Have you ever:
*Have you ever done, or said something with the very best of intentions. And yet, someone watching or hearing was offended?
*Have you ever been offended by another’s words or actions. Only to find out later they were perfectly justified in what they said or did?
Have you ever jumped to the wrong conclusion?
Me, I’m a yes on all of those.
The ancient tribes of Israel were a yes as well, and therein lies our lesson for the day.
What I heard you say…
A few decades ago, back in the days our company (really it was just my wife and myself) was working on a large gas well automation project in Southwestern Kansas. We were to provide communications equipment and installation for newly installed flowmeters that monitored and controlled gas flow in the wells.
This was in the early days of gas well automation. It was a complicated project, even a bit cutting-edge, as automation on this scale was a relatively new thing. The system involved two tall towers to permit communications with several hundred remote wells over a large geographical area. The prime contractor from Denver, employed a gentleman they called the Project Manager. He was tasked with managing and coordinating the progress of the various parts of the project.
The Project Manager was a retired US Navy Commander. This fact allowed he and I to hit it off right away. As I recall, he and I were the only two ex-Navy guys on the project.
After our morning meetings where he outlined the goals for the day’s work, the Project Manager would always ask each participant their plan for the day. After hearing us verbally state our goals for the day, he would always say, “What I heard you say was….,” and then repeat what he had heard us say.
It was interesting how many times what he heard us say, was not what we thought we had said.
What we’ve got here is failure to communicate.
It was much like the clip from Cool Hand Luke. Captain, in charge of the prisoners on a Florida chain gang, utters those immortal words to Luke a prisoner (played by Paul Newman) who refuses to submit to the system. After physically knocking Luke to the ground, Captain says, “What we’ve got here is failure to communicate!”
Luke the prisoner in the movie is knowingly and willfully subordinate, leading up to the now famous failure of communications.
But none of us on the automation project were insubordinate, at least not knowingly so. You and I, we are not usually insubordinate in our daily communications with family, with friends, or maybe even business associates. We don’t normally, intentionally cause a failure to communicate.
Not knowing is the tricky part.
You had never intended to fail to communicate…but you did! It happens to the best and well intentioned of us all (count me among the well intentioned group). No effort is really required to fail. In fact, it seems to happen automatically, and with little or no effort. Regardless of our best intentions, failing to communicate can be a total accident.
Recently, my friend Matthew Henry and I discovered in our morning reading that it happened even to the nation of Israel, with almost disastrous consequences.
The Old Testament helps us out
Joshua Chapter 22 tells the story. It’s of the time when Israel had conquered (mostly) the land of Canaan, their promised land. The wars for the most part are over, and Joshua has given the warriors and their families leave to go home to their assigned lands. Finally, after all the years of war, a time to go home and rest.
As we read in the chapter, we soon discover the nation of Israel, God’s chosen people, had a massive “failure to communicate.”
- Then Joshua called the Reubenites, and the Gadites, and the half tribe of Manasseh, And said unto them, Ye have kept all that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you, and have obeyed my voice in all that I commanded you: Ye have not left your brethren these many days unto this day, but have kept the charge of the commandment of the Lord your God. And now the Lord your God hath given rest unto your brethren, as he promised them: therefore now return ye, and get you unto your tents, and unto the land of your possession, which Moses the servant of the Lord gave you on the other side Jordan. But take diligent heed to do the commandment and the law, which Moses the servant of the Lord charged you, to love the Lord your God, and to walk in all his ways, and to keep his commandments, and to cleave unto him, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul. So Joshua blessed them, and sent them away: and they went unto their tents. Now to the one half of the tribe of Manasseh Moses had given possession in Bashan: but unto the other half thereof gave Joshua among their brethren on this side Jordan westward. And when Joshua sent them away also unto their tents, then he blessed them. Joshua 22:1-7
Here Joshua specifically addresses the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half tribe of Manassah who were given lands on the other side of the River Jordan, the area from which the Hebrew pilgrims had crossed over. This land was not technically in the promised land, but had been allotted to the aforementioned tribes.
These people were headed home for well deserved rest in their own lands- on the other side of the River.
Joshua sent them home.with some nice stuff as we read further in Chapter 22.
They were going home with the spoils of war, or in other words, with their booty.
- And he spake unto them, saying, Return with much riches unto your tents, and with very much cattle, with silver, and with gold, and with brass, and with iron, and with very much raiment: divide the spoil of your enemies with your brethren.” Joshua 22:8.
Hey, let’s build an altar….
But before they crossed over the River to their lands on the other side, with hearts full of gratitude to God for leading them and preserving them when the odds had seemed to be stacked against them, they decided to build an alter. A good and great thing one would think, and with proper motives.
They thought it all together fitting they should build an altar expressing and demonstrating their thanks to the one true God.
Their brethren remaining in the Promised Land saw the altar and thought it idolatrous, pagan, and sacrilegious. The nation of Isreal already had an altar! They had all helped build it with great ceremony and thanksgiving. Surely they didn’t need another.
But they built an altar. This is where the problem starts, where communications failed.
Seeing these two and a half tribes building an altar caused great concern for the remaining tribes. They thought their brethren had turned pagan. It looked as if they had turned against their God who had done so much to deliver them. Did they ask the two and a half tribes? No! They failed to communicate.
It was almost war!
And they almost went to war.
- And when the children of Israel heard of it, the whole congregation of the children of Israel gathered themselves together at Shiloh, to go up to war against them. – Joshua 22:12
But cooler heads prevailed.
So, finally they communicate. All was well. The altar was for all good purposes, none of them idolatrous or pagan. And everyone left in peace.
- And when Phinehas the priest, and the princes of the congregation and heads of the thousands of Israel which were with him, heard the words that the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the children of Manasseh spake, it pleased them. – Joshua 22:30
Do you have a “failure to communicate?”
How about your “failures to communicate?” Do you go straight to war or do you get together with your Phinehas and your princes and communicate?
Or do you continue in the direction of war?
I’m hoping Phinehas will be happy with your choice.