Dear Reader,
Last Sunday, as I was getting ready to go to church, I had a heart-stopping moment when my earring simply refused to go through either of my pierced ears. I had not worn earrings for a week.
"Mom, don't tell me the flesh grew back AGAIN?!"
My mother came over and, with her help, I managed to put my earrings on. Though she did tell me that the skin was starting to grow again.
Let me explain my reaction and why exactly my heart lurched in fear.
When I was nine years old, I requested to have my ears pierced. This wasn't an unusual request since most girls would have already had them pierced by that age.
My earlobes were pierced (ouch!) and I kept the earrings in for a month in order to ensure the holes would stay open for the rest of my life. After the month passed, my mom removed the earrings to let my lobes rest for a week.
And the flesh grew back in that one week! I couldn't wear earrings at all!
I had my ears re-pierced when I was seventeen. (I have no desire to repeat that painful experience!) Since then, I have noticed that when I don't wear earrings for a week, or even a few days, the flesh would grow back slightly. That is why I wear earrings almost constantly to ensure that complete coverage of the holes never occurs.
Which brings me to the point of this anecdote.
In the Bible, ears refer to listening. (No surprise there!) I bring to your attention the story of the Golden Calf, in Exodus 32.
"And Aaron said to them, Break off the golden earrings... And all the people broke off the gold earrings which were in their ears... And he received them at their hand, and... made it a molten calf" (Exodus 32:2-4, KJV)
Do you see the significance of this action? At that point, the Israelites told themselves that they were no longer going to listen to God. So they broke off the golden (gold speaks of divinity) earrings. And they cast those earrings into an idol, the golden calf.
I don't know about you, but, whenever I think of my ear piercings, I think about this story. And when the incident at the beginning of this story occurred, I thought of this story even more.
Many times, if I'm really honest, I don't want to follow God's will. To me, it seems painful to do so, especially when it means that my flesh, my worldliness, is going to get cut again. There have been times that I stopped reading the Bible just because what I read cut me through and through.
But we have to read the Bible. If not... our worldliness can grow. Like the flesh in my ear.
And, trust me, it is painful to get rid of that excess flesh. Spiritually and physically.
That incident reminded me I needed to return to reading the Bible in order to hear God's voice. It's interesting to see how God can minister to a person and speak to a person through little incidents.
So. Are you listening to God this week? You never know when a little incident could bring something crucial to your growth as a Christian. :)
Hope you all have a blessed day. :) Do drop me a letter sometime. :)
Yours truly,
Joanna
A Minister's Daughter
Exodus 32
Update: Those images have all but disappeared from my mind, praise be to God! God is so wonderful. I no longer have the desire to read that sort of graphic material. The battle can be won, thanks to Jesus. Okay.. now I'm crying. Moving on. I'm still recovering from that teensy-weensy obsession with the pop group. It's not as bad as before. Trusting God to remove this unhealthy obsession from me.
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