"None sing hymns to breath. But oh, to be without it." -Lord of Light
"Nor is (God) served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and BREATH and everything."
Breathe in. Good. Now breathe out. Wonderful. Think about what just happened. You breathed. Not a big deal, right? We do it all the time. Oxygen comes into our lungs, goes out in our blood cells, and goes to our cells all over the body, and then we exhale CO2, which is bad, and this keeps going, and so we live. (Okay, if I remember my Magic School Bus, that is how it works when we breathe. If that is wrong, then I am stupid and apologize, but my point is still valid.) How often do we stop and thank God for giving us breath? How often do we recognize this as an amazing manifestation of his grace and love. Just simply to breathe.
How about before a rainstorm, when the air is charged. Think about a cool autumn day, crisp air filling your lungs. Biting cold in the middle of winter, you can feel the air going deep and see it come back out. Or simply emerging from a stuffy room out into the clear night to get fresh air. Breathing is amazing. In fact, I will honestly say that one of my favorite things to do is breathe. Just sit back, in a meadow or by some body of water, close my eyes, and breathe.
But days wear on and they take their toll. Before we know it we are rushing from one thing to another. There is always something to worry about, someone to please, and so we lose sight of breath. We still are breathing, but we just don't notice it. One of those tiny miracles we take for granted. No one celebrates breathing, but to be without it is torture.
So here is my honest plea to all of you out there who happen to read this (which I think is at one person right now), please, don't forget to breathe. Don't forget that you are breathing. Notice it, enjoy it, and above all, praise the Lord that you are breathing.
It is something more than utilitarian. Just some method our body uses to keep us alive. It is a gift from God.
God, thank you for the gift of breathing.
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Ranting at 2 am.
So when will we all wake up and admit that America is pretty much struggling to stay afloat? I read a bit of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speech before the U.N. and while I think he is an idiot (solely for his denial of the Holocaust) it saddens me that he makes a lot of sense when talking about the state of America. He said "As long as the aggressors, because of their financial, political and propaganda powers, not only escape punishment, but even claim righteousness, and as long as wars are started and nations are enslaved in order to win votes in elections, not only will the problems of the global community remain unsolved, but they will be increasingly exacerbated," and while I do not agree with a lot of his thoughts, some of them, like this one, make sense.
America is no longer this shining beacon of greatness, this ideal nation that the world ought to be worshiping. If we ever were that it ought to be plain by now that we no longer are. Hell, 700 Billion dollars to bail out Wall Street ought to sound odd to us and really, it should piss us off. What has our government been doing? Other than winning elections based on gay marriage, abortion, and stem cells, none of which they have done much about, they have simply put us in a position where we are in a war that is unwinnable, costing billions of dollars, and killing thousands of people. Causing unrest in the Middle East. Ignoring social justice issues like genocide in Darfur. Hell, Bono is doing more good in the world than our government, than our country, and why is it that no one is pissed off about this?
I cannot put all the blame on the government. I am not a fan of Bush, but that hasn't blinded me to the fact that this is all our fault. Yes, you and I, the average American. Consumer extraordinaire. Why does no one care that our country is failing? Because it could be worse. We look out, and we still own cars and plasma screen tvs. Ignore the fact we can hardly afford gas, can't pay our cable and electric bills, and probably can't even afford the houses we live in.
We live in a country that is run by companies and advertising. Please consider that the entire purpose of advertising is to convince you that you need something that, before you had ever seen it, you lived without perfectly. but we are motivated because if our neighbor gets one and we don't have it we will be looked down upon. Yes, we are that foolish and easy to manipulate. All we want is more. We buy our Nike's made by slaves, marked up several hundred percent, endorsed by someone who makes more to play a game than some countries' GDP, and we buy them up and wear them proudly.
We live in a society so numb and paralyzed by fear that we need to be taking pills to make it through the day. If you aren't satisfied you must have a mood disorder. Because of course the American dream is supposed to be some pretty fairy tale where all we do is frolic in meadows and drive our hummers to little league where our sons grow up to make millions and buy us a nice place to retire. And if we stop to look around at what is really going on we see something so different that is scares us, and instead of doing something about it we let ourselves become zombies.
We live in the age where counterculture has stalled. Gone are the days of true protest, of hippies redefining love and creating something new. Gone are the days of punk where people gave a nice F-off to authority. Now we have hipster bull crap that creates nothing new and adds nothing to the world but some misplace sense of mass-produced "individualism" and angst.
We live in an age of calloused indifference which threatens to destroy everything. We live in what is supposed to be the best nation on Earth. Full of freedom and opportunity. But we get caught up in xenophobic hatred, irrational fear, created by those who say they are protecting us. We are lied to, by our government, by the media that, once, was the backbone of democracy. We are lied to by every single product and advertisement that tells us we need it.
The slums of third-world countries are more alive, more thriving, than our supposedly great country. We are afraid of everything. Community dies as we grasp for more and more things to call our own. Life is dying as we go from living to merely existing.
And one election is not going to fix it. Yes I will vote in November, and I even hope that it does some good, but this goes way beyond picking a new man who will be 90% like the old one. I don't know what the answer is. I don't know if anything short of massive revolution will solve it.
And to us, oh Christians, how we have dropped the ball. We who spend so much time picketing homosexuals, praising our president who lets hundreds of thousands be massacred in Africa, tell me where our priorities are? Because I can't figure out which passage in the Bible tells us to hate. I find several, however, where Jesus calls out hypocrites, then goes off and eats with the tax collectors and prostitutes and loves them. This callousness from us, who call ourselves Christians, that more than anything is unforgivable.
Sorry for the rant, but I needed to say it.
America is no longer this shining beacon of greatness, this ideal nation that the world ought to be worshiping. If we ever were that it ought to be plain by now that we no longer are. Hell, 700 Billion dollars to bail out Wall Street ought to sound odd to us and really, it should piss us off. What has our government been doing? Other than winning elections based on gay marriage, abortion, and stem cells, none of which they have done much about, they have simply put us in a position where we are in a war that is unwinnable, costing billions of dollars, and killing thousands of people. Causing unrest in the Middle East. Ignoring social justice issues like genocide in Darfur. Hell, Bono is doing more good in the world than our government, than our country, and why is it that no one is pissed off about this?
I cannot put all the blame on the government. I am not a fan of Bush, but that hasn't blinded me to the fact that this is all our fault. Yes, you and I, the average American. Consumer extraordinaire. Why does no one care that our country is failing? Because it could be worse. We look out, and we still own cars and plasma screen tvs. Ignore the fact we can hardly afford gas, can't pay our cable and electric bills, and probably can't even afford the houses we live in.
We live in a country that is run by companies and advertising. Please consider that the entire purpose of advertising is to convince you that you need something that, before you had ever seen it, you lived without perfectly. but we are motivated because if our neighbor gets one and we don't have it we will be looked down upon. Yes, we are that foolish and easy to manipulate. All we want is more. We buy our Nike's made by slaves, marked up several hundred percent, endorsed by someone who makes more to play a game than some countries' GDP, and we buy them up and wear them proudly.
We live in a society so numb and paralyzed by fear that we need to be taking pills to make it through the day. If you aren't satisfied you must have a mood disorder. Because of course the American dream is supposed to be some pretty fairy tale where all we do is frolic in meadows and drive our hummers to little league where our sons grow up to make millions and buy us a nice place to retire. And if we stop to look around at what is really going on we see something so different that is scares us, and instead of doing something about it we let ourselves become zombies.
We live in the age where counterculture has stalled. Gone are the days of true protest, of hippies redefining love and creating something new. Gone are the days of punk where people gave a nice F-off to authority. Now we have hipster bull crap that creates nothing new and adds nothing to the world but some misplace sense of mass-produced "individualism" and angst.
We live in an age of calloused indifference which threatens to destroy everything. We live in what is supposed to be the best nation on Earth. Full of freedom and opportunity. But we get caught up in xenophobic hatred, irrational fear, created by those who say they are protecting us. We are lied to, by our government, by the media that, once, was the backbone of democracy. We are lied to by every single product and advertisement that tells us we need it.
The slums of third-world countries are more alive, more thriving, than our supposedly great country. We are afraid of everything. Community dies as we grasp for more and more things to call our own. Life is dying as we go from living to merely existing.
And one election is not going to fix it. Yes I will vote in November, and I even hope that it does some good, but this goes way beyond picking a new man who will be 90% like the old one. I don't know what the answer is. I don't know if anything short of massive revolution will solve it.
And to us, oh Christians, how we have dropped the ball. We who spend so much time picketing homosexuals, praising our president who lets hundreds of thousands be massacred in Africa, tell me where our priorities are? Because I can't figure out which passage in the Bible tells us to hate. I find several, however, where Jesus calls out hypocrites, then goes off and eats with the tax collectors and prostitutes and loves them. This callousness from us, who call ourselves Christians, that more than anything is unforgivable.
Sorry for the rant, but I needed to say it.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Diction, Ad
Sometimes I amuse myself with the little things in life :)
So I came across something today and it immediately made me think of things regarding the spiritual realm. Here is what I read, from the magazine AdBusters:
"What most of us experience when it comes to addiction is a pattern of continually seeking more of what it is we don't really want and, therefore, never being satisfied. And as long as we are never satisfied, we continue to seek more, while our real needs are never being met."
And at this point in reading, I realize, we, as humans, are addicted to sin.
I will try to explain my logic here. See, we know we sin. We are sinful both by nature and by choice. We are descendants of Adam, and we have original sin and so our very nature is sinful. And considering that before we accept Christ nothing we do proceeds from faith, and so we know from Romans 13 that everything we do therefore is sin. And we know we choose to sin, because we have all done it. Many times. But then we come to know Christ and we are freed from the bondage of free will. That is, we are finally able to do good because of Christ and the Spirit. We are no longer slaves to sin. And so we now have the ability to sin no more. But we still do. Christ proved that it is possible to live a fully human life and never sin, despite facing all the trials and temptations that we all face. So then, we know it is possible, through the Spirit, to not sin. But we do. There has to be a reason. And there is. We are addicts.
We need to understand this concept of "what we really want" because that is important. What we really want is to be happy, to find joy, to find meaning. These are, I would argue, the basic desires of humans. What we overlook is that there is no source of true joy other than Christ. So the only thing anyone really wants, and the only thing people need, is Christ. Think on that and see if maybe your heart for evangelism changes a bit....it is slowly starting to work its way into me, though I am not there yet. But anyways, we are all striving after meaningless pursuits that we do not really want. They seem like what we really want. They may look like it on the outside, or at least give a temporary impression that they are the true thing we seek, but really, they are nothing. And we are left unsatisfied. his is where we mess up really bad. We feel dissatisfied, and too often we attribute that to God. We think that God is withholding our happiness from us. Because, we argue in our minds, if the thing I really want (but not really) isn't satisfying me, then God must be responsible. This is especially true for believers who assume they have been pursuing Christ, but have lost sight of Him and are going after something that seems like the real thing but isn't. And of course an illusion of Christ is not going to satisfy truly. So we assume that it is actually Christ that hasn't satisfied us. I do not know how, with all the love and grace we are given, and all the pain and sorrow being far from Him causes, how we can think that Christ would somehow not satisfy us, but I believe we truly do assume this, at least down somewhere really deep in our subconscious. So then we decide to look elsewhere for satisfaction. And again we are not satisfied and this keeps going until we finally recognize that we have turned so far from God and that this is the reason our lives no longer resemble anything good or worthwhile.
We are addicted to sin. We have, as believers, entered into a recovery program, that, if utilized properly, is 100% effective. But we don't really know how to use it to maximum efficiency, or else we don't believe it really is perfect, and so we fall off the wagon and go on binges, ending up face down in a mixture of (metaphorical) blood and vomit and waste and after spending time wallowing in rock bottom we recall our program (God, Christ, and the Spirit) and because it is perfect we are able to get up again.
We are sick and need to be made well. We have the most amazing healer.
We are weak and cannot stand on our own. We have the power that raised Christ from the dead within us.
We are addicts. But we have Christ, we have grace, and we know that is enough.
No man can, of his own will and power, overcome an addiction. It is a compulsion, something he cannot, of his own will, control. It is impossible. For man, but not for God. With God, all things are possible.
I am so thankful we have a God who loves us and saves us from the ravages of this horrid addiction.
So I came across something today and it immediately made me think of things regarding the spiritual realm. Here is what I read, from the magazine AdBusters:
"What most of us experience when it comes to addiction is a pattern of continually seeking more of what it is we don't really want and, therefore, never being satisfied. And as long as we are never satisfied, we continue to seek more, while our real needs are never being met."
And at this point in reading, I realize, we, as humans, are addicted to sin.
I will try to explain my logic here. See, we know we sin. We are sinful both by nature and by choice. We are descendants of Adam, and we have original sin and so our very nature is sinful. And considering that before we accept Christ nothing we do proceeds from faith, and so we know from Romans 13 that everything we do therefore is sin. And we know we choose to sin, because we have all done it. Many times. But then we come to know Christ and we are freed from the bondage of free will. That is, we are finally able to do good because of Christ and the Spirit. We are no longer slaves to sin. And so we now have the ability to sin no more. But we still do. Christ proved that it is possible to live a fully human life and never sin, despite facing all the trials and temptations that we all face. So then, we know it is possible, through the Spirit, to not sin. But we do. There has to be a reason. And there is. We are addicts.
We need to understand this concept of "what we really want" because that is important. What we really want is to be happy, to find joy, to find meaning. These are, I would argue, the basic desires of humans. What we overlook is that there is no source of true joy other than Christ. So the only thing anyone really wants, and the only thing people need, is Christ. Think on that and see if maybe your heart for evangelism changes a bit....it is slowly starting to work its way into me, though I am not there yet. But anyways, we are all striving after meaningless pursuits that we do not really want. They seem like what we really want. They may look like it on the outside, or at least give a temporary impression that they are the true thing we seek, but really, they are nothing. And we are left unsatisfied. his is where we mess up really bad. We feel dissatisfied, and too often we attribute that to God. We think that God is withholding our happiness from us. Because, we argue in our minds, if the thing I really want (but not really) isn't satisfying me, then God must be responsible. This is especially true for believers who assume they have been pursuing Christ, but have lost sight of Him and are going after something that seems like the real thing but isn't. And of course an illusion of Christ is not going to satisfy truly. So we assume that it is actually Christ that hasn't satisfied us. I do not know how, with all the love and grace we are given, and all the pain and sorrow being far from Him causes, how we can think that Christ would somehow not satisfy us, but I believe we truly do assume this, at least down somewhere really deep in our subconscious. So then we decide to look elsewhere for satisfaction. And again we are not satisfied and this keeps going until we finally recognize that we have turned so far from God and that this is the reason our lives no longer resemble anything good or worthwhile.
We are addicted to sin. We have, as believers, entered into a recovery program, that, if utilized properly, is 100% effective. But we don't really know how to use it to maximum efficiency, or else we don't believe it really is perfect, and so we fall off the wagon and go on binges, ending up face down in a mixture of (metaphorical) blood and vomit and waste and after spending time wallowing in rock bottom we recall our program (God, Christ, and the Spirit) and because it is perfect we are able to get up again.
We are sick and need to be made well. We have the most amazing healer.
We are weak and cannot stand on our own. We have the power that raised Christ from the dead within us.
We are addicts. But we have Christ, we have grace, and we know that is enough.
No man can, of his own will and power, overcome an addiction. It is a compulsion, something he cannot, of his own will, control. It is impossible. For man, but not for God. With God, all things are possible.
I am so thankful we have a God who loves us and saves us from the ravages of this horrid addiction.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Better
"Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you." Psalm 63:3
I read that, and I can't comprehend it sometimes. Most times. Your steadfast love is BETTER THAN LIFE! Better than being alive. The love of God is better than the whole of life. That statement is huge.
And it seems so simple. Of course God's love is better than life. Life is sadness, we are here in the midst of a time where sin runs rampant on the streets. We live in a place where there is sadness, pain, loss, death, anger, hate. We live in a world where hatred is so strong that seven years ago some people hijacked airplanes and ran them into buildings. We live in a world so heinous that war is not only a constant, but it is also a billion dollar industry. We live in a world where people are bought and sold as though they are things, as though they are less than human. We value money more than love, power over peace, security over justice. We live in a world that screams that life is the best thing there is.
Your steadfast love. Steadfast. It means immovable. The love of God is steadfast, it will never move, indeed it isn't able to. He loves us so much! And that love, it is better than life.
Life can be good. We can find ways to enjoy it. I can list of a seemingly infinite list of all the crap about life that drags me down, and I listed a bit of it above. At the same time I can list so much more that life has to bring us some form of joy. Every blade of grass, every star, every breeze, each drop of rain, all of it is beautiful. Every person that brings a smile to my lips just to think about or to see. These things that are part of life, they are great and I am thankful for them.
Even still, God's steadfast love is better than life. It isn't even close. Not that life is so bad or so good, but it is that God is infinitely greater than all we can know or imagine! God is so much better than life. Every time I read this, it gets to me. One verse, but so powerful.
I consider all the actions I take in a day that seems to be my confession to the opposite; that I love life more than God, that I think it is better. I only need to take one second to remember that is not true. That the steadfast love of God, the God of the universe, who is and was and ever will be, who chose me and set me apart before creation, not for any good I had done or ever would do, but simply because He loved me according to His sovereign purpose, that this God, the God of all creation loves me with a steadfast love! Yeah, that is better than life. And I thank God for that love every day.
I read that, and I can't comprehend it sometimes. Most times. Your steadfast love is BETTER THAN LIFE! Better than being alive. The love of God is better than the whole of life. That statement is huge.
And it seems so simple. Of course God's love is better than life. Life is sadness, we are here in the midst of a time where sin runs rampant on the streets. We live in a place where there is sadness, pain, loss, death, anger, hate. We live in a world where hatred is so strong that seven years ago some people hijacked airplanes and ran them into buildings. We live in a world so heinous that war is not only a constant, but it is also a billion dollar industry. We live in a world where people are bought and sold as though they are things, as though they are less than human. We value money more than love, power over peace, security over justice. We live in a world that screams that life is the best thing there is.
Your steadfast love. Steadfast. It means immovable. The love of God is steadfast, it will never move, indeed it isn't able to. He loves us so much! And that love, it is better than life.
Life can be good. We can find ways to enjoy it. I can list of a seemingly infinite list of all the crap about life that drags me down, and I listed a bit of it above. At the same time I can list so much more that life has to bring us some form of joy. Every blade of grass, every star, every breeze, each drop of rain, all of it is beautiful. Every person that brings a smile to my lips just to think about or to see. These things that are part of life, they are great and I am thankful for them.
Even still, God's steadfast love is better than life. It isn't even close. Not that life is so bad or so good, but it is that God is infinitely greater than all we can know or imagine! God is so much better than life. Every time I read this, it gets to me. One verse, but so powerful.
I consider all the actions I take in a day that seems to be my confession to the opposite; that I love life more than God, that I think it is better. I only need to take one second to remember that is not true. That the steadfast love of God, the God of the universe, who is and was and ever will be, who chose me and set me apart before creation, not for any good I had done or ever would do, but simply because He loved me according to His sovereign purpose, that this God, the God of all creation loves me with a steadfast love! Yeah, that is better than life. And I thank God for that love every day.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Pleasure Cruise
"For am I now seeking the approval of man or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ."
Now I know we like to please man. And we all do it. When we avoid calling someone out, we do not speak truth in love, we stay silent in fear of confrontation or what they'll think. But this isn't about that.
How do we please God? Think on that for a moment. What comes to mind? What do we have to do to please God? We went over this tonight, and it led to an interesting thought.
God reveals His will to us in His Word. We are told to "Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with thy God." -Micah 6:8, "Love the Lord your God with all your strength and all your heart and all your mind," and "Love thy neighbor as yourself." -Matthew 22: 37-39. But of course, though these are the things we think of, how we might obey, what we might do that God will be pleased with us, we may not think about John 6:28-29 which says "Then (the disciples) said to (Jesus) 'What must we do to be doing the works of God?' Jesus answered them, 'This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom He has sent."
We were talking about grace, and being cloaked in righteousness. And when this question, of what pleases God was asked, another guy answered, saying that because of grace, God sees us who have accepted Christ as perfect. Which sparked a thought. I will tell you my thought process:
God tells us His will for us in scripture. He has commands which He has given us. And so obedience is important and good, but it can so easily become corrupted by our selfish desires. And selfishness is not pleasing to God. And then I think of this verse where after Jesus was baptized, "A voice from Heaven said 'this is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased," -Matthew 3:17, and so we know that God is pleased with His son, Jesus. And we see in Romans 3:21-25 "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins."
We are clothed in the righteousness of Christ, because of His grace. We are clothed in the righteousness of Christ, with whom God is well pleased! So then, when we lean fully on God, embrace His grace and trust fully and wholly in it, when we sacrifice any claim to righteousness we think we have on our own, cling to grace and clothe ourselves in the righteousness of Christ, then the Lord can look upon and and be well pleased! And it is nothing of ourselves, it is all God's love and grace, and Christ's sacrifice and grace. And we need to thank God for that every day.
Speaking of that, I think we really don't appreciate the magnitude of grace. Common grace, the fact that we are allowed to live at all, the beauty of creation, all of it is a gift of God's grace and a testament to His love for us. Breathe it in deep. It is amazing. I say this because a few hours ago Adam and I were on top of the parking ramp so he could take pictures for a class. While we were up there I looked into the sky and muttered a prayer simply asking to see a shooting star. Not two minutes later, there it went, splitting the night sky with light. And it was amazing. Grace: A favor rendered by one who need not do so. A simple gift, but so amazing. Praise God!
Now I know we like to please man. And we all do it. When we avoid calling someone out, we do not speak truth in love, we stay silent in fear of confrontation or what they'll think. But this isn't about that.
How do we please God? Think on that for a moment. What comes to mind? What do we have to do to please God? We went over this tonight, and it led to an interesting thought.
God reveals His will to us in His Word. We are told to "Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with thy God." -Micah 6:8, "Love the Lord your God with all your strength and all your heart and all your mind," and "Love thy neighbor as yourself." -Matthew 22: 37-39. But of course, though these are the things we think of, how we might obey, what we might do that God will be pleased with us, we may not think about John 6:28-29 which says "Then (the disciples) said to (Jesus) 'What must we do to be doing the works of God?' Jesus answered them, 'This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom He has sent."
We were talking about grace, and being cloaked in righteousness. And when this question, of what pleases God was asked, another guy answered, saying that because of grace, God sees us who have accepted Christ as perfect. Which sparked a thought. I will tell you my thought process:
God tells us His will for us in scripture. He has commands which He has given us. And so obedience is important and good, but it can so easily become corrupted by our selfish desires. And selfishness is not pleasing to God. And then I think of this verse where after Jesus was baptized, "A voice from Heaven said 'this is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased," -Matthew 3:17, and so we know that God is pleased with His son, Jesus. And we see in Romans 3:21-25 "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins."
We are clothed in the righteousness of Christ, because of His grace. We are clothed in the righteousness of Christ, with whom God is well pleased! So then, when we lean fully on God, embrace His grace and trust fully and wholly in it, when we sacrifice any claim to righteousness we think we have on our own, cling to grace and clothe ourselves in the righteousness of Christ, then the Lord can look upon and and be well pleased! And it is nothing of ourselves, it is all God's love and grace, and Christ's sacrifice and grace. And we need to thank God for that every day.
Speaking of that, I think we really don't appreciate the magnitude of grace. Common grace, the fact that we are allowed to live at all, the beauty of creation, all of it is a gift of God's grace and a testament to His love for us. Breathe it in deep. It is amazing. I say this because a few hours ago Adam and I were on top of the parking ramp so he could take pictures for a class. While we were up there I looked into the sky and muttered a prayer simply asking to see a shooting star. Not two minutes later, there it went, splitting the night sky with light. And it was amazing. Grace: A favor rendered by one who need not do so. A simple gift, but so amazing. Praise God!
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Can Heal The Leper's Spots
"And a leper came to (Jesus), imploring him, and kneeling said to him 'If you will, you can make me clean.' Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, 'I will; be clean.' And immediately the leprosy left him and he was made clean." -Mark 1: 40-42
The other day I was reading an old issue of AdBusters, an amazing magazine, and I came across this quote, regarding prevailing attitudes in America. After an hour of frantic searching I can't find the exact quote, but it was something to this effect; That the leper is resigned to a life without feeling. He loses his toe because he cannot feel the pain of the cuts he gets, cannot feel the infection spreading. He loses limbs because he cannot feel them as they are beaten as he goes through his day. He feels nothing.
And tonight at church it hit me that Jesus cures leprosy several times. And that there may be some incredible symbolism there. Not simply the miracle that Christ heals the sick, because yes that is there and important, but I look at this, and we are all lepers.
We numb ourselves. We go through the day, letting ourselves get nicked. We cut our (metaphorical) feet on broken glass. We bang our arms and legs on tables and doors. We do not feel the infection we pick up in the street, cannot feel the bruise on out skin. And so it festers. We are all in danger of becoming leprous. Uncaring, unmotivated, completely oblivious to what is going on with our bodies, with our lives.
But Christ can cure us. He does. He is moved with pity. Anyone who knows me well should know I do not like the idea of being pitied, but when I look at something like this, that Christ, moved with pity, heals the leper, I thank God for His taking pity upon us. We need to implore him, to be on our knees, asking to be made clean, because our nerves are dead in leprosy. They need to be awoken. We need to feel, to know when we are nicked and cut, so we can be healed. This is, I suppose, an urgent plea not to grow calloused, so numb that it becomes a disease that you can no longer feel. Don't become a leper.
The other day I was reading an old issue of AdBusters, an amazing magazine, and I came across this quote, regarding prevailing attitudes in America. After an hour of frantic searching I can't find the exact quote, but it was something to this effect; That the leper is resigned to a life without feeling. He loses his toe because he cannot feel the pain of the cuts he gets, cannot feel the infection spreading. He loses limbs because he cannot feel them as they are beaten as he goes through his day. He feels nothing.
And tonight at church it hit me that Jesus cures leprosy several times. And that there may be some incredible symbolism there. Not simply the miracle that Christ heals the sick, because yes that is there and important, but I look at this, and we are all lepers.
We numb ourselves. We go through the day, letting ourselves get nicked. We cut our (metaphorical) feet on broken glass. We bang our arms and legs on tables and doors. We do not feel the infection we pick up in the street, cannot feel the bruise on out skin. And so it festers. We are all in danger of becoming leprous. Uncaring, unmotivated, completely oblivious to what is going on with our bodies, with our lives.
But Christ can cure us. He does. He is moved with pity. Anyone who knows me well should know I do not like the idea of being pitied, but when I look at something like this, that Christ, moved with pity, heals the leper, I thank God for His taking pity upon us. We need to implore him, to be on our knees, asking to be made clean, because our nerves are dead in leprosy. They need to be awoken. We need to feel, to know when we are nicked and cut, so we can be healed. This is, I suppose, an urgent plea not to grow calloused, so numb that it becomes a disease that you can no longer feel. Don't become a leper.
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Massive Miniatures
So I read something Piper wrote about the miracle that is rain. He goes through a theoretical conversation trying to explain how rain occurs. How water turns into vapor, rises into the air, travels miles and miles before condensing and dripping back to earth in what is really a complicated process. Here is the link: http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/TasteAndSee/ByDate/1998/1117_The_Great_Work_of_God_Rain/
Reading that gives me a greater appreciation of all the miracles we take for granted. The rain, falling down from the sky. How often do we think of the true miracle that is there. See, science explains away a lot of things. But I feel that something is overlooked in the whole science vs. religion debate, and that is that science reveals much of the glory of God! How can I say this? Simple. God created everything, and His providence sustains it. And so a rock will always be a rock, and will always have the characteristics of a rock. Water is water and always will act like water. Atoms, chemical bonding, and a whole bunch of other chemistry and biology and physics terms that I don't know, all of them reveal a God who is massive and controls everything, even down to the tiniest detail. I don't know about you, but I find that incredible. So when it rains, we ought to appreciate that great work of God. When the trees change colour and go bare in the fall, appreciate that as a great work of God. To me, science doesn't negate the existence of God by any means, it shows just how great He is.
God, your glory shines around. The moon and stars arrive by night, crying out to show your glory and love. The waves sing hymns off the rocks as they crash, they raise a joyous tune in their ebb and flow. The wind sings through the trees, songs of your righteous deeds. The sunset illuminates the beauty of the God who came to save. The plants grow skyward, exalting you, raising their limbs to touch you. The sky spreads out over all creation showing the expanse of your glory and perfection. The lightning shines, illuminating your truth, the thunder rings echoes of your justice. Lord, the birds cry out for want of you. The creatures call out, proclaiming your provision. The ice crystallizes and reflects your glory. Fires rage, illuminating and burning with your passionate love for us. O God! Let me join in with creation to praise you! Lord in whatever way you desire let me fill it. Let my tears water your earth as my knees hit the floor. Let my blood be a testament to your sacrifice. Let my life join in with creation to bring you worship and praise. Father God, perfecter of love, God over all else, whom I love with all my heart, my whole life; Lord be glorified. In my life, be my life. Be glorified Lord. Every step, every breath, every beat of the heart, every instant, be glorified. Be glorified. This I beg. This I pray. Amen.
Reading that gives me a greater appreciation of all the miracles we take for granted. The rain, falling down from the sky. How often do we think of the true miracle that is there. See, science explains away a lot of things. But I feel that something is overlooked in the whole science vs. religion debate, and that is that science reveals much of the glory of God! How can I say this? Simple. God created everything, and His providence sustains it. And so a rock will always be a rock, and will always have the characteristics of a rock. Water is water and always will act like water. Atoms, chemical bonding, and a whole bunch of other chemistry and biology and physics terms that I don't know, all of them reveal a God who is massive and controls everything, even down to the tiniest detail. I don't know about you, but I find that incredible. So when it rains, we ought to appreciate that great work of God. When the trees change colour and go bare in the fall, appreciate that as a great work of God. To me, science doesn't negate the existence of God by any means, it shows just how great He is.
God, your glory shines around. The moon and stars arrive by night, crying out to show your glory and love. The waves sing hymns off the rocks as they crash, they raise a joyous tune in their ebb and flow. The wind sings through the trees, songs of your righteous deeds. The sunset illuminates the beauty of the God who came to save. The plants grow skyward, exalting you, raising their limbs to touch you. The sky spreads out over all creation showing the expanse of your glory and perfection. The lightning shines, illuminating your truth, the thunder rings echoes of your justice. Lord, the birds cry out for want of you. The creatures call out, proclaiming your provision. The ice crystallizes and reflects your glory. Fires rage, illuminating and burning with your passionate love for us. O God! Let me join in with creation to praise you! Lord in whatever way you desire let me fill it. Let my tears water your earth as my knees hit the floor. Let my blood be a testament to your sacrifice. Let my life join in with creation to bring you worship and praise. Father God, perfecter of love, God over all else, whom I love with all my heart, my whole life; Lord be glorified. In my life, be my life. Be glorified Lord. Every step, every breath, every beat of the heart, every instant, be glorified. Be glorified. This I beg. This I pray. Amen.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)