Category Archives: Sin

Catching a Vision

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Creative playWhen two-year-old Emerald and I play together, we enjoy a variety of simple pleasures: reading books, chasing bubbles, playing piano, drawing with markers. But most fun of all is watching her come up with her own creative “games.”

It was her idea to climb into an empty bathtub with her super-balls and stir them up till they fly around like hail in a hurricane. She does it every time she visits .

And she often asks me to reach for her half-dozen sippy-cups so she can stack them, match them with their appropriate lids, and arrange them in a circle like the numbers on a clock.

Vision.Though two-year-olds are total entertainment, maybe it’s more than that. Emerald may grow up to be a visionary, someone who dreams big and tries new things.

The other day she walked into the kitchen (after rummaging through my desk) with my magnifier glasses on her nose. After staring silently for the longest time, she finally just said, “Eyes.”

No doubt she meant, “My eyes can’t see right.” What she saw through them was blurred, but when I offered to take the glasses, she chose to keep them, walking through the house while gently turning her head this way and that to experiment with her new vision. She was fascinated.

VisionNot long ago I had a similar experience but with a non-visionary response. I found a pair of extreme magnifiers at a rummage sale and got a good laugh trying them on. But unlike Emerald’s desire to experience something new, I couldn’t wait to get them off. She pushed through positively; I gave up.

But of course eye-vision is one thing. Being a true visionary is something else. It means believing in an idea so completely that words like impossible, unlikely, or impractical aren’t roadblocks. Visionaries don’t hear even sharp criticism, because their drive to shoot for something fresh and new is so strong.

God knows all about being a visionary. Talk about a vision! His was to save corrupted mankind from sin, an impossible task from our perspective. But he saw through to the end result and ended up accomplishing exactly what he set out to do.

Now, as he offers salvation to each of us, we have to choose whether or not we’ll believe his vision about a sinless future in eternity with him. In a way, that calls for each of us to be a visionary.

We also have to be visionaries about the details. How will things go when we step out of this world and into the next? Since we don’t know for sure, we have to blend God’s word with trust in him. As we do, it’s best not to criticize or worry, which is what non-visionaries do. Instead we should simply “catch God’s vision” and expect that somehow everything is going to work out perfectly.

“Where there is no vision, the people perish.” (Proverbs 29:18)

Tending To It

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In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve had only one chore: God instructed them to tend the garden. He had already accomplished the planting, and there were no weeds to pull. Garden of EdenGenesis 2 tells us they didn’t even have to water it, since the river took care of that. From the sound of it, all they had to do was decide which “delicious fruit” they felt like eating each day and then eat it.

But then sin and rebellion entered the picture, and everything changed. On that awful day, God approached them in a mindset they’d not seen before. His goal was to have a serious talk with them, describing the demotion they were about to experience. And none of it sounded good.

God used the words “curse, pain, hostility, labor, toil, sweat, thorns, and thistles.” Sadly, this meeting, during which Adam and Eve said nothing, was their last before being ejected from the garden and their perfect lives there.  Immediately afterwards, he sent them away.

NateNelsonNow, thousands of years later, the words of God’s solemn speech to our ancestors still apply to us. We bump into them virtually every day as we tend to our homes, our cars, our bills, our health, our relationships, and yes, the thorns and thistles in our gardens.

Adam and Eve started out with only one tending-chore, and that a pleasant one. But after sin happened, they and the rest of us have had to tend to one thing or another virtually around the clock. Our work never ends. As Mom used to say, “Even when we sleep, the dust is settling, the weeds are growing, and the sheets are getting dirty.”

But God knew that the many new stresses on his first two people might overwhelm them (and us too), so he did something wonderful. Though he subtracted Adam and Eve’s idyllic lifestyle and substituted a list of negatives, he left some important positives in place.

This young couple would still be able to share laughter, enjoy tasty food, experience pleasing aromas, get excited about things, and experience joy, love, contentment, and lots more. Though God did punish them on that fateful day, he also encouraged them by allowing them to keep many of the good gifts he’d given them in Eden. And amazingly, he continues to give those same gifts to us today.

Surely Adam and Eve walked out of their beautiful garden that day feeling miserable and fearful. But God was actually tending to their hearts in a way they almost certainly didn’t realize then: His strong, saving presence was walking right out with them.

And amazingly, he’s still walking with us today.

“The Lord is like a father to his children, tender and compassionate to those who fear him.” (Psalm 103:13)

Clumsy

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January 1st is a great time to begin again. All of us are good at pretending we have a clean slate then, and we love the idea of a fresh start. I determined to begin 2015 right, so in the first hour of the first day I grabbed my prayer clipboard and a new pen. Affixing a stack of notebook paper to it, I sat down to begin writing out a prayer.

OopsAs I plopped onto the couch cushion, however, my mug of coffee bounced and sent its contents up and over, onto the paper, clipboard, and couch, doing away with my clean slate before I even began.

I couldn’t believe I’d been that clumsy right off the bat, spoiling an otherwise perfect moment. But that’s the way life goes. Though I may be clumsier than most, all of us make messes now and again.

Sometimes I wonder about my Christian life, whether or not I’m stumbling through that like a bull in a china shop. Do I handle God’s Word with the utmost of care? Do I take him for granted when life is going well? Do I engage in prayer only when things go wrong? Am I quick to blame him for messes that are my fault?

I know he’s very forgiving of my many blunders and doesn’t hold it against me when I make innocent mistakes. But do I have a teachable heart that learns from them and determines to do better next time? And am I careful about what I believe?

Once my coffee-soaked papers had dried, I decided to use them anyway, as an object lesson, hoping they’d remind me to be careful with my faith and faithful to take care.

“Who can discern their own errors? Forgive my hidden faults.” (Psalm 18:12)

Praising and Praying with Mary

Thank you for praying for little Anders. He had a crisis with his heart last night that was averted with quick, expert care. Pray for stability and increasing weight gain with each new day.