Tag Archives: Grace

Grand Master

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IMG_20130626_170600“In 40 years of teaching art, you are my only failure!”  My own mother said this to me.  “You can draw your breath and flies, and that is all you can draw!”  This might seem pretty harsh but she meant it.  It was true– sad, but true.
      Hanging on the wall in my office at church in a most prominent place is my only effort at painting.  It is a picture of “The Spirit of St. Lewis”, flying low over an ocean buoy during Charles Lindbergh’s historic flight across the Atlantic Ocean.
        I was about 10 or 12 years old and I was in tears, looking at the mess I had made of that painting.
       “Joe, what’s wrong?”
       “Ohhh Mom!  I can’t do anything right!”
        “It’s not so bad.  Let me have your brush.”
        In her aged, skilled hands my splotchy attempt at sunrise BECAME sunrise!  The blob of orange paint I had carelessly dropped became a buoy bobbing in the endless expanse.”     I looked in disbelief at what had just happened and exclaimed, “Mom, I guess I AM an artist!”
        Now, years later, when I realize I have messed up or when someone comes into my office fretting over an error in judgement, I look at that painting and think of the greatest Master.
       God is a wonderful and talented Artist.  He is so great that nothing I do can ruin the painting that is my life.  But I must do these things:

     1.  I must be serious about the painting that is my life.
     2.  I must be honest and admit that I have messed it up.
     3.  I must hand my brush to the Grand Master.
     4.   I must be patient and trusting as before my eyes He transforms my mess into a true work of art.

      When I did that long ago, my painting ceased to be mine alone.  It became Mom’s and mine.
       Today when I do this with my life, it ceases to be mine alone.  My life becomes a portrait of God in me.

A Good, Dull Pocket Knife

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knives!-780460A Good, Dull Pocket Knife

“I learned two things in the Navy. I learned how to tie a knot and how to sharpen a knife.”
As a boy of about ten, I watched wide-eyed as my brother used his pocket knife to shave the hair off his arm in demonstration.
When I tie a knot it doesn’t stay tied and its never tight. My brother could take a knife that wouldn’t cut butter and in no time at all, shave with it. I could take his knife and in no time at all, it wouldn’t cut butter! My pocket knife won’t shave. In fact my pocket knife barely cuts a string … and I like it that way.
A long time ago I carried a brother-sharpened pocket knife. I was amazed at how easily it cut the hay bales I fed to the horses. I could slice through anything with it!
I still bear the scar on my index finger. While cutting an apple for my horse, I continued my slice as it went deeply into my finger! So now I carry a dull pocket knife. It was easier to just let it be dull than it was to learn to sharpen it and learn to be careful enough with it. It stays dull now and its better that way.
Knives are like people. They come in different sizes, some with assorted “blades” that can do almost anything, others with deft skill that can accomplish great things. Then there are others, who often feel like they are just never quite sharp enough for the job at hand.
The thought of hurting another person is repulsive to me. I would rather be careful with my words and with my actions so that after I have said or done what was needed I don’t find my words “slicing” into another’s heart. My finger hurt for a long time. It was bandaged for a long time. As I said, I still bear the scar today.
In our world of production, profit, and gain too often our goal is to have the “sharpest knife” possible so that in our chosen job or perhaps even in our home we might operate with precision and efficiency. But how many deep wounds are we leaving behind with our words or actions that take a long time to heal and leave a life-long scar?
“The Lord has told you, human, what is good; he has told you what he wants from you: to do what is right to other people, love being kind to others,
and live humbly, obeying your God.” -Micah 6:8

Area 51

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Area_51Area 51

The first time I knew about ‘area 51’ was when the movie Independence Day portrayed aliens bent on the destruction of earth. These beings had visited the earth before and we met them at the secretive ‘Area 51’. They were ruthless, savage, beings who hated all things human and were bent upon the destruction of what they saw as vermin.

As members of the human race we find it difficult to understand how anyone could be so certain that there is no good in us to the point that we should be destroyed without pity. But this is how these aliens viewed us earthlings.

‘He was in the world, and the world was made through him. Yet the world did not recognize him. He came to his own creation, yet his own people did not receive him.” John 1:10-11.

“Who among you can find fault in me?”(John 8:46) Then why are you plotting to kill Me?” (John 7:19) Though Jesus was light, love and all that is good, pure, unpretentious, and self-sacrificing, He was alien to this world. It seems we felt toward Him similar to how those aliens felt toward earth’s inhabitants. “He came to His own.” Being betrayed by a friend’s kiss, abandoned by friends and family alike, He faced those of He came to save crying “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!”.”We don’t want this Jesus. We would rather have this murdering Barabbas among us.” (Matthew 27:21-23) Could nails or spear pierce the heart more than these words uttered by those He loved enough to die for?
Examining my own fragile love, observing how easily I can judge another for less than I myself have done; I think I am one of a race of aliens so extraordinarily different by nature than one such as Christ as to be a member of another race. For me this explains how we could treat Him so badly, so very badly. At the heart of it, this Christ is so different from us. The members of our race seem capable of an endless, sordid list of ever worsening deeds of destruction, torment, greed and self gratification.

Watching the news, witnessing the endless stream of brutality and sordid behavior among us, it is not hard to understand how One such as He could meet such a fate. Perhaps the real surprise is not that we killed Him but that His time among us lasted as long as it did.

Wonder of wonders that He could love endlessly a worm such as me… such as you.

“Oh, love that will not let me go. I rest my weary soul in thee. I give you back the life I owe. And in your ocean depths its flow may richer, fuller be.” (Kurt Kaiser)

Why?

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WhyWhy?

Over and over we have heard, “Why!” perhaps more as an exclamation than as a question. Why did a 20 year old kill his mother in cold blood and then proceed to kill twenty children and the adults who cared for them? What turns a rather anonymous young man into an instantly infamous killer?
The world we see is the temporary world for it will end. The world we do not see, the world of the spirit is the permanent world for it preceded all we see and will exist after all we see is gone. In the same way that we cannot understand the lights in the sky and the paths they take at night without understanding the celestial world, we cannot understand much that takes place in this physical world without understanding the spiritual one. Hence, we must be students of Scripture, quick to prayer and humble in obedience in order to begin to understand these things. It is at this point that those whose lives are lived apart from the world of the spirit come up empty.
The truth is that our world is fallen and infected through and through by sin, our desire to live apart from God. The nature of sin is, in some ways, like a virus which lies dormant in the human system. Much time pay pass in which thought it is present, symptoms are virtually absent. This may be because of medication, time, age, circumstances or some unknown.
In our country we are able to keep some of the most catastrophic effects of sin at bay by means of law enforcement, our military, our money, our location, walls, borders, government, etc. When we have periods of relative peace we may think that the virus has been licked! But it has not been. It is still present and active. In much of the world and in many segments of our society the effects of sin are much more apparent. Newtown, CT by all accounts has been a good place to live. People are prosperous, well educated and caring. It is possible in such a peaceful setting to forget some of the symptoms of this virus we call sin. For whatever the reason (s), one of the more violent symptoms of sin emerged Friday, December 14th.
Jesus was asked once (Luke 13:1) if certain people were worse than others because of catastrophic events in their lives. His answer was sobering. “Unless you repent you will all likewise perish!” Jesus is saying that we live in a world affected deeply by sin and we are all more threatened by that world than we would care to think. Those asking the question wanted an answer to their question, “Why?” which would allow them to grasp the situation and control their destiny. Jesus’ answer reaffirmed much of what He taught about the uncertainty of this life, this world and all that is in it.
Perhaps a better question might be, “Because the virus of sin is throughout our society and our world, why do these terrible things not happen more often than they do?”