I was watching one of my favorite movies, “The Last Castle”, with Robert Redford, several nights ago. It is the story of a military prison and Redford is the ranking officer at the facility. The leadership of the prison is arrogant and demanding – and the prisoners are leaderless. Redford, having been in similar situations before, gives the men hope, motivation and organization. The prisoners, who start to respect Redford, go against the prison rules by saluting him when they cross paths. Of course, this leads to problems and discipline issues.
Redford takes the opportunity to teach about salutes and how they came to be. It turns out that salutes originated in the olden times when knights approached one another and raised their visors as a sign of respect and to identify who they were in front of. Eventually, as time progressed, and the general society moved from suits of armor to ornate headgear, the traditional interaction was to remove your hat or headdress, as the case may be, as a sign of respect. This practice also affirmed that it was safe, as the raised hand to salute or remove headgear showed that the hands were empty and not carrying a weapon.
As time continued to move forward, things changed from removing ornate headgear to saluting or touching the visor of a hat as a sign of respect. That has since become even a little more informal as the convention today calls for a nod of the head as an acknowledgment in everyday society as opposed to even touching or removing the hat. So you can see that throughout the centuries, our nod of the head can trace its history all the way back to jousting the knights in full armor dealing with one another. Military solutes are still the norm today – centuries later…
As always, I found the movie very engaging but I had forgotten the part about salutes and Redford’s speech on the history of the practice. I was interested enough that I went out and researched the other facts in tonight’s post.
Of course, I always study these human interactions in light of our relationship with God and His Son, Jesus. While I understand the raising of visors, headgear – or a tip of the hat or a sideways glance to acknowledge another in public, its important remember that the origins of the practice were to identify yourself in front of of each other.
Thank goodness we don’t have to have this kind of relationship with God. He knows who we are – even if we are covered up and not even visible to Him. That’s because God is omniscient – all knowing, as well as omnipresent (everywhere at once) and omnipotent (all powerful). God created us, he knows every hair on our heads and every detail about each of us. That should be comforting to each of us.
Our verse for tonight is a more obscure verse than some of the more well known references to God knowing us, such as Psalm 139. The apostle John, who wrote the Gospel bearing his name, tells us the words of Jesus in John 10:14-15, “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me— just as the Father knows me and I know the Father—and I lay down my life for the sheep.”
So not only did God created us in His image, but He “knows” us in a unique way. Furthermore, Jesus reminds us that we know Him. The relationship between God the Father and Jesus is a wonderful illustration for us – making sure that we try to emulate the behavior between Father and Son.
My encouragement this evening is that we can rest in the assurance that God knows us completely. This means that He knows EVERYTHING about us. In fact, we can’t hide from God. But it’s not a relationship of hate, it’s a relationship of divine love. My prayer this evening is that we will take a moment and reflect on what it really means to be fully known by the Creator of the universe and everything in it. The most powerful, all knowing and omnipresent entity in all creation knows you, and me. Period! Have a great day in the Lord, grace and peace…