In this way, innocent blood will not be shed, and you will not become guilty of bloodshed in the land the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance. ~Deuteronomy 19:10
If you follow baseball, you know that one of the most important things coaches discuss about pitchers is the quality of their pick-off play. How quickly can the pitcher change his motion from a pitch to the batter standing at home plate, to a throw over to first base, catching the runner who is sneaking closer and closer toward second? What are the things a pitcher does that tip the runner off that the throw is coming his way?
You don’t even have to be a big baseball fan to know what a runner looks like as he bobs and dances just a few feet from the safety of the first-base bag. His goal is to get a head start on his journey to second base and to avoid being thrown out by a pitcher with a good pick-off move.
We’re often tempted to live our lives away from safe zones. We’re usually a few feet from the bag, trying to move ahead to second base while desperately hoping to avoid getting caught. The external pressure and internal tension of living in this place can be exhausting.
The interesting verses today are about places that were like the safety of standing on the first-base bag. These locations were often referred to as “cities of refuge.” God asked Moses to establish these cities as “safe places” for people who were wrongly accused of murder but who were, nonetheless, under the threat of danger by their accusers. Imagine such a space where the truth about you was all that mattered, a place where no one pretended and no one jumped to premature and inaccurate conclusions.
This would be a community where you could be who you are without the pressure to be someone else. It would be a place where you were loved and appreciated, not because of your activity or your capability but simply because you were you.
Now, don’t get the wrong idea about these areas of refuge. If you read ahead (see vv. 11–13), you’ll see that these cities were not for real murderers to hide. The law applied here just like everywhere else. These were not fortresses for concealing the guilty but sites for the security of the vulnerable—those whom the world had falsely accused.
You’re way ahead of me, aren’t you? If there were ever a fitting description of what your home—or even your place of work—ought to feel like to you, and to each worker or member of your family, it’s this one: a place of refuge, a tender place of welcome and safety. A dwelling where there is no need for pretense and no special value attached to showing off. Where the inhabitants are nurtured without suffocation, disciplined without disrespect, and loved without limits.
Cities of refuge . . . what a great idea. What a good idea it would be to ask God to help you build your home or your place of work like this.