Dawn

My favorite time of day is dawn, especially if I happen to catch a magnificently colorful event. I feel privileged, as if I were among the few to see such splendor.

The beautiful striations and remarkable depth of those sunrises are caused by clouds. They create the show, or rather, the sun around and through them. It has something to do with contrast—light and dark—and the glory lasts only a few minutes. This time of year in winter-wrapped Colorado, the magic moment occurs between quarter to seven and seven.

On mornings that break clear and pristine, the sun merely opens its golden eye upon the land and the horizon brightens. It’s beautiful, yes. An ongoing reminder of God’s faithfulness, but without the pyrotechnic explosion of red and pink and orange.

It doesn’t take my breath away.

I’m disappointed if morning comes to a cloudless sky because I know there won’t be a show. But that’s not the way I view my life. I want no clouds or storms in my daily existence. No show, thank you very much. Just give me easy, calm, windless life … even if the clouds and storms are the very things that magnify the power and light of the Son.

Forgive me, Lord. Shine through the dimensions of my life and display the glory of your power.

Getting from here to there

“Transition” is not one of my favorite words. It implies hard work, change, letting go of the familiar and heading into the unknown. It takes a person from what was to what will be and often involves pain. Biological mothers everywhere know exactly what I’m talking about.

So do daddies watching daughters glide down the aisle in white dresses, and employees leaving the nest of comfort on the wings of promotion. Transition is everywhere.

As a writer working on a fiction manuscript, I face it in nearly every scene. How does Fernando get from his Ford and into his front room? How does Paula get from dinners for one to picnics in the park? Transition.

And how do last month’s holiday cookie-eaters get from their sweatpants back into their dress pants? They call my son Jake.

Jake is a personal trainer who helps people change. He teaches them how to get from pudgy to perfect, and even uses special exercises called—you guessed it—transitional exercises.

For example, if a client is working muscle set A, and wants to move to muscle set B, Jake takes him from an exercise for set A, into an exercise that uses both set A and B, and then into one that uses only set B. Sounds logical, but it’s hard work.

We can’t get away from transition, and we shouldn’t want to. The push from here to there keeps us moving forward. It squeezes life out of boney winter branches into green spring buds, and builds strength into the flabby muscles of winter revelers.

Transition challenges us, even as we trade in an old, marked-up calendar for a nice new clean one.

Some people worry that 2012 will be the last page in mankind’s datebook. If it is, fine. If not, great. My life doesn’t hang on a round Mayan rock with no room for the future; it hangs on the cross of Jesus Christ who said He’d never let me out of His hand.

Transition is not easy, but we have Someone who promised to get us through it. As we take those first steps into 2012, let’s look to the God who knows what’s coming, and trust Him to take care of us along the way.

Behold, I make all things new. —Rev. 21:5 (NKJ)

What is Your Perfect Gift?

Tradition teaches us that 2,000 years ago three Eastern kings journeyed to the land of Israel to see the foretold Christ child. But scripture mentions the number of gifts, not the number of kings.

When the Magi found Mary, Joseph, and the young Jesus, “they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh” (Matt. 2:11b NIV). Unusual gifts for a little boy.

Gold was the currency of kings. As a first-century Judean carpenter, Joseph probably had seen very little of it and so prized it accordingly. No doubt it helped finance the family’s flight to Egypt when Joseph was warned to relocate.

Incense, or frankincense, represented the adoration of God’s people. Priests offered it in the temple to symbolize prayer rising to heaven. This costly commodity was harvested by collecting the sap from slashed and bleeding Boswellia trees.

Myrrh is also a fragrant resin obtained from tapping a specific tree, one whose thorns can pose a considerable challenge. It served medicinal purposes, and was used in burial preparations, as when Nicodemus wrapped the crucified body of Christ in linen and myrrh and aloes (John 19:39-40).

These gifts are nothing like those I received for my newborns and toddlers, but they were highly fitting for the Son of God—our King, our Priest, and our Sacrifice.

This Christmas as we open our treasures and consider what to give, we probably won’t find gold, incense and myrrh. But we will find representations of them: faith refined like gold, the sweet savor of worship, and the sacrifice of praise.

Never doubt that you have something of great value to give our Lord. For you bring the one perfect gift He wants above all else, the one which only you can give—yourself.


For Christmas reading: The Other Wiseman by Henry Van Dyke.

Are you full of it?

Writing assignment: Evaluate yourself as a friend.

I told my students to measure themselves against criteria that defined a good friend, and then write a short essay, supporting their findings with evidence.

Though it was a college composition class, some students had more difficulty with spelling than anything else, and as I read through their papers I noticed an unusual standard listed by one young man: faith fullness.

I knew he meant faithfulness, but the way he wrote it made me see the term differently—perhaps with the significance intended by the word’s originator.

Faith fullness.

I wondered about my own quota. How do I measure fullness of faith? Would it be the same way I measure a glass of water, a tank of gas, a heavy meal of Italian lasagna?

Would it be to say I am full of faith, half full of faith, hardly at all full of faith?

I want to be full, yet Jesus said a mustard seed-sized drop would do.

Whew! I’m so glad.

Sometimes when I look into the glass, a drop is all that’s there.




(Image creator: winnond)

Home alone on Black Friday ... and loving it

So it’s Black Friday—the day merchants’ ledgers run from red into black as Americans flood sale-sloppy stores for bargain prices on Christmas trappings.

Since I am not most Americans, I stay home on Black Friday. A bustling crowd in my kitchen for Thanksgiving dinner is one thing, but hustling through a crowd of strangers—perfect or otherwise—is quite another. It’s not for me. I’d rather settle into the sofa with a leftover-turkey and cranberry sauce sandwich and a good book.

Merchandizers do a fine job of telling me what I should buy for Christmas, as well as when and where I should buy it. But as my son says, Black Friday isn’t even in December, and Christmas shouldn’t begin until December.

I like that. Why rush things? Valentine’s Day will be here before we know it, and retailers will start reminding us by December 27.

However, my son obviously has not been the Christmas-gift-purchaser over the years, so he has no idea of what it means to spot that perfect something in March or September, and then hide it away for later. Which, of course, is why I don’t have to worry about Black Friday.

I also appreciate the fact that some people plan ahead for The World's Biggest Shopping Day and make it a fun outing with relatives or close friends.

But rebelling against the commercialization of Christmas is my way of occupying the season, and the current season is still Thanksgiving. I plan to stay home and be thankful on the day after I over-stuff myself on stuffed turkey.

Thank God for leftovers.

And a safe refuge of peace on Black Friday.

Life is so unfair

I recently posted a fill-in-the-blank request on Facebook in the form of a question I’ve heard many times:

“What in the world did I ever do to deserve ____?”

I expected answers like:

a wrecked car
cancer
an unfaithful spouse
getting fired
this ridiculous interest rate

Surprisingly, not one answer was a complaint. No whining. No resentment or grumbling. Instead the answers were:

God’s love and favor!
The perfect children that God blessed me with.
Such a cool and thoughtful Auntie!
My beautiful family.
All the blessings this life has given me.

One respondent said he knew it was a loaded question. That’s good. It means he has already confronted himself with what matters most in the face of life’s unfairness. And it is unfair, you know.

I haven’t done one single thing to deserve the privilege of walking along the river on a clear morning, or marveling at the beauty of a silent snowfall, or coming home to a warm house and a hot cup of coffee. I’ve done nothing to deserve my family and good health, a job I enjoy, faithful friends and God's grace and forgiveness, but I’m thankful for it all.

Yes, life is unfair. And I am extremely glad that I don’t get what I deserve.

Sing to the Lord all the earth!

“Sing to the Lord, all the earth.” So said the shepherd boy who became king.

But does the earth have a voice other than the sigh of a breeze, a river’s whisper, or the crunch of new snow on the path? Does it sing as it warms to the dawn and birds twitter in the light?

I see the earth’s voice in the changing leaves of a Rocky Mountain fall. Yes, see. Not only can I hear the earth praising its Creator, I see it in the blaze of yellow trees once green, in a cerulean sky, and the brilliance of a billion stars on the darkest night. Even the heavens declare his glory.

A song by Mercy Me invites us: “And all of creation sing with me now / lift up your voice and lay your burden down.”*

That’s an amazing exchange, to lift one thing and lay down another. After all, my burdens are so heavy, I can hardly carry them at all, much less lift them up. Maybe I’m not meant to. Maybe I am supposed to drop them and simply raise my hands.

The earth praises God all around us in the manner, and with the purpose for which it was created. We, the crowning jewel of God’s creativity, choose to praise him.

Will we?


*“All of Creation” from The Generous Mr. Lovewell
1 Chronicles 16:23 NIV