Once upon a time in Florida, there was a pale green house with a screened in porch and one slow ceiling fan. It sat, small and unassuming, under giant trees with great lengths of gray curly hair that flowed from their branches. Off to the side was a small storage shack that held black rubber inner tubes with air valves that stuck out a good inch (they could leave a nasty scrape right down your rib-cage if you weren’t careful) and scratchy rafts with popped seams that still floated just fine.
A few yards away was a lake, also small and unassuming, always still, always murky, always smooth but for splashing and paddle boat oars and an occasional fish rippling the surface.
I have pictures of my mom and dad when they were teenagers with cool hair and wild bathing suits standing knee deep in the water, smiling big, the pale green house just out of the frame. I have pictures of my grown-up parents floating, tossing and splashing years later with my brother and me in that same lake, with that same house in the background and on the same rubber inner tubes and scratchy rafts.
Artist: Nancy Harvey (Shannon’s mom)
They are vivid memories. But the thing I remember most is surprising – it is the sand. I’ve never felt or seen sand like it since, soft and pale and almost impossible to walk through. It moved and shifted as the soles of our feet pressed on it, even when we quickly dug our toes in for stability. When we followed that smushy sand down into the water – it transformed under our feet like something alive and would slowly pull us into it, like quicksand without the “quick.” We stood like stones at the water’s edge and watched as our feet, then our ankles, slowly disappeared into that sand, as if there was no such thing as solid ground.
It was wet and gloppy and we made the most amazing dribble towers on the edge of the shore. It was too something (heavy? slippery?) to make a sand castle. Maybe heavy is a good word – I can still feel the adrenaline that propelled me up off the ground and sent me screaming into the water away from my brother as he shouted “Who wants applesauce!?” and lobbed fistfuls of the sloppy dripping sand straight toward my curly head, where the sand would SLAP and grind down to my scalp and take days to come out.
Why am I thinking about this place now? Why am I remembering that sand with such detail, and finally, why am I writing it down to share with you?
Well, the reasons are layered. The first is that I miss being able to be somewhere else. The second is that lake was beautiful and lovely and I wanted to invite you to visit it with me in my memory, in case you also miss being able to be somewhere else.
But mostly, I wanted to think about that sand with you. The days are growing long, the novelty of being at home has worn off, for us grown-ups, for our teenagers, for our little ones. We started off a few weeks ago standing on new and unstable ground, each step shifting beneath us, changing sometimes by the day, causing us all to feel an unfamiliar instability, measuring our steps to find a walking rhythm.
And the days have melted by like Dali’s clocks, like dribbles of wet sand running down a melting tower.
Some of us are lingering around up on the shore, growing accustomed to the strange new ground that we are walking on. Restless maybe, stepping around burrs of inconvenience and attitudes and boredom, working through the (very real) disappointment of canceled things, but doing pretty well considering. Some of us are closer to the water’s edge, where the sand seems to breath just enough to swallow our feet slowly, almost imperceptibly, until we look down and see that we are buried up to our shins.
If this is where you are, may I ask what is in your sand? Loneliness? A slow build of pressure contained in the walls of your home? The squeeze of online schooling or bickering kids that seems to get tighter each day? A low hum of impatience toward those close to you? The constant chatter of news and information that seems to change by the minute, crowding your mind and stealing your attention span? The knowledge that your first month’s bills were covered, but you aren’t so sure about the second?
Still others of us have felt like we are already underwater, feet wedged into that mysterious sand that gulps and holds fast. What makes up this sand? Have Isolation and a deep loneliness begun to make you feel smothered by their heat? Has your job disappeared like steam off that inner tube? Are you a caregiver who suddenly can’t give care due to restrictions? Has the tension in your home become oppressive or even frightening? Have sopping heavy wallops of circumstances landed on you, blindsiding you, grinding into you and you can’t shake them off?
Oh church family, my words seem hollow today. I wanted to write with shouts of LIFE coming off Easter Sunday, and indeed Life is ALL around us, even now. But I know for many of us, our hearts are growing tired. I want to remind you that you have a family, brothers and sisters and fathers and mothers in Christ. Like Paul who so desperately wanted to join his “spiritual children” in Thessolanica but was “torn apart from them,” so we desperately want to be knit together through our bond of Christ’s family.
So, for today, let’s pray to the One who is able to lift us from the miry bog, the Lifter of lonely heads, the One who sees us and finds us in the sand. Let’s pray that He who is able would rescue and revive and restore and refresh his children.
I had the opportunity last night to briefly meet with the worship and technical teams before they began preparing for the services for this week. Just walking into our auditorium where our church family gathers week to week did something inside of me. But when I saw the faces of those I love and minister with regularly my heart was overcome with emotion and gratitude. I wanted so badly just to reach out and embrace and encourage each of them. We stood in a circle, trying to stay apart appropriately, and I attempted to encourage and thank them for all the work they were putting in. As we prayed my heart again was moved with emotion. I was just grateful to be with my brothers and sisters, to look into their eyes and see them face to face. I didn’t realize how much I missed them and all of you. I share Pastor Aaron’s longing to meet together again with all of you. I long to lift my voice in worship together, corporately, with all of you. I long to lift my prayers to God together with you. I eagerly desire hearing God’s Word preached and taught as hundreds of us are gathered together. I look forward to seeing so many of you in the foyer, out in the parking lot and all over our campus.
Hebrews 10:24-25 has never been more real to me than now – when I can’t experience being together with you all.
“And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting
to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the
more as you see the day drawing near.“
Hebrews 10:24-25
So, let’s do just that………consider how. We are having to be quite creative and to fight for fellowship these days aren’t we? We use Zoom, talking on our phones, FaceTiming, texting, emailing, even for some writing letters or cards; all in attempts to “meet together” to connect. Why? Because we were created for community and not isolation. This is why, in part, this new normal is so difficult. We weren’t created to walk this life alone. No, we do indeed need each other. This is why so many of our kids are anticipating going back to school – so they can be with their friends. We, like them, want to get out of the house, to see another human being – face-to-face. The bottom line is that we need both solitude and community. Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s small but powerful book Life Together points to this where he says,
“Let him who cannot be alone beware of community… Let him who is not in community beware of being alone… Each by itself has profound perils and pitfalls. One who wants fellowship without solitude plunges into the void of words and feelings, and the one who seeks solitude without fellowship perishes in the abyss of vanity, self-infatuation and despair.”
― Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Faith in Community
As we continue to live in new degree’s of isolation and togetherness, consider how to reach out to one another, whether that is your normal pattern or not. I encourage you to call your families, do a Zoom or conference call with a friend, neighbor or coworker. Write that letter, send that email or text. When you see your neighbor outside, speak to them. Get out and take a walk and pray to the God who lives in eternal unity and fellowship, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
We live in an unprecedented time where community is needed more than ever. I long for the day when we are together again, but until then I will fight to connect to do life together. I invite you into the new journey of doing life together.
Faith over Fear.
That is what we have heard a lot about these last several weeks.
We’ve encouraged it as a church, you’ve probably seen it in a
social media post from another Christian outlet, or maybe you have
even encouraged someone else with that same truth. And for good
reason, it is a good reminder during times like these. It is a good
reminder that faith is what should be produced in us as we seek the
Lord in this season. Pressing into the Lord during this time is
important for us all to do. Seeking refuge in the Lord is right.
(Psalm 16:1)
But what if the Lord
is asking more of us? What if it is not just a simple equation of
replacing fear with faith. Or having faith, instead of fear. What if
the Lord wants to use this season for something much more?, What if
He wants to remove that which stands in our way of faith most often,
something that is actually at the root of the fear we often have?
What if before the Lord can increase our faith He has to do a much
deeper work; a much more inconvenient work in our life?
What am I talking
about? Well let me lead you there by way of describing first how the
Lord showed me this work just this week.
I was reading Exodus
14. Now this isn’t so much about what I was reading. It is more
about how, deep down in my heart, I was reading it.
It is a familiar story. Moses has led his people out of Egypt into the wilderness. The people have watched over time how God has shown up through plaques and miracles, signs and wonders, and now as a pillar of dust and fire. To say that these people have seen some amazing acts of God would be an understatement. He is literally leading them day and night in a pillar of dust and a pillar of fire by night.
But now they have come to the Red Sea, a geographical dead-end. And here comes Pharaoh, hard-hearted and ready to destroy the Israelites. Imagine you are an Israelite, you’ve seen God literally send an angel of death to fight for you. You have seen God overthrow and bring to his knees the super-power political leader of your day. You have spent the last several days watching as God manifest himself in your midst through dust and fire. And at the first sign of trouble you want to run back to Egypt. I mean, I can get you being afraid. I can get there being some trepidation in your voice and heart at this moment. I can even expect the question: “Lord this looks like a pretty tough situation. Not sure how you are going to get us out of this one.” I can understand all that, but No! The Israelites sarcastically mock Moses, basically saying, “Oh so you brought us out here to die. We told you so. We had it better in Egypt.” (Exodus 14:11-12)
And if I am honest
as I have told that story to kids, as I have read about it over and
over, there are times that, I may not have shaken my head, but deep
down in me, I was shaking my heart at least. I was scoffing at the
Israelites. “Oh yea of little faith! You’ve just witnessed God
fighting for you. And now you doubt him?”, my heart would say.
But this time,
during this season, reading that story in the midst of COVID-19
exposed my pride, arrogance, and vanity. I didn’t shake my heart at
the Israelites, I sadly identified with them. I asked myself, “How
many of your prayers sound like those Israelites?” I may not be
staring at the Red Sea, but take a second and look at your calendar
for April. Think about the prospect of employment if this season
continues. Look into the abyss of what is now our unknown situation
and see if you don’t feel a little bit of what the Israelites felt
that day.
Which leads me to
the inconvenient work the Lord is up to in my own life, maybe your
life, and maybe the church as a whole. We have talked a lot these
last few weeks about having faith and believing in the goodness of
the Lord. But what I have forgotten and maybe you have too, is that
belief and faith is a two-step process. Faith’s biggest obstacle is
not fear, it is what lies as the source of that fear, sin and
idolatry.
John the Baptist comes on the scene and his ministry can be summed up in three words, “Repent and Believe.” Jesus comes on the scene and begins his ministry in Mark 1:14 and his first recorded words in that gospel are this, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” Jesus first “sermon” in Mark is to call people to repentance and then belief. “Root out the sin, recognize where you have believed in opposition to my good news, and then believe in the gospel,” Jesus says. Repentance is always the first step in the process of deepening faith. Moving towards God is always accompanied by moving away from and acknowledging false beliefs, false gods, and insufficient idols.
I don’t say this
from an ivory tower or some emotionally distant vantage point. I
realize our current situation has already seen people lose their
jobs. Families are making or will begin to have to make tough
choices. Much of what lies ahead of us is unknown. That is why I
called what the Lord is wanting to do, such an inconvenient work.
Not an insensitive work, but an inconvenient one. In the midst of
all this unknown, in the midst of this Red Sea of questions and
worry, in midst of this diseases and hurt, the fact that the Lord may
want us to repent so that our faith could be made stronger is
inconvenient, from our human perspective at best.
But if we want more of God. If what we really seek is to be transformed into the likeness of His Son in the midst of this trial, then it would be foolish for us as a church not to recognize that the greater work of deepening faith may have to come through the road of repentance. We want to be comforted by God, but realizing areas where we have first made God small is often the first step in His comforting work.
Think back 6 months ago. Would you ever have believed, in the midst of your work and toil, your leisure and spare time, your business and money-making endeavors, that out there in the world somewhere there was lurking a little tiny virus, no bigger then 1/1000th of an eye lash that could bring the world to its knees? Our biggest weapons, all our money, and all our power have yet to stop this thing. At best right now all we hope to do is contain it. Oh but how powerful, whether we realize it or not, did we feel at that time. How little thought did we give of the millions of ways God’s good grace was maintaining our world and keeping us going. How much of our days did we think that we, in our own power and might, happened because of our ability to make it so?
And yet a tiny virus
has shown us that we aren’t as in control as we thought we were.
One tiny virus has shown up and once again reminded us how fragile,
how needy, and how vulnerable we are. And we would be worse off if
we simply hunkered down during this time, thought nothing of the
different ways, known and unknown, that we have forgotten God in the
midst of our everyday lives.
God brought his people to the Red Sea because he loved them. It was easy for God to get them out of Egypt, but it took a much longer time to get Egypt out of them. The same is true for us. We are living a similar exodus story. The Israelites were brought to the Red Sea so that they would feel their need of God. And God has brought us to this point because we need the same. And neediness’ companion on this wilderness journey is often repentance. God may not part every figurative “Red Sea” for us. What God did for the Israelites in the wilderness that day, is not prescriptive for what God will do for you in your family, with your health, or with your job in this season. Not because God doesn’t care about those things, but because God has already parted this sea. He did it when His Son came to this virus infected earth and died on the cross for our redemption. He did it when he raised His Son from the dead because death had no claim on his sinless and perfect life, and he does it today because he is still ruling and reigning in the midst of the pandemic. God has not been dethroned by COVID-19. And as you look to an unknown future, acknowledge the ways in which you are stilled pulled to want to go back to Egypt. Acknowledge where you heart is prone to despair. Stare at the Red Sea of your future and be reminded of Moses words to the people at that day, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord.”
Easter is my favorite time of year. I recently heard that according to the church calendar, Easter actually lasts for 50 days. I would like to propose that we all commit to wearing pastel colors and provide Cadbury eggs to the congregation during these days at CBC. Who do I need to speak to about that? (Joking, joking…)
In all seriousness, Easter can splash by us like a rock skipping on a lake. Many of us moved from praising our risen Lord in the morning to vacation mode or back-to-work-the-next-day mode in a matter of hours. As believers, we live in the shadow of Easter every day, butas we know, we are a forgetful people.
The message of Easter is a familiar one to most of us, but still we move through it, here today gone tomorrow. The Lord knows that we are forgetful, and he reminds us to remember again and again, no matter how familiar the message. Peter tells us, “So, I will always remind you of these things, even though you know them and are firmly established in the truth you now have.” Not only does he give us his own Word so that we will always have the “remembering” at our fingertips and in our heart, he writes the story of Easter so our eyes can see it. I heard someone say last week, “Isn’t it beautiful how creation tells the Easter story over and over again?” Yes, it certainly is.
Some years ago, long before we moved into this house, someone planted a magnolia tree in our back yard. It’s a rare kind, according to my dad who knows about such things. When we moved in a few years ago, it quickly became my favorite view. It grew up tall and huge, shading the corner of our sun-room and perfectly hiding the unattractive corner where the air conditioning unit and coiled-up hose lived.
However, apparently its glorious leaves and branches that I loved to see draped over the corner of my house were (not quite so gloriously) threatening to rub the shingles off the roof. One summer day last year, my husband casually mentioned that he was going to trim it back “because it’s brushing all over the roof.”
I headed out for the afternoon and this husband of mine—whom I will identify by his initials to protect his identity B(ert) W(ilson)— killed my tree. All that remained was a sawed off fat stick in the ground with spiny looking angry branches that poked out from its once beautiful form. I sputtered and stared and may have gotten a few tears in my eyes and said (yelled), “What have you DONE to my tree?? You killed it!”
“Of course I did! It was destroying the roof, Shannon!”
For the past year I have stared bleakly in the direction of my once beautiful tree, hating the stumpy spiny thing that remained, lonely for its previous shape and health and life and shade. A few weeks ago I walked out onto my porch and sat down facing the used-to-be-tree. The tree that was dead. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Out of the spiny hideous poking remains bloomed the most pristine, perfect white flowers. My dead tree (indeed, dead!) was suddenly gloriously bursting with life.
I stared and then cried as this tree proclaimed the story of Easter to me. It shouted it with flitters of joy in the petals of those flowers. “Remember Jesus!” It said. “Remember the good news!” And I did. I remembered that his body was once dead. Dead! His body was ruined, crushed, destroyed, pierced, buried behind the rock and sealed in death…. until LIFE burst forth where there was no life. This is the resurrection story of my Jesus written on the white bursts of life on that tree. Before my very eyes.
I love Easter and I loved celebrating here at CBC among our body. I love that one week later I sat and thought of that magnolia tree again as Pastor Aaron painted the picture of my heart- our hearts. Dead. Without life. No thready pulse, no shallow breath indicating life. No life.
“You (me, us!) were dead
in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of
this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is
now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the
passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and
were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.But
God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,
even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ!”
Because of HIS life
bursting forth that Easter morning, our hearts that were dead can burst to
life.
We heard from Ezekiel the prophet that it is the LORD who does this. HE washes us with clean water so we can be clean. HE cleanses us from all our idols. He gives us a new heart and a new spirit. HE doesn’t just give our old heart a jolt, he removes it (as it was dead and made of stone!) and puts a new soft heart within us — one that will love the Lord our God. One that will mark us as a child of God. One that was bought for us with the blood of his Son.
And into the world we go with our new hearts pumping the life of Christ in our veins. No longer are we followers of the course of the world and the prince of the power of the air, but we are followers of our Jesus who died and gave himself for us.
So, Happy Easter (again and still), brothers and sisters of Community Bible Church. It is a joy to walk with you in the newness of life. Let’s be on the lookout for the story of Jesus as creation proclaims it in these weeks and tell others what we see!
The
appalling and unsettling story of Amnon and Tamar in 2 Samuel 13 was the
subject matter of Aaron’s recent messages on sexual sin and past trauma. The passage
paints a grim picture: In Amnon’s broken desire for his half-sister, he “made himself ill.” After he had violated
her, Scripture describes Amnon’s twisted emotional response: “… for the hatred with which he hated
her was greater than the love with which he had loved her.” In the
tragic aftermath of Amnon’s sin, he sends Tamar away in turmoil and shame.
I
was recently praying about a challenging relationship when I sensed the still,
small voice of the Holy Spirit speak to my heart: “Susan, you’re loving like Amnon.” I was jolted into
attention. I continued to pray and recognized that this was a correct assessment
of my heart. Amnon’s so-called love came with an agenda, was self-serving, and
evaporated when his planning didn’t produce the desired result. I couldn’t
claim that my love was much better in the relational challenge I was currently
encountering.
Our
Amnon-love is hereditary. The sin of Adam and Eve found its origin in a
self-serving agenda. They saw that the forbidden fruit was “good for food, a delight to the eyes, and desirable to make one
wise,” and they wanted it more than they wanted to obey God. So they
ate it. In their futile attempt to hide from God and each other, “… they sewed fig leaves together
and made themselves loincloths.”
This
act of self-protection was something new. Prior to their sin, they had no
thought of self-preservation or self-justification. Sin brought with it a
devastating and sinful self-orientation that has infected every person who has
ever been born. Not one of us is exempt. We are prone to love like Amnon.
The
inescapable truth is that we want our own way. We’re those wayward sheep in
Isaiah 53:6, “All we like sheep have
gone astray; we have turned – every one – to his own way.” And when wayward self-interested sheep bump
into each other, the bleating begins.
One
of the most beautiful passages in Scripture is found in Philippians 2. It
doesn’t use the word “love”, but it is a perfect description of the
love that God makes possible through the Holy Spirit who indwells us:
Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind
let each of you regard
one another as more important than himself; do not merely look out for
your own personal
interests, but also for the interests of others (verses 3-4).
Paul
David Tripp describes what happens in our hearts when we love with an agenda.
He describes Amnon-love: “If sin
turns me in on myself so that all I live for is me, then sin in its essence is
antisocial. Living for myself and the satisfaction of my selfish desires
dehumanizes the people in my life. No longer are they people to me. No longer
are they objects of my affection and service. No, my loved ones and friends are
reduced either to vehicles to help
me get what I want or to obstacles in the way of what I want. When they deliver what I want, I speak kindly to them,
not actually because I love them, but because I love myself and the fact that
they have satisfied my desires. When they get in the way of what I want, I
speak unkindly to them because I love myself, and they have made the mistake of
getting in the way of what I crave.”
In Relationships: A Mess Worth Making,
authors Timothy Lane and Paul Tripp get specific about what it looks like when
our loving looks like Amnon’s:
Refusing to let go of a moment of hurt
Getting angry when our children complicate/inconvenience our lives
Becoming defensive when challenged
Avoiding conflict out of fear
Being resigned to a broken relationship that could be healed
Gossiping about people
Pursuing comfortable relationships and avoiding difficult ones
Envying other people’s friendships
Controlling relationships out of a desire for security
Blowing up at people when our agendas are trampled
Living in bitter isolation in the face of disappointment
One
of God’s purposes for the church is to teach us to love. We’re surrounded by
bleating sheep – and they get in our space and they eat our grass. God calls us
to a sacrificial love that is defined by the cross of Christ. All of our love
for others must find its source in that Love that provided for us a new power
and a new desire to say “no” to the self-protection and
self-orientation that is our natural Adam-and-Eve inherited inclination.
When
we think of Amnon and his sin against Tamar, we can readily comfort ourselves
and dismiss any personal conviction, because we have never been violently or aggressively
abusive. But when we dig a little deeper, we realize our love is often Amnon-love
in seed form, bearing no resemblance to the patience, kindness, and goodness
that the Spirit desires to produce in the hearts of those who belong to Jesus.
The
love of Christ that God makes available to us and through us is costly: It
requires two deaths. The first of those deaths occurred almost 2000 years ago.
Christ’s death on the cross paid the penalty for our sin, so that we might be
forgiven and receive new lives and new hearts. Jesus’s death paved the way for
a second necessary death: our death to self. It’s a daily choice made possible by the power of God’s Spirit who lives in us,
and by God’s grace which He offers freely to all of His children: my life lived
for the benefit of others, or my life lived to benefit me.
Loving
like Amnon doesn’t take work. It comes naturally. But something supernatural happens in the hearts of those
who belong to Jesus when we surrender our desires to Him and find our
satisfaction in Him. Our capacity for true love increases. Tara Barthel says, “As we trust in the Lord and persevere
in love, He carves out a vast space that holds His grace in our hearts, for
only He can enable us to obey the command, ‘A new command I give you: Love one
another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men
will know you are My disciples, if you love one another'” (John 13:34-35).
I
can think of no better way to celebrate Easter this year than by loving like
Jesus – by the power of His blood-bought grace and for the magnifying of His
resurrection glory.
Do you remember the Charlie Brown
character Pig-Pen from the famous Peanuts cartoon strip? He was Charlie Brown’s friend, who always seemed to have a cloud
of dust following him where ever he went.
He could never get clean. There
was one time he was able to get clean, but as soon as he went outside, he
instantly became dirty, declaring himself “A dust magnet.”
Most days as a father to 4
children, I think that we might have given birth to 4 Pig-Pens. Often it is not dust that seems to be
radiating and originating from my children, although that will change as Summer
gets closer. No, my children seem to be swirled in a dust cloud of their own
things. Crayons and Legos, empty juice
boxes and used sucker sticks, goldfish crackers and socks.
You might suspect that my wife and
I have never taught our children what and where trash bins are in our house. Or
you might think that we prefer dirty clothes to sit for days in the first spot
they land, not in the dirty hamper. Or
you might suspect that we prefer our children to take off their shoes and to
make getting anywhere on time more fun by playing that stress-free game of
“Where did my other shoe end up?” You would be wrong. We really try to teach our kids about trash
bins, clothes hampers, and how to put their shoes away. Alas, somedays it feels like our kids our Pig-Pen. They are just “dust, Lego, crayon, empty
juice box, goldfish crackers in the couch cushion” magnets.
A few weeks I came home to some creation
sitting on our side table. It was a
penny and peppermint glued inside a small coin box that I got my children on my
last trip to Costa Rica. The box was
held up by a Lego man. When I asked my
kids what in the world this thing was, my youngest told me, as if I was crazy
for not recognizing it at first sight, that it was clearly, a “Leprechaun
Trap”. Of course, a Leprechaun trap! How could I not have known?
Or this last week, as the weather
was getting warmer, I came home to my kids outside with craft supplies making
something. All I could think about at
the time was how much of that stuff will I have to pick up. Who is going to leave the glue out? How
many-colored pencils will be left out and how many will be put back in the box?
Why do they have tape, and will they not ever make a mess?
It was later that night however
that I went into our master bathroom and there on the mirror was taped a piece
of paper from one of my kids. It read:
Mom and Dad, I love you guys.
(I+ drawn heart+ drawn stick figures to represent my wife and I)
Here (Heres) some flowers for good luck.
And taped to the paper where two flowers (probably weeds)
That paper is still up in our
bathroom today. And it reminded me of an
interesting verse in Proverbs.
“Where there are no oxen, the manger is clean, but abundant crops come by the strength of the ox.”
Proverbs 14:4
This may seem like an interesting
verse to think about, but I think it has a lot to do with family life and
ministry to the family.
Oxen are dirty, they are expensive,
and they are time consuming. But if you
want a harvest you must have them. There
was no getting around this for the ancient Israelites. You can have a clean feeding trough (manger)
or you can have abundant crops. But you
really can’t have both.
We live in a world that continually
tries to tell families that they can have it all. That you can have the perfect house, the perfect
kids, the perfect vacation, the perfect on and on and on. And we are constantly bombarded by these
images through entertainment, commercials, and social media. It even has a name online, it’s called the
“curated life”. Curated means selected, organized,
and presented using professional or expert knowledge. People have even started posting about their
curated messy-life, which is just a form of emotional showmanship that
masquerades itself as vulnerability. God’s wisdom tells us this. Life is messy. You can’t avoid it. But there is a harvest that can come with the
mess.
The glorious thing is that God cares
so much for us. He cares about the small
things in life and he cares about the big things. He knew ancient farmers would worry about
barns and troughs that never could get cleaned.
He cares about moms and dads, at work and at home, caring for their
families in 1,000 different ways.
Life is messy and Life is beautiful,
and life is somehow beautiful because it is messy. And that sentence wouldn’t make any sense if
it weren’t for the Good News of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Who makes something
beautiful out our of mess.
Because every so often, out of the mess, you might get something like this:
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