and how cool us is it God Shares how to get your feet fitted not only with the gospel of peace but for that higher ground, that secret place on the steep path it is going to be exciting and dangerous I assure you.

Traction wasn’t exactly Firestone’s idea nor Michelin, God designed the type of traction surface necessary for all sorts of High Mountain adventures beyond any capabilities of a vehicle tire. I wish wish my tires could apply pressure right to let or front to back even dig in by pointing forward. I would note that King David being the Shepherd that he was observed something about hooves when he said in

Psalm 18:33

“He makes my feet like those of deer
and makes me stand on my heights.

His son Solomon knew why as we read in

Song of Songs 2:14 

SO.. how do we get those feet David described or cleft hooves? Those cleft hooves indicated that they were clean animals Leviticus 11, and two things made an animal clean 1. Chew the cud 2. Cleft Hoof? Why what was God telling us what made a clean animal, why was David asking for those feet.

As the 23 Psalm says “He Makes us lie down in green pastures”

Later his son Solomon in Song of Songs Chapter 1 verse 7 takes it a bit further

“Where do you graze your flock and make them lay down at noon.” The Good Shepherd feeds us in the morning then makes us lay down so we will chew our cud. His word takes long to digest. Sheep not only have 4 stomachs they have 82 feet, yes I said feet of intestines in order to suck all the nutrients out of their food which takes 3-5 days. Every week God feeds me and for days I’ll ruminate, that concept or precept for hours, their is so much that my soul just chews and chews. Like the sheep it makes me clean.

The sheep’s hooves cloven for the balance needed to climb and scale the mountain top adventures with God not fully engaged with the ground or the worlds golden calf down below. Leviticus 11. The beloved will need these as in chapter 2

A well fed beautiful sheep, that can climb the steep path navigate the cleft in the rock with its hooves… Well fed, its form is beautiful its soul restored it voice is sweet.

“Why should I be as a veiled woman”. Veiled women were prostitues wanderers lost and ashamed.. As Tamar disguised herself to trick Judah into fathering Perez.

We all have a veil a mask we use to cover our shame. Face to face is intimacy and quite dangerous in a world where others are trying to compare themselves and judge in order to feed their pride and their justification for sin.

The original reason for the mask or fig leaf is we feel naked and exposed as Adam did with his sin. My brilliant disguise is my personality I have designed a way to get you to like me without exposing my real feeling, as John Eldridge

I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid. – Genesis 3:10

You don’t need a course in psychology to understand men. Understand that verse, let its implications sink in, and the men around you will suddenly come into focus. We are hiding, every last one of us. Well aware that we, too, are not what we were meant to be, desperately afraid of exposure, terrified of being seen for what we are and are not, we have run off into the bushes. We hide in our office, at the gym, behind the newspaper and mostly behind our personality.

“By the flocks of your companions”

Who are the companions??? Some say Moses Aaron and Miriam, Some day Idols false Gods… All I know for sure is; one- they are shepherds and two -they are not the good shepherd.

Hirelings- John 11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12 The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. 13 The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.

The Good Shepherd is all about taking care of your feet as he modeled at the last supper. He cares for you deeply, Jesus longs to meet with you in that cleft in the rock, but the balance, traction and alignment necessary will be in you feeding well and following Him to lay down at noon and chew your food daily, then when Jesus knows you can handle the steeper path he will lead you to the cleft, I promise.

What does that really mean, “The Last Shall Be First”? All Week God has had me on the lesson plan of “Work” with Jesus Parable of the Day Laborers or as some say The Workers in the Vineyard. It’s just not fair is it? Here is the Parable Matthew 20:1-16

“For the kingdom of heaven is like the master of a household, who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard.  Now when he had agreed with the workers for a denarius per day, he sent them into his vineyard.  And he went out about the third hour and saw others standing in the marketplace, idle. And to them he said, ‘You go into the vineyard too, and I’ll give you whatever is right.’ So they went. Again he went out about the sixth and ninth hour and did the same. And about the eleventh hour, he went out and found others standing around. And he said to them, ‘Why have you been standing here idle the whole day?’

“‘Because no one hired us,’ they said to him.

“He said to them, ‘You go into the vineyard, too.’

 “Now when evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning from the last to the first.’ And those who had come about the eleventh hour each received a denarius. And when the first came, they supposed that they would receive more; yet they too received a denarius.

“But when they received it, they began to grumble against the master of the house, saying, ‘These last guys did one hour, and you’ve made them equal to us, who bore the burden and scorching heat of the day!’

“But answering, he said to one of them, ‘Friend, I’m doing you no wrong. Didn’t you agree with me on a denarius? Take what is yours and go. But I want to give this last guy the same as you. Am I not permitted to do what I want with what belongs to me? Or is your eye evil because I am good?’

“So the last will be first, and the first last.”

Provoking isn’t it. Worth meditation, by all means, as so much of our lives are devoted to our work. Here is the way many look at work in our culture listen to this work montage.

With that point of view, essentially, “I’m taken what they’re given cause I’m workin for a livin”. That parable brings anger and disbelief, that, Jesus, God, would say such a thing, and then to finish with “the first will be last and the last will be first”! What the heck?

Then I started thinking how bad it feels to be unemployed verses how good it feels to do a job well and find myself achieving or doing more than I thought I could. Finding out that I really can do things, I am not lazy or ineffective, especially work with my own hands. It actually answers a core question for men according to John Eldredge’s Wild at Heart, the question: “Do I Have What It Takes”?

I would also ad that the workers who came early in the morning had the joy of working with a good boss and other diligent workers rather than sitting wondering if they would get work that day. Those who came later and later had worse days in my view with the worst being those who didn’t find work until the last hour. Those who go to work with this adventure and battle point of view, listen to this montage.