Is the Devil Allergic to Shrubbery?

All three of these Biblical figures are similar in that people doubted them and that the peanut gallery was quite vocal in these doubts. They had a similar choice that I had to make: listen to the naysayers and give up or yell “La, La, La” as loud as possible and go for redemption. Obviously, we know that these three went La, La, La and became some of the biggest heroes of our faith. To do this, each of them had to find a way to ignore the distractions and the detractors. This is what our Hedge is for: noise canceling. One of the greatest modern-day uses of a physical garden hedge is that it blocks out noise and blocks out distracting people, traffic, etc from entering our domain. Our spiritual Hedge is meant to do the same for us. Job is the guy that is known for having a “hedge” around him. We see how the devil slowly starts stripping away everything from Job. Most people wrongfully assume that the devil was stripping away Job’s Hedge, but this is not true. Our Hedge is not meant to be our physical comforts, our wealth, or our connections. Our Hedge is the spiritual bulwarks that we enact through praise, prayer, Bible reading, and faith. Job refused to go against his faith, refused to sin (see 2:10). Job was willing to accept the good and the bad in life. Job was able to withstand every single attack because he had a hedge that helped him endure the attacks. Job’s Hedge was constructed from a life of righteous living, with a focus on blamelessness. As he was attacked by everyone that was meant to comfort him, Job stayed behind that Hedge and yelled a variant of La, La, La (well, he said that the allegations were lies, but I think that you can forgive this loose translation). Job teaches us a valuable lesson about how to cancel the noise that comes from people: he relied on his relationship with God. Job was adamant that his relationship with God was not compromised by sin and wrongdoing. He was adamant that he had followed the laws and the expectations of a God-fearing man. He never relied on what he had built, but he focused on his love for God and the amount of faith that he had in God. When we are hit hard by the troubles of life, we focus on what we are losing or how the situation will impact our comfort. Job never worried about his comfort; he was content to scrape himself with potshards without blaming God. Job never worried about what he had lost. None of these paragons of faith were born with a special amount of faith. They had to build their faith. Esther was terrified to go before Xerxes. There is nothing wrong with being afraid of the task before you, but Esther’s example was to go off and pray and fast. David had already spent his time tending the sheep and building his faith in God while being alone in the wilderness. Job prepared for his trial by constantly sacrificing and praying. In each case, you see that these heroes were off alone working on their relationship with God. They were behind their Hedge growing their faith. The Hedge allowed each of them to block on the noise and to focus on their relationship with God. Remember, a hedge’s purpose is to allow things to grow. Blocking out the noise of the naysayers, the experts, and the odds against us is one of the most vital roles of the Hedge. Often, God calls us to do things that just can’t happen unless there is a miracle, and it is for this very reason why we have to get good at yelling La, La, La when confronted with a task that is impossible. We know that the task is impossible-for us. Thankfully, we aren’t the ones actually accomplishing anything. Think of how different the Bible would have been if people had listened to the naysayers or to the facts against them. Moses was afraid to go to Pharaoh. Anaias was rightfully hesitant to meet Saul. Ruth was told to go back to Moab. Rahab was probably hesitant to betray her people. The Bible would still have all these stories of the Plagues leading to the Exodus, someone becoming a Paul, and women who would become part of the genealogy of Jesus, but the difference is that the names would be different. As Mordecai told Esther in Esther 4:14, God’s work will come regardless.