“Say Ah” – Nov. 3

“Ah, Lord God!  It is you who has made the heavens and the earth by your great power and by your outstretched arm!  Nothing is too hard for you.”  Jeremiah 32:17

Upon September’s conclusion, I knew October’s difficulties.  The nature of my employment had conspired against me by scheduling five business trips in the span of four weeks.  I realize that, for some, this may have been business as usual.  However, six business trips constituted my annual total in years past.  I am not accustomed to this level of business travel.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I should reveal the locations of my business travel before you commiserate too much with me.  I was working in the following National Parks:

Mount Rainer National Park
Death Valley National Park
Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Muir Woods National Monument
Olympic National Park
Yosemite National Park

I can just feel the sympathy evaporating as this list is read.  It was rough duty but someone has to do it.  My only appeal for sympathy is that while I was traveling to beautiful locations it was for work.  My typical trip was a three day affair; flying to the Park on day one, conducting the project meeting on the following, and then returning on the third day.  These trips contained a lot of time in airports, planes, rental cars and hotels, albeit, in the context of a spectacular National Park.

I have found that it takes purposefulness to truly combat the busyness of business.  I endeavor to purposefully carve out time in each business trip to appreciate the particular locale of my trip, especially on trips to national parks, otherwise I will miss the spectacular.  It is easy to fly in, do the work, and fly out without ever looking up.  We can miss a lot of wonder in our diligent toil.

Therefore, I try to find a moment or two on each business trip to set aside my labor, look around me and say, “Ah, this is spectacular!”

I have realized my need to be purposeful in looking past myself so that I can appreciate the wonder of the world I live in, otherwise it doesn’t happen.  Beholding the glorious is one of the unique characteristics of being human.  There is no other creature who has this unique ability to appreciate the spectacular.  It is what we were made to do.

However, I often fail to regularly do what I was uniquely created for.  I get so consumed by my daily toils that I fail to look up and appreciate the world around me.

If I am failing to appreciate the world in which I am placed,
how can I truly appreciate the Creator of that world?

If I am failing to appreciate my Creator,
how can I truly trust him?

If I don’t truly trust Him,
how can I say that I have faith in Him?

Consider how Jeremiah may have come to his declaration of faith, “nothing is too hard for God”.

He beheld the heavens and the earth;
He praises the Creator, “Ah, Lord”;
He reasons that creation must have required great power through the outstretched arm of God;
He concludes in faith that if God can create the world around him then there is nothing too hard for him.

I don’t know if this is exactly how Jeremiah thought.  Although, this is how my faith often works.

My soul is most refreshed when I lay aside my preoccupations and simply behold His glory.
My faith is renewed through each exclamation of “Ah, Lord”.
My resolve is strengthened when reminded of my God who can do anything.

I believe that we all can grow in our trust that “nothing is too hard for God”, which means that we all can use more “Ah, Lord” moments.  Maybe, rather than trying to do more, we simply need to carve out 15 minutes a day to merely relax and enjoy the spectacular nature of our Creator.

PRAYER: Lord, thank you for the spectacular world that we live in.   Thank you for putting on display your glory.  Thank you for creating me with the ability to praise you.  Forgive me for often failing to do what I have been uniquely created to do.  Lord, remind me, today, to look up.  Remind me to behold your glory, today.  Father, inform my theology through the appreciation of your creation.  Build my faith through all the “Ah” moments that you grant me.  I pray this in the precious name of your Son, Jesus Christ. Amen

“RULE OF LOVE” – August 20

“It is I who by my great power and my outstretched arm have made the earth, with the men and animals that are on the earth, and I give it to whomever it seems right to me.”  Jeremiah 27:5

All representative societies have the rule of law as a cornerstone; a compilation of rules to ensure that the weakest of citizens are protected from the powerful.  The powerful are always  tempted to do what is right in their eyes.  Regardless of motivation, the rule of law intends to limit the exercise of power.

In a similar manner, I have a tendency to try and subjugate God to my concept of the rule of law.  I conjure a rule of love by which I seek to constrain the power of the divine into a paradigm that is acceptable to my sensibilities.  My rule of love encompasses all that is lovely and kind and pleasant.  I easily attribute all the byproducts of this rule of love to God.

However, my concept of the rule of love gets me into trouble when I read books like Jeremiah.  The prophecies of Jeremiah crush my feeble boundaries of love.  God’s wrath confronts my sensibilities.  I am tempted to retreat back into my little paradigm of love and turn away from the reality that the wine of God’s wrath has been and will be poured out upon a rebellious people.

Thus the Lord, the God of Israel, said to me: “Take from my hand this cup of the wine of wrath, and make all the nations to whom I send to you drink it.  They shall drink and stagger and be crazed because of the sword that I am sending among them.  Jeremiah 25:15-16

Babylonian captivity (Photo credit: jimforest)

The sword that the Lord sent among them was the nation of Babylon.  The creation of the Babylonian empire was a brutal and horrifying saga of conquest.  Love was not the message of the Babylonian armies.  Death, misery, and suffering were the result of resisting the armies of Babylon.  Yet, it seemed right to God to give the Babylonians their empire.

Babylon was neither the first nor the last empire to gobble up vast portions of the earth.  History tells us of the Aztecs, Inca, Assyrians, Persians, Egyptians, the dynasties of China, the Mongols, Romans, Byzantines, Ottoman, Nazi, Soviet, British, Japanese, and American; just to name a few.  God has allowed them all.  He was the one who determined it was right for them to rule.

The destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem (Titus and the Roman legions in 70 CE) – painting by Francesco Hayez (1867) …item 3.. Josephus claims that 1,100,000 people were killed during the siege, of which a majority were Jewish and 97,000 captured. (Photo credit: marsmet543)

Consider all that these conquerors have done to the conquered in the name of empire.  The savagery that humans have done to one another in the name of conquest turns my stomach and confounds all that I understand to be right and wrong, good and bad.

Conquest does not fit into a warm-fuzzy concept of the rule of love.

Many have turned from the God of the Bible when their concept of a loving God will not fit into biblical portrait of God that includes His wrath.  “A loving God would not do that”, is a statement that I have often heard.  Others refuse to look upon those scriptures that teach of God’s wrath.  Still others create theologies that make God respond to the development of empires, the atrocities perpetrated on the conquered, and all other forms of evil in this world.

These are all attempts to subjugate God to a rule of law that we have created; a rule of love that elevates God’s love above His wrath.

We forget the world that we live in.  This earth is not a world of love.  It never has been.  If it were a world of love, then we would not need a Savior.  The evil and sinful acts that happen every day in this world testify to our need of a Savior and remind us that we live in a world facing God’s wrath.

I believe that it is revealing that God’s wrath can be seen in the actions that are most clearly absent of His love.  When God’s love is withdrawn, the evil of man’s rebellious heart can be clearly seen.

It is a terrifying thought to live in a world without the love of God.  It is a fearful thing to face the wrath of God.  Jeremiah was prophesying of God’s impending wrath through the Babylonians so that God’s people would turn back to Him:

Then Jeremiah spoke to all the officials and all the people, saying, “The Lord sent me to prophesy against this house and this city all the words you have heard.  Now therefore mend your ways and your deeds, and obey the voice of the Lord your God, and the Lord will relent of the disaster that he has pronounced against you.  Jeremiah 26:12-13

Likewise, it is good for us to behold a world without God’s love that faces only His wrath.  We do a disservice to all who walk in the flesh when we focus only on God’s love and ignore His wrath.  The warnings of God’s wrath are intended to persuade the lost to mend their ways and deeds and obey the voice of God.

All the evil that is perpetrated on this earth should remind us of our need for God’s love.  That is why Christ came to this world.  He did not come to make this world a nicer place.  He came to save sinners from the just wrath of the Father.  God’s most loving act was the sending of His own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin to condemn sin in the flesh.  That is how God showed His love to the world.

The full revelation of God’s love is what is necessary to satisfy the final demonstration of God’s wrath.

We either accept all of God’s love through Jesus Christ or we get none of it.

That is the rule of love.

PRAYER: Lord, I fear your wrath.  I fear it for myself and for my enemies.  I fear a world that is absent your love.  Thank you for sending your son to save a sinner like me.  Thank you for showing such great love to this rebellious and sinful world.  Lord, I want all of your love.  Forgive me for those times that I have not valued your love for me as I should.  Forgive me for those times that the joy of my salvation, the joy in your love, does not radiate from my being.  Thank you for reminding my of your wrath and turning once again into the loving arms of your embrace.  I pray this in the precious name of your Son,  Jesus Christ.   Amen.

“SUMMER HEAT” – August 14

“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord.  He is like a tree planted by water that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.”  Jeremiah 17:7-8

Utah desert Mist (Photo credit: Loco Steve)

My personal battle with gophers continues but the media has changed.  The gophers continue to mound the debris of their subterranean creations on the surface of my field.  However, these mounds are no longer heaps of malleable brown clay containing the lingering moisture of a long winter.  The heat of summer has wrung the soil dry.  My field is speckled by tan mounds of wisping dust, dug from earth hardened by months of unrelenting heat.

The sun scorches this field in its natural condition.  Agriculture fruit does not sprout from its soil since irrigation water is beyond the reach of even the most adventurous root.  The green along the ditch banks stands in sole defiance against the brown of August heat.  A canopy of green aligns the irrigation waste ditch running below this waterless field.  Trees have sprung up to the sky and their leaves remain green no matter the number of days whose temperatures eclipse the century mark.

English: Oasis near Ica in Peru (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The heat cannot brown the leaves of these trees.  These trees have sent out their roots beneath the source of sustaining water.  These trees have no reason to fear the bleakness of their surroundings because all that can been seen is not what is ensuring their life.

We all go through dry times.  We all will experience the spiritual bleakness of an August month.  The heat of circumstances can feel as if it were wringing dry the freshness of our soul.  As the spiritual drought comes on, we might have the tendency to panic.  We might become dejected and anxious.  We might allow our eyes to go in search of refreshment to stave off our parched sensibilities.

We have no need to fear when we trust in the Lord.  When we place our trust in the Lord, it is like roots sunk deep under a mighty river.  The refreshing living water that will sustain us through any scorching trial comes through the conduits of trust.  A Child of God can continue to be a productive oasis even in the bleakest of desert because they are not nourished by what is on the surface.  Their trust is in what is unseen.  Their assurance is in things hoped for.

I have walked through many a dry spell.  Those have been discouraging times that I have not enjoyed.  However, there have been lessons for me in each exposure to the intense heat life.

The most important lesson of these trials has been trust.  When I feel a drought coming on, my tendency has been to get anxious.  I don’t like the heat.  I don’t like the discomfort that I know is coming.  I love the freshness of a spiritual spring.  I relish the vitality that comes to me when my surroundings are drenching me with the water of encouragement and joy.  New growth and fruit comes naturally and easy in the spring of my soul.

I then have to put my trust in the promises of God.  Trust in God pumps His living water to a soul being wrung dry from the heat of a dry season.  That is why we are blessed.  We are blessed because through the power of a great and living God we can thrive through any barrenness.  We are blessed because we have a Father in heaven who gives us what we need, when we need it.  He is the one who sustains us when we feel like we are going to shrivel up and blow away.

We just need to continue to trust Him.

PRAYER: Lord, you know how much I dislike dry seasons.  However, I know that I need them.  I know that I need to learn how to trust you more.  I know that I don’t trust you like I should.  Help me to trust you more.  Thank you for all the blessings that flow from trusting in you.  You are so good to me.  You have sustained me through so many droughts.  I know that you will carry me through the dry seasons that are yet to come.  Thank you.  Help me to be fruitful in all seasons.  I pray this in the precious name of your Son, Jesus Christ.   Amen.