A Cloak Of Invisibility

MSNBC reports that researchers are getting closer to the development of technologies that would make objects appear to disappear, to radar and/or human eyes. That's amazing. But the point I'd like to make in this post is that the object is still there.

Let me be the first (?) to point out that that's not what God does to our sin.

"The LORD is compassionate and gracious,
slow to anger, abounding in love.

He will not always accuse,
nor will he harbor his anger forever;

He does not treat us as our sins deserve
or repay us according to our iniquities.

For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
so great is his love for those who fear him;

As far as the east is from the west,
so far has he removed our transgressions from us." (Psalm 102:8-12)

It's often said that as believers, "When God looks at me, He sees Jesus."
I disagree. When God looks at me, He sees me. The forgiven, clean, new me re-created by Him, ready for Heaven. The blood of Jesus doesn't just hide our sins, it removes them, leaving us visible to God through and through, with nothing to hide.
What a God!

The Lawn Meter

I'm one of the people who failed to get their lawn mowed before it rained each of the past 6 or 7 days, so needless to say it's been getting a little out of hand. The grass was long, okay? Yesterday it finally quit raining long enough for me to get out there and cut it, and as I did, my neighbor (who had cut his) came over and presented me with this handy, helpful, and from the looks of it inexpensive, "Lawn Meter" so that in the future I'll have a better idea of when it needs to be cut. You can see on the right end of the scale that anything up to about an inch is "OK". Thanks, Spencer. I love living next door to a guy whose lawn is usually so shabby it makes mine look good. Takes the pressure off of me.

Define Marriage

Thinking of my mom and dad being together for 50 years got me thinking also about marriage itself, and what it means to be married. Now, the concept of marriage and what it should be like really doesn't seem that complex to me. There's plenty written in the bible about God's design for marriage, and my wife and I pattern our own marriage after that. A typical marriage in our culture stays fairly close to that pattern too. But here's where controversy arises.

"What makes a marriage?"

Is it the wedding ceremony that causes the two to become one? Does a minister or justice have what it takes to change a dating couple into a married couple? Although there are wedding celebrations in the bible, I don't find much in the way of wedding ceremonies in the bible. There are many passages that speak to fidelity, submission, respect, honor, commitment and the like which plainly reveal God's idea of marriage. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it's those types of things that MAKE the marriage. I think the ceremony marks the relationship, makes it public and legal, but I'd argue that the marriage itself was already there. I don't think it would be a stretch to compare it to (my understanding of) baptism, where the relationship has already been established and the commitment is there, the life has been dedicated, and the ceremony "declares" what has already taken place.

An example of the inadequacy of the ceremony to make a couple truly married would be the middle-of-the-night, drunken Las Vegas wedding. Sure, it may be legally binding but does it produce a lifelong bond between the bride and groom? I'm not saying it can't work out that way, but it's not the ceremony that does it. If it happens, it's because the two people comitted to each other.

What about gay marriage? I'm not even going to go there, because although it could be argued that there is love and commitment in a gay relationship, scripture portrays that as a twisted version of a right relationship, and one that should never be.

What I've been thinking about is the difference between a man and woman who love each other and live together and are committed to each other but have never had a ceremony, and a couple who love each other and live together and are committed to each other and HAVE had a ceremony. Is one couple married and the other not? What if the couple who never had the ceremony are more committed and deeper in love than the couple who did? Does the ceremony still have the say-so? You might ask, "What's keeping the one couple from having the ceremony?"
I suppose there are lots of reasons why they wouldn't. Ideally, of course, they would have the ceremony. But if everybody did, I don't suppose I'd be writing this post, would I?

50 Years For Mom & Dad

This Friday my mom and dad will (as you might have guessed from the title of the post) celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary. I tell you it's a good thing to stay married that long! And it's also a good thing that "It's the thought that counts" when it comes to celebrating it, because although we tried to plan a big sha-bang, Mom ain't havin' none of that. She said if we buy them a trip together we'll be throwing our money away, because she's not going. She doesn't like to fly and she can't sit that long in a car. No dance or polka band because well that's just too much. We tried planning an Amtrak trip out of town for the family, but she caught wind of it and that was that.

So this Friday night we'll be having a small family get-together at the Old Country Buffet. They love it there. So do us kids, but come on... Not for their 50th! Anyway, I suppose we'll be home in time to watch the news, or maybe just go to bed early.

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY MOM & DAD, WE LOVE YOU!

We Are Not Of This World

While skimming the pages of Greg Boyd's latest book "The Myth of a Christian Nation", my mind began wandering down one of its own paths (my mind is like a maze-- you should see it in here), wondering if this particular thought applied to me or not. Boyd was noting how often we Christians tend to tie our politics to our spirituality, and sometimes confuse the kingdom of this world with the Kingdom of God. Conservatives are pretty sure that liberals are devil-worshippers, and liberals are convinced that the devil worships conservatives. But liberals and conservatives can come together and agree that God is on "our" side when our opponent's lair is overseas. Boyd gives several examples, one of which is the first Gulf War, where it was "obvious" that God was on "our" side because of the ease with which our forces swept away the Iraqi forces. Patriotism and religion mingled, and we all knew that America and her allies were blessed by God, and working His will in Iraq. Well, weren't we?

I'll admit that I began to get a bit nervous at this point, because I was wondering if Dr. Boyd was about to go into a rant about how America sucks, the war was wrong, Bush sucks (W and HW!), we should be more politically correct, gay is okay, and......

But no. For one thing, I know him better than that. For another thing, as soon as I started wondering why I was getting nervous, it occurred to me that he was right. He was starting to irk the patriot in me. Some of his examples would touch the same nerve in a liberal as this one was touching in conservative old me.

The point Boyd was making was that God gave His all to save liberals, too. And the (certainly) thousands of Iraqis that died. Maybe the war was just. Maybe it wasn't. Maybe the current situation in Iraq is wrong, or maybe not. Whatever our feelings on this or any other issue, we need to remember that although I believe fanatically that abortion is wrong and you, a Christian, may believe it's a neccessary right, we are ambassadors for Christ. God's agenda isn't a political one. Although there are many critical issues we can affect, and many that we should, our highest priority is to honor our Father by bringing His truth and His Kingdom to a world who is lost without Him. Everything, whether it's fighting a "just war" or protesting an "unjust invasion", must be done with an eternal perspective.

This is getting longer than I had intended so I'm gunna wrap it up, but first I want to tell you something that I dragged up from my not-too-distant past, while pondering the big picture Boyd was presenting. We were planning for a camping trip, when a gay family member asked if it would be okay to invite their partner to join us. After some thought and some discussion I said that no, it would be better if they didn't, because there would be younger family members present and we really didn't want them exposed to that sort of thing. The idea was to protect the family. That was our little "family government" way of laying down the law. But in light of Boyd's argument, I think I made the wrong decision. It could have been an excellent opportunity to demonstrate, and invite everyone involved into, the love of God. That is, after all, our highest calling in this world. WWJD? I don't think He would shut out the sinners. I think that in that moment I forgot I was an ambassador from another Kingdom. Remember that although we live here, we're not from around here.