Spring - Time for Bulbs

Not long ago, they were all frozen solid. Buried in the ground since the fall. Surrounded by very damp, water drenched frozen mud. Bulbs and roots, frozen and squeezed all winter. Left there six month ago and now... and now they are warmed by the sun and growing. Yes, the bulbs are up and it won’t be long until we have another opportunity to enjoy the array of colour as the flowers appear. Tulips in one garden, daffodils in the other, while crocuses will bust into bright beautiful flowers down the row.
I love spring. Love to see the new growth while ignoring the fall leaves still crowding the yard. Love to see the snow bells arrive early thinking the cold nights will destroy them. But there they are each morning. Still showing off their early greenery and white drooping flowers. Spring is a time for new starts. Where nature wake from their restful sleep and begins all over again. Not knowing much about how it works, I leave it up to Him. He knows what He is doing and He doesn’t need my advice or expertise.
A long time ago I heard of a stranger wandering into a well manicured English country garden. Seeing the gardener he complimented him on such a beautiful garden he and God have produced. The gardener told the stranger that he should have seen it before when God was doing it on His own.
The funny thing about that story is, I believe God doesn’t need us. After all He created it all before we even arrived. But I also believe the God asks us to tend His creation. We sing a song at church that has to do with people but I think it fits here. “In His time, He makes all things beautiful in His time.” He has it all worked out. The cycle of life goes on and on. He keeps it going, while we just take our turn tending His creation.
He does the same in our hearts. When we let Him be the gardener of our lives the fragrance of God fills the air, the array of colour boggles our mind and it shows from each of us the beauty of God in us. And as a well tended garden shows the master’s hand, so does the garden of our lives when God tends it by trimming, cultivating, pruning and feeding us. He knows what He is going and He does it better, much better then we can do ourselves. Maybe we should just leave it to Him.
Something to think about.
Rob

The Class Picture

A good number years ago I had the opportunity to teach some grade eight students here in Hamilton. I had them engage in an exersize that was not particular mind shattering. The instructions were simple. “One by one, come up to the front of the room and arrange yourselves for a class picture.” A couple of kids wanted to jump up right away and get in the back row. One after another the picture started to develop. The back row was filled first then the middle row and finally the front row. No one wanted in the front row, well, except for two boys, but they are another story.
Here they were, all trying to get in the back row, and trying to blend into the green board behind them. Trying not to be seen or not to be the centre of attraction, i.e., front row. It was a wonderful experiment with them. They even had discussions about who they wanted to stand beside. At one point there were four girls trying to stand beside Sandy. Get the picture?
And here is what their actions told us. They all wanted to fit in. Fit in with their friends, fit into the whole and definitely fit in so they didn’t stand out. There was something more about how they arranged themselves. I believe they were saying they felt they were nothing without the whole. They were individuals who found completeness in the group. A completeness that put everyone on the same level, be it the back row of the picture. Or did they? The teacher and I saw beyond that. Or should I say behind it. Back behind their crusty exterior were individuals wanting to break out. But they were afraid. Afraid of the group? Afraid of being put down for thinking well of themselves and achieving?
One after another we saw the confusions melt from their faces. Yes, we observed the struggles going on, internally and externally. The struggle to be part of the group and the desire to be an individual and excel at what they do best. Fortunately, the lesson was not over when we took the picture. We went on to talk about what they had just experienced. It was then that they learned and understood the reality they could have both.
God has made us in such a way as to crave relationships. Casual ones as well as intimate relationships. All of them are important and should never be taken lightly. But within each one of us, beats a heart that yearns to use our gifts and abilities completely. Paul writes about the analogy of the body. We are all a part of it but we have different gifts so the body functions properly.
It was a great day for those tweens. It was the start of the blossoming of twenty three-young lives set free. They not only felt good about being part of the class but now they had freedom to use and share their unique gifts and abilities for the benefit of the greater good. We have this freedom was well. You are part of the Church of Jesus Christ and He has given to each of us unique gifts for the good of the whole. Gifts unique to you and gifts the church still needs today. Are you using your gifts? I know you know what they are. He still needs them.
Something to think about.
Rob

Just an old truck

Used to know a wonderful farmer back in my Saskatchewan days. Nice middle age bachelor who kept pretty much to himself. He hadn’t been to church in a while but was still connected to the church in some small insignificant way. I had been given a list of people who were, “members and adherents” and noticed his name as someone I had yet to meet. So I asked and found out he was a brother of one of the men.
He lived in the immensely large old Four-Square farm house on a seldom used side road just north east of town. It was time for a visit. After all, I had covered most of the people in the first couple of months and why not. The directions were precise. “You can’t miss it. Hasn’t been painted since the war.” And there is was, sitting a 1/4 mile back from the road (to avoid dust from the road I was told). As I arrived I took note of a small nondescript red tractor going forward and back followed by a black cloud churned up by the cultivator. I stopped in the lane and watched as him drove away and down the field and came back. When he finished the second row, feet from the car, he stopped and powered down. I ventured out onto the field as this thin, wiry dark-haired farmer jumped down and put out his hand. I told him he didn’t have to stop cultivating if he didn’t mind if I rode along. It was idle chit chat for a number of minutes until he turned abruptly and demanded as he looked me straight in the eye; “Why are you here?” In my own direct reply I told him I wanted to meet him and didn’t care if he came to church. Just as quickly he turned around resuming his driving and chit chat. To say the least, we became good friends.
When summer was ending, I offered to help him with getting the crop off before winter. He took me up on the offer and told me he would give me thorough training before venturing out on the field. A day was set and one morning early I arrived to find the farm deserted. Or so I thought. About half hour after arriving, out he came, wiping his breakfast from his face. Almost without appoligy he informed me I was too early as the grain is usually tough before nine.
Working together we forged ahead getting everything fueled up and check and greased. Then to the field. I would drive the old ‘24' Massey and he would drive the 1955 Ford grain truck. My training took all of five minutes. There I was going back and forth, back and forth. One load after another after another. It was now midnight and again, the grain was getting tough.
The next day, I was there a little later. Today I would offer to trade places and drive the grain to town. No was his answer, "You're doing fine. And it wouldn't be safe, after all, the truck didn’t have brakes.” Hadn’t for a good number of years and you need to know how to drive it just so . . . I bet it did. Eight miles to town with each load and eight miles back empty. To tell you the truth, he never did fix the brakes.
Life is like that sometimes. We are just going, going, going through life and there is nothing to stop us. Use the horn to warn others your coming. Or just make it louder. Don’t worry about the brakes until. . . until we come to a crossing in the road where life changes direction and we find ourselves in the ditch or worse, wrapped around some innocent fellow traveller. I think God gave us guidelines for life, just like the lines on the road to keep us on the right side and keep us safe. And sometimes He gives us, in my word, brakes to keep us from crashing and burning. It is not just our physical life that needs tune-ups, spiritually we need them to. Take your heart back to the manufacturer. By the way, do you need your brakes repaired?
Something to think about.
Rob

Sunrise

It was dark the other night. Very dark in fact. The neighbour had actually turned off their porch light. There were no moon and no stars. The cloud cover was thick and high. It didn’t even reflect the city light thousands of feet below. It was dark and still. I got up early and not wanting to wake anyone else I left the lights off. Groping in the dark I made my way out of the room, down the stairs and into the office. All without bumping into something or stubbing my toes, plural, or even tripping on things not in their place.
Can you remember one of those nights? Where the term, black as coal fitly describes the dark. You get up and make your way. You believe you know where everything is and you take one step at a time, slowly. We move cautiously from one room to the next. Being familiar with your home, it can be easy unless you have kids who leave their toys everywhere. Not here either but I though I would push your memory back a little. I too remember the pain and the words I didn’t use.
As I listen to the ticking of the clocks in our home, I notice like you have many times, light coming up in the eastern sky. At first there is just enough to make out the shadows of the trees and building. Then more is revealed. We begin to see more then outlines. We see all that has been there all the time. There are the two chairs left out all winter, the chimes in the pear tree. We had heard them in the gentle breeze but now we see them. The picnic table, the solar lamps long out after the energy is gone. We just couldn’t see any of it until the light came and the sun arose.
That is exactly what happens in our lives when we live in darkness. My bible tells me about living in darkness. In fact I only have to think back a couple of month to remind myself of the verse that said, “The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined . . . ”
Isaiah was telling us about getting to see. For many, the light is too bright like the noon day sun that Andre Crouch writes in his song, He’s the Light. They run from it and hide. They close their eyes and put on masks to shelter their eyes from a light that shows every imperfection. We don’t want anyone to know about . . . So we hide and ask Jesus to supply just enough light. What we believe is just enough.
The Great Light of Jesus is there not to reveal our imperfections, but it’s there to guide us. Remember these words;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Great is Thy faithfulness,
Morning by morning new mercies I see;
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me,
The light actually reveals more of God’s mercy directed toward us. He is not looking at our imperfections. He is allowing us to see Him and His presence in our lives. When we allow our eyes to fully adjust to the light of Christ, we will see Him as He is. And we will have found our way.
Jesus is the light of the world.
Something to think about
Rob

Good News!

The head of the weather here in Canada has just told us this week, that winter is not over. Thanks. We needed to hear that. Why couldn’t he have just said, “Spring will be here soon”. It’s a lot easier to take that. When it comes to bad news, we don’t want to hear it. This is bad news to me but maybe it’s good news to others.
I like good news. It’s going to warm up this week. YAH!! I like it! Don’t tell me about the weekend. Give me at least a couple of day of good news. I have even stopped watching the weather channel. Not that it depresses me but, if it is bad news and cold I can take it better if it just happens and I deal with it at the time. Sort of like not wanting to know the bad news until it happens.
It’s not like that with God. He told us that Christ won! Things will come in life that we really don’t want to have to go through. That’s the bad news and we can deal with it when it comes. So no matter what comes our way, we walk on to the victory march into heaven. We can approach the bad news in life because we have a heaven to go to. He said it, “I go to prepare a place for you... you will be with me there.” Great News in a Bad News world.
Do you know the good news of Jesus Christ. He came and died to pay for your sins. He paid it all, and all to Him I owe. We are forgiven and that my friend is the good news. Now and forever.
Something to think about.
Rob