Things Ignoring the Shelter in Place Order

I was just out in my garden and noticed several things that apparently have not received the shelter in place orders. The Gerber Daisy given to my wife by a friend is blooming, the roses are budding, the rain fell last night watering everything, the trees are budding, birds across the street are singing, squirrels are scurrying around as usual, the sun came up on its own, and clouds are moving across the sky. All these things simply do what a mighty God created them to do. They do not question their existence, worry about the times, argue over politics, or stew over where the next drop of water or ray of sunlight will come from. Flowers bloom because God designed them to and in that one simple act, they glorify God. Ultimately, God holds all things together, including us. He spoke time and space into existence and made a universe that precisely runs like clockwork. He declares the beginning from the end and nothing is a surprise to Him. When Jesus said “Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them” (Matthew 6:25), He was talking about this simple truth. We can learn a lot from the simplicity of creation. We can have hope and assurance that the God of all creation knows the numbers of hairs on your head.

Harmony in the Church

The Lord inspired the Apostle Paul to write in I Cor. 12 that the body of Christ has many different parts, but is one body. Those words are just as true and relevant today as they were to the Corinthian church 2,000 years ago. We continue to argue over minor doctrine, treat one spiritual gift as more important than another, or become prideful in our own role as if God needed us, and us alone, to complete His will. False doctrine also creeps into the church under the disguise of the latest revelation or prophetic word. Our Enemy, the Devil, seeks to divide, discourage, distract, and defile us in our daily walk with the Lord. If he can’t have our souls, he will attempt to sideline us to make us ineffective and unproductive in the faith (2 Peter 1:8 tells us how to avoid this trap).

Allow me to give you another analogy for the body of Christ. Much like a symphony, the Church has many members with many different talents and callings. We must play together in harmony. God is our conductor and His Word is our sheet music. We each have a part to play, and each part is vital to all the others. But we must keep our eyes on the conductor, and play according to the sheet music. There is room for individual expression within the church, just as each instrument has its own individual sound and each musician in a symphony will express the sheet music through their own creativity. But we must all be playing in the same key, keeping our eyes on the conductor lest we get lost and create disharmony by playing in the wrong part at the wrong time in the wrong key. We must use discernment to know when a teaching is off-key (I Cor. 12:4-11), if even by a little. We must have humility to allow a brother or sister to help us stay in tune. If a brother or sister is out of tune, we must help them with love and with patience and with all gentleness.

Who is God to You?

How do you see God? We are seeing trends that suggest the way we view God depends a lot on the way we view our own fathers 1,2, 3. Those who had an absent father tend to view God as absent, or non-existent. Those who had an abusive father tend to view God as a galactic tyrant looking to punish us for every wrong doing. Finally, those who come from mostly functional families where the father was kind and loving, likewise see God as kind and loving.

The Bible tells us that God is the same today, yesterday, and forever. Yet, I came across an interesting verse one day. In Psalm 18, David writes “With the merciful you show yourself merciful; with the blameless man you show yourself blameless; with the purified you show yourself pure; and with the crooked you make yourself seem tortuous.” (Ps. 18:25-26 ESV) How can God who is the “same yesterday, today, and forever” be merciful, blameless, and pure to some while “tortuous” to others?

This passage reminds me of an expression that goes something like this… The same sun that melts wax will harden clay. Like the sun, God is the same. He is unchanging. Yet our perception of Him varies depending on the lens through which we see Him. If our life is good and our motives are pure, we see God as good. Yet if we are leading a wicked and deceitful life, we will be afraid of God, hardening our hearts toward Him and steeping deeper into rebellion against Him. It isn’t God that changes, it is what we are made of that makes the difference. What is our moral fiber? How do we respond to heat and pressure? How do we respond to success and power? Will we be wax or clay?

So it comes back to the question Jesus asked His disciples. “Who do you say that I am?” (Matt. 16:13-20) Who is God to you? The answer to that question says more about who we are than who He is.

1https://www.deseretnews.com/article/865581540/Father-figure-Relationships-can-project-our-perceptions-of-God.html

2 https://www.fatherswap.com/2015/07/how-fathers-affect-our-view-of-god/

3 https://newspring.cc/articles/is-your-relationship-with-your-dad-affecting-how-you-see-god

God Isn’t Safe. But He’s Good.

I have a little confession to make. Although I feature Ansel Adams in my photography class, I had never been to Yosemite. At least not that I was old enough to remember anyway. It’s only about a four hour drive from where I live, and yet I never seem to make the time to go there. Until last week that is. My family and I finally made the pilgrimage to the photographer’s mecca, visited the Ansel Adams Gallery, and experienced the majesty of that valley tucked away between granite walls.

The snow melt this year made the falls roar with the sheer power of falling water. We hiked to Lower Yosemite Falls and felt the wind and freezing mist created by the crashing deluge from above. The sheer magnitude of that power was breathtaking. God is like that. His absolute power should make us tremble before Him. His majesty is boundless. He. Is. God. And there is none like Him.

Further down the valley however, the same water that thundered over the rocks becomes a gentle trickle and eventually fills still ponds with mirror like reflections. Children dip their toes and splash in them. Adults make camp next to their peaceful presence. The same water. Thundering in power at one point, yet gentle and peaceful at another.

God is like that. His sheer power and glory are awesome, yet He leads us by still waters. He created time and space simply by speaking, yet he comforts us and draws us near in times of trouble. He overturned tables and drove the money changers out with a whip, yet spoke softly to a hurting woman who was about to be stoned.

Rest in that. Rest in the knowledge that the God of the universe knows the number of hairs on your head. He is fearless, he is awesome, and He is good.

As C. S. Lewis wrote about Aslan, “Safe? … ‘Course He isn’t safe. But he’s good.”

Children and Gardens

Growing children is much like growing a garden. Love is the water they need daily, unconditionally, and without limit. Some days they may need more than others, but it is always available and vital to life. Education is the fertilizer that helps them grow strong and bloom into the person they were designed to be. The right kind can make all the difference. Lastly, discipline is the pruning we must do to encourage positive growth in the right direction. Some may need more than others depending on their growing habits. Also, prune them early and often while they are young. It is much easier to trim a twig from a sapling than saw a branch from an old oak.

So love much, teach them well, don’t be afraid to prune them when needed, and they will grow and bloom and produce much good fruit.

Saved by Grace, and Growing in Grace

My wedding may have been on Janurary 8, 2000, but my marriage is ongoing today. The wedding event itself is now past tense, but the marriage is continually present tense. In this same way, we were saved by grace when we accepted Christ into our hearts, and we are also being saved (I Cor 15:12) daily when we pray, read His Word, seek Him, and take up our cross and follow Him.

As a photographer, I have participated in staged weddings. A wedding may be staged for an event or a group for educational or commercial purposes. It may look like a real wedding with all the usual vendors, but the bride and groom are models, there are no vows exchanged, and the participants may never see each other again after the photoshoot. There is no on-going relationship. A true marriage on the other hand is a continual process. It may begin with a ceremony that appears similar to the staged wedding, but it is the ongoing day-to-day relationship after that event that defines the marriage.

In the same way, our relationship with Christ may begin by praying “the sinner’s prayer” but we must not stop there and leave the work of Christ unfinished in our lives. Yes, we are saved by grace, not of ourselves. There is nothing we bring to the table. It is all Christ’s work on the cross that makes us clean. Once we accept His free gift however, we must nurture and foster our relationship with the One who saved us. Paul writes to the Philippians “Therefore my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.” Phil. 2:12-13

Our salvation was finished on the cross, and our relationship with Christ begins when we turn our hearts over to Him, but the work of growing deeper in that relationship is just beginning. Thankfully He works in us so that we can have that relationship. So we are saved by grace, but we must continually pray and seek the Lord and allow Him to work in us so that we can grow in grace as well. We were saved, and are being saved day by day.