Rain

It’s just after 8:00am on this gray Saturday morning. My two oldest girls are at a church sleepover so the house is unusually quiet. All I hear is the drip of the coffee pot, the pecking of my fingers on the keyboard and the noise of my mind.
From where I sit at my computer desk I can look through a glass sliding door directly into the backyard of our house. My eyes scan back and forth looking at all the work I need to do. If only it weren’t raining. But with the rain also comes my rest. For I cannot go outside and work now, I must wait for better weather. It’s ironic, the rain nurturers the plants (and weeds) and causes them to grow, but it also hinders me from maintaining them.
My yard mocks me…
Oh how I wish my mind would be as quiet and peaceful as my house is. You would think with my kids away and the rain outside I would grab a good book or flip on the TV and just relax.
But there is unrest in my soul. There is work to be done.

Earlier this week, the sun was out. So I threw on my work shoes, went out to the shed and fired up the lawn mower. I started out on our little patch of grass in the front yard. As I went, I noticed it was a little warmer that it had been. But before I knew it, I was done. On to the back yard!
The grass in the back was a little higher than the front. And because of the shade of the surrounding cedar trees the grass was still wet from the previous night’s dew. I also noticed I had 3 new mole holes. My ambition left little by little as my mower and I entered into combat with perils of my back yard. I wished my day had been spent at rest.

It would seem that life can sometimes be like impatiently waiting for the rain to stop or yearning for a more relaxing, cooler day. In our eagerness to get out and make the yard beautiful we might take for granted those days of rain that bring the growth. When the rain does stop falling and the sun is out we grab our rake and the gas can and head out. Sometime during our work we gaze into the hot sun and wish it were a little cooler. Or when looking at the work ahead of us we grow weary and wish for rest. We wish for a day when we could just grab a good book or flip on the TV.

The writer of Ecclesiastes would most likely stand over us, put his hand on our shoulder, empathically smile and say, “For everything there is a season…” a season for the rain, for growth, rest and patience, and a season for sun, for action, labor, and accomplishment. Wisdom and contentment are found in making the most of whatever season we find ourselves in.

The wind is blowing outside. I don’t feel it on my face and don’t know where it has been or were it is going. I only know its there. The trees outside are gently blowing in time with the chorus of my wind chimes. There are times when I have felt the wind on my face and could have even told you what direction it was going. But not today. Today I trust it is blowing because of the effects of it and my experience of being in it.
With the wind comes my peace.

It's now half after 9:00 and I find myself now looking outside and enjoying all the shades of green and the buds on my magnolia bush.

Maybe I will grab that book…

Oh look, the rain has stopped.

The Traveler?

The Listeners
By Walter De La Mare

'Is there anybody there?' said the Traveller,
Knocking on the moonlit door;
And his horse in the silence champed the grasses
Of the forest's ferny floor:
And a bird flew up out of the turret,
Above the Traveller's head
And he smote upon the door again a second time;
'Is there anybody there?' he said.
But no one descended to the Traveller;
No head from the leaf-fringed sill
Leaned over and looked into his grey eyes,
Where he stood perplexed and still.
But only a host of phantom listeners
That dwelt in the lone house then
Stood listening in the quiet of the moonlight
To that voice from the world of men:
Stood thronging the faint moonbeams on the dark stair,
That goes down to the empty hall,
Hearkening in an air stirred and shaken
By the lonely Traveller's call.
And he felt in his heart their strangeness,
Their stillness answering his cry,
While his horse moved, cropping the dark turf,
'Neath the starred and leafy sky;
For he suddenly smote on the door, even
Louder, and lifted his head:-
'Tell them I came, and no one answered,
That I kept my word,' he said.
Never the least stir made the listeners,
Though every word he spake
Fell echoing through the shadowiness of the still house
From the one man left awake:
Ay, they heard his foot upon the stirrup,
And the sound of iron on stone,
And how the silence surged softly backward,
When the plunging hoofs were gone.

When I first encountered this poem I thought that it was a poem about the absence of God. We as the travelers have come looking for God but he is not there. We have kept our promise but he has not kept his. It wasn't until someone called my attention to the fact the Traveler is capatalized. A detail that suggests the reverse. The Traveler is God coming to call upon us. But instead of people he finds the hollow shell of a house. Like a theif in the night he came and found men asleep.

The listeners are you and me. As we read we here His call and knock on the door. Are you asleep?

Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with himi, and he with Me. (Revelations 3:20)

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The Scandal of the Incarnation

There is more to the story of Jesus washing His disciples feet in John 13 then a one time lesson in servant leadership.

Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come that He should depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end. And during supper, the devil having already put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon, to betray Him, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come forth from God, and was going back to God, rose from supper, and laid aside His garments; and taking a towel, He girded Himself about. Then He poured water into the basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded. And so He came to Simon Peter. He said to Him, "Lord, do You wash my feet?" Jesus answered and said to him, "What I do you do not realize now, but you shall understand ahereafter." Peter said to Him, "Never shall You wash my feet!" Jesus answered him, "If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me." Simon Peter said to Him, "Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head." Jesus said to him, "He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and ayou are clean, but not all of you." For He knew the one who was betraying Him; for this reason He said, "Not all of you are clean." And so when He had washed their feet, and taken His garments, and reclined at the table again, He said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you? "You call Me Teacher and Lord; and you are right, for so I am. "If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. "For I gave you an example that you also should do as I did to you." (John 13:1-15)

It should come as no surprise that there is more to this scene then meets the eye. Only John, a gospel well known for its use of symbols and metaphors, recounts this event. Instead of recounting Jesus institution of communion as Matthew, Mark and Luke do, John tells the story of Jesus' bathing his disciples. Doesn't that seem odd? Thus the first question we should ask is why John would replace a story of the first communion, a story that signifies Jesus death on the cross, with a simple story of Christ washing his disciples feet?

There are a few details that I would like to call your attention to.

• First, Jesus action arises from His awarness that He is God. Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come forth from God, and was going back to God, rose from supper... While this passage dosn't explicitly claim that Jesus is God, it does bring to mind various places in John where it is claimed (John 1:1, 14). Jesus awarness that He is intimately connected to God the Father is the foundation of His action.
• Second, water is a symbol for the Spirit throughtout the Gospel of John; From John the Baptist first declaration that he baptizes in water but Christ will baptize in the Holy Spirit to John explanation in John 7:37-39 that water represents the Spirit.
• Third, the water represents Christ. When Jesus goes to wash Peter, Peter at first refuses. But Jesus says to him, "Unless I wash you, you have no part with me." By refusing the washing of water, Peter has inadvertantly rejected Christ.
• Fourth, The image of Jesus laying aside his garment and humbling himself in the form of a servant brings to mind another passage of scripture, Philippians 2:5-8. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death--even death on a cross!

Together these details suggest that footwashing is a symbolic reinactment of THE INCARNATION. Its an illustration of what it means to say that God became man. Jesus laying aside his garments represents how he laid aside his glory. Pouring the water into the bowl represents the Word (water) becoming flesh (bowl). And the washing of the disciples feet represents Christ giving of Himself, of His Spirit, to His disciples.

In addition, the act itself signifies the scandal of the Incarnation. I think in our present society we have lost the shock and the horror that Peter experienced as His Lord sat down to wash his feet. I beleive it would parrallel in some sense the shock of watching Robert Schuller take off his clothes in the the middle of his sermon to walk among his congregation. Imagine the peoples horror as he takes off his robe, unbottons his shirt and then unzips his pants. Imagine the gasps from the crowd, the red faces the eyes closing and the heads turning away. Imagine the people standing up and walking out of the Crystal Cathedral. Imagine the pale skin, aged and overweight body of Robert Schuller standing naked before the world. That is the scandal of the Incarnation. That is the scandal of God washing men's feet. This is the scandal of the cross.

What is the Incarnation?

What is the Incarnation? Simply put, the Incarnation is the Christian belief that the invisible God became man. If you have ever eaten a can of chile con carne you'll known the root meaning of the word. To incarnate is to in flesh (i.e. meat). A carnivore is an animal that eats meat. The Incarnation is the fact that God became man.

Many passages of Scriture undergird this belief.

In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God (John 1:1) And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. (John 1:14)

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death--even death on a cross! (Phillippians 2:5-8)

The incarnation is not just a nice belief. It is essential for a relationship with God. It is the connecting link between word and action; the meeting ground of meaning and the material world. John 1:18 states, "NO ONE has EVER seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known." This final phrase "made him known" also means "to explain." The point and purpose of the Incarnation was to completely explain God. Priests, Pastors, and Preacers, throughout the ages, have attempted to explain the Word of God, to flesh it out and apply it to daily life. Jesus Christ, as the Incarnate Word is the realized application of all that the Father requires. To look at Jesus is to see the invisble God.

Philip said, "Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us." Jesus answered: "Don't you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father'? Don't you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? (John 14:8-10)

At Biola University, my alma matter, there is a mural of Jesus holding out the bible. The mural is entitled "The Word" and thus is fitting illustration to this present topic. The pages of the bible are red, like many bibles used to be. The interpretation is found in the fact that the same hue is found in the pigment of Christ's skin. Christ is the Word made Flesh.

I also find it fitting that Logos is the Greek word that our English bibles translate as Word in John 1. The word logos has an important history among Greek philosophy but it also has immediate recognition today. A logo is a tangiable representation of a company or organization. Logos are visual statements that expresses the heart of what a company stands for. Logos advertize as well as inspire. Today, its as if your company is invisible until it has a logo. Christ is the incarnate Logos. He is the invisible God tangiably represented. In him we have experiential access to the Father.

But there is more to the Incarnation then the fact that God became man. The Incarnation is the tie that has unified all things. It is right that even our calendars hinge on Christ's birth. Christ's Incarnation has forever established a link between the immeterial and the material, between spirit and body, between faith and practice, between purpose and existence.

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created; things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. (Collosians 1:15-20)

Superman as Christ

I love this preview. It illustrates how words and images in our culture can subtely combine to proclaim Christ. Christ isn't Superman but Superman is a representation of Christ.