Dirt and Eyes

This time of year, mowing can be pretty miserable.

Contrary to popular belief, it actually does get really dry here in the Evergreen State in the summer, and just as soon as the soil dries out and the moles push it on top of the lawn in nice big shovel fulls, mowing can be like creating my very own dust storm. It's so bad I have to stop sometimes and let the dust clear. It gets in my eyes, nose, mouth, ears, and well pretty much all over me, but it especially hurts in my eyes. And that's even while wearing a dust mask and safety shades. My new saying between wiping my eyes and coughing is "Dust finds a way."

Interestingly, though, I have started to realize that there is a Biblical picture in this mess. My struggles remind me of one of my favorite Jesus stories in John 9, where Jesus stoops down, spits in some dirt, and applies the muddy remedy to a blind man's eyes. I' always get a huge grin out of this story, and it is my guess that John was grinning too as he wrote the whole account down. The rest of the story gets even more humorous after the blind man washes the mud out of his eyes and is healed; his exchange with the disbelieving and spiritually blind pharisees is simply classic. This newly-healed blind dude had so much cheek! The Pharisees didn't find his sarcasm all that funny, but man, I would have loved to have been there to give that bro a fist bump.

The grins aside, I love the practical application here for me! Could it be that Jesus lovingly puts a little dirt in my eyes by way of healing my spiritual blindness? It sounds kind of strange, even borderline heretical, but I believe it's true!

Now to be clear, I don't mean "evil" by dirt. But I do mean "trials," and it's very clear that Jesus lovingly puts some trials in our lives so that we can learn and grow from them. The dirt hurts in the moment, but when I run to the life-giving water to be washed, I come up healed and able to see spiritual things more clearly! That's been true so many times in my life. Every time I go through a trial, it makes me run to Jesus, and I find cleansing and healing! I come out of it with more spiritual wisdom and maturity then I ever find in the good times.

Now, to switch gears a little bit, there is very clearly some "evil" dirt we gotta get out of our eyes too. This isn't the stuff Jesus puts on us, but the stuff we foolishly bring on ourselves. It's pictured in Mathew 7 as both a log in a hypocrite's eye and a speck in another poor soul's peeper. A big takeaway from the parable? Get the stuff out of your eye! And when you've done that and can see clearly, help your brother clean his eyeballs as well. Here too the solution to getting clean is running to the pool of life-giving water, Jesus, to wash. As John 1:9 puts it, If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

The final point is, the fact that we only see clearly when we get the log out of our eye should give us pause to try and keep dirt out of our eyes in the first place. When we don't see clearly, bad things happen both physically and spiritually, amen? I confess I have hit a rock or twenty while mowing because I can't see clearly. And a nest of wild baby rabbits. Yes, it's true. So sad. :(

This guarding of our eyes against dirt is especially relevant for us young men, I think, and our battle for sexual purity. We need to be like Job and make a covenant with our eyes not to lust after any young woman. Of course, making a covenant is one thing; keeping it is the rub! Even worse, it so often feels like our culture is a great big dust storm that we are walking into with our eyes wide open. But keep renewing your mind, men! Keep being transformed rather than conformed!

I specifically exhort you, young men, because I can empathize with you and truly feel our struggle, but it is, of course, important for everyone--male and female, young and old--to keep our eyes clear! The lust of the eyes is one of the "big three" things the world pulls us into, but if we are Children of God, our love for God is our motivation now. (1 John 2:15-16) So friends, I really want to leave you with this encouragement: you have been redeemed, so shine brightly for Christ by keeping clear eyes!

The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!

Mathew 6:22-23

Live Life Now

All I remember was a loud bang as the semi truck hit me.

I was on the last stretch of my journey home from Idaho last Sunday, crossing the mountain pass near our home. Night had fallen by then, and the mist rising from the partially melted snow reached for me like silver fingers in my headlights. I was following a semi truck and a utility van, the former of which was kicking up abundant amounts of sand which had been laid down to protect us from ice that had long since melted. Both the van and my truck were slowly coated with a greasy sheen of dirt. I was thankful it was still warm enough to use my windshield cleaner.

The semi truck was having problems going over 40 miles an hour up the steep mountain slope, and graciously he pulled over into a slow vehicle turnout to let us pass. The van hurried past him, and my truck reluctantly kicked into overdrive and sped up to 60 to match pace with the van. Headlights turned the corner in front of me, probably from some snow junkie making his way back down from the pass. 

Then I looked over to see the semi truck already coming back into my lane. 

I honestly don't remember much of what happened the next two or three seconds. I remember frantically looking ahead and realizing the semi truck driver was coming back over because he hadn't stopped on the slow vehicle turnout like I had assumed but was still rolling and maintaining a fair amount of speed. He had eaten up all the short space of the turnout lane and had nowhere to go but back onto the highway. I was only about two-thirds of the way past him as he was veering back onto my lane. The silver side of the semi grew closer and closer fast. My rear-view mirror folded in first. I remember oddly enough that it flashed in my face as the mirror rapped against my window. Then there was the loud bang as the semi hit me. 

I remember the oncoming car swerving to try and give me room and avoid the head on collision. I also remember there was no shoulder for him to get over onto, leaving most of the car still in the lane I was getting pushed into. I remember stomping on my brake . . .

And the next second, I was back behind the semi.

It took me a few minutes of shock and disbelief before I could process what had happened. I was shaking, both hands gripped on the steering wheel. And all I could manage to say, over and over, was "oh my goodness, oh my goodness." 

Which quickly turned into "Thank you, Lord, thank you, Lord" as I realized just how close of a brush with serious injury or even death I had been preserved from. 

Moments like this, when the veils of how fragile life really is are pulled back, sure gives me a moment to pause and reevaluate what is truly important. Would I have been content to enter the afterlife just then? With no formal goodbye to my family and friends? What would I have had to show for my life when I stood before Jesus? So many of my aspirations are future goals. I will serve you when X, Y, and Z happens, God. When I finish my degree, God. When I am married, God. 

It was revealing just how little of my 21 years would have counted for eternity. 

In that moment, all worldly passions fade. I wanted to get home to my family and hug them all tightly and promise I'd be a better son and brother. I wanted to call all my friends and give them some encouragement. I wanted to share the Gospel with someone who needed it before I never had the chance to again. 

When eternity suddenly is a few feet away shining in the headlights of an oncoming car, you realize how every second here on earth is a blessing that should be used to the fullest. No more pointless pursuits. No more discontent and dreams for only the future. Material things like a brand new, gaping dent in your truck become a non issue. You realize it's time to live life now. Make it count. Leave your family and friends with no doubt that they were loved deeply by you. Be ready to stand before God and be content at the good works He was able to work through you while you still had breath on earth.  Your prayer becomes "Use me now, Lord!" 

Micheal W. Smith's song "This is Your Time" resonates personally and is a great way to sum up this post. May we all make every moment count and truly live in light of eternity!

What if tomorrow 

And what if today

Faced with the question

Oh what would you say

This is your time

This is your dance

Make every moment

Leave nothing to chance

Swim in the sea

Drink of the deep

Embrace the mystery of all you can be

This is your time

The Forgotten Cross

It sits there in the little balcony overlooking our hill. It should have been lighted all Christmas season long. All it asked of me was to plug it in. Its warm, yellow glow should have been cast across our home like a comfortable, familiar blanket you'd wrap around yourself to keep out the cold. Instead, the gloom of these short winter days crowd in relentlessly.

It waits for me still, but now I will come only to take it down. I'll fold down its short arms. Lower it to the ground. Store it away in the crawl space below our house to keep it safe for next year. It's my cross I made--A couple different lengths of black PVC roped with bright lights to shine the symbol of the Good News of Christ.

It's the cross I forgot about all Christmas season long.

It's true. It helped that for the first time in a while, my dad was the main Christmas light setter-upper this year. But still, I had time to haul the cross up there to our balcony . . . I just never remembered to plug it in.

I can't help but feel a similar parallel to my faith the past month. It's there--steady, never in doubt of falling. And yet, it isn't shining. It feels almost forgotten even, or at least neglected. My devotions have been almost non-existent. Men's Bible Study and Church have been like little islands of light and hope I robotically swim to, walk across, and plunge into a sea of apathy on the other side. I've let all the distractions this season offers deaden my faith.

The analogy holds: like the cross, I haven't been plugged into my power source. I haven't been consistently abiding with Christ, and the witness my life should be as a Christ follower has been very dim. In this dark, desperate world, I've slipped into a pattern of selfish distractions that has kept my light from shining. My faith is there, yes, but it hasn't been alive for others to see and benefit from.

Thank goodness, I am committed to a God who will never wander from me and loves me more than I can even fathom. Who but Jesus would stay in a relationship so one-sided? Would you, if you were barely acknowledged day in and day out? Would you love someone who hurts you day after day in so many ways through his sin?

I am so humbled by that thought alone, and it awakens my love and desire for the Lord. It's more than that, though. My Sovereign God aligned several things to strike me all at once on Sunday. The first was a timely message from one of our visiting missionaries, reminding me that every Christian life consists of peaks and valleys. The valleys aren't abnormal, but they can be escaped through praise, prayer, and consistent time in God's word.

The second was a devotion I read by Ray Comfort. I was challenged to consider how my life was showing how thankful I was for Jesus's sacrifice for me at the cross. Not much currently, I had to admit. At the bottom of the page there was a prayer to pray, thanking Jesus and committing to live in gratitude. I prayed that prayer full-heartedly, which led to a longer prayer pouring out my heart.

It was as if this sip of everlasting water showed me just how thirsty I really was. I couldn't drink fast enough.

The third hit me as I rolled into bed after midnight. A new year--an oft-realized chance for a fresh start. I committed then and there that priority 1# for the New Year was reviving my spiritual walk. No more apathy. No more spiritual dehydration. It feels so nasty when you start coming out of it, really. Like the Steven Curtis Chapman song says so fittingly: "I'm playing GameBoy standing in the middle of the Grand Canyon/ I'm eating candy sitting at a gourmet feast/ I'm wading in a puddle when I could be swimming in the ocean/ Tell me what's the deal with me/ wake up and see the glory."

So, here's my prayer for all of us in the New Year: May we take this time to recommit our lives to Jesus, that we will wake up and see His glory and live every moment for it. Let's not forget the cross. The distractions we can get wrapped up in are a pathetic, life-sucking trade-off in comparison. May we all make resolutions that will trim out these distractions and maximize our potential for Christ. He's given us each different gifts and desires to use in service of Him; let's not waste them! 

It's truly the only way to really live. 

A Glimpse of God's Care for Me in an Ordinary Worry

Has God ever given you a glimpse of His amazing, sovereign care for you, even in the little things? Have you ever gotten shivers as you realize that there is far more than just coincidence at play in your life? 

I was given just such a glimpse yesterday.

It started with something bad.

I was loading my mower into my trailer after one of my first few lawns of the day, slowly dismounting while brushing dust and grass clippings off me, when my eyes fell on a troubling little crack on my mower deck. I thought at first that it was just a bit of paint flaking off, but further inspection revealed that my deck somehow cracked all the way through in that one spot. And it looked like it could get worse.

This was not exactly a shiver-worthy God moment. More like a “God, I just spent $3,000 dollars on this piece of equipment; and it’s already developing a serious issue??” kind of moment. This concern was in the back of my mind all day long. I was imagining myself having to drill a couple holes in my deck and bolt down a piece of metal to hold the crack from getting worse. Nothing like a tacky hillbilly fix to a piece of equipment you were hoping would retain its value for a few years.

Fast forward to later in the day. My work done, I headed over that evening to a new customer’s place to get a bid in on the lawn. The man and his wife are super nice, both new believers and members of our church. It was so clear while talking to the husband, Doug, that his faith was real and impacting his life. If you ever need a pick me up, just get talking with a new believer, I tell you! It was really encouraging and refreshing.

But as good as this was, the real cherry on top and what really showed God’s sovereignty was this: On a whim, Doug asked to take a look at my mower. While I was enjoying showing it to him, somehow it came out that he loved to weld and fabricate metal. Almost out of the blue, he said he’d be happy to help me if I ever needed anything welded.

I must have stood blinking at him for a couple of seconds in shock that God had so quickly given me relief from my silly little worries. “As a matter of fact,” I blurted out, and showed him the crack in the deck.

And would you believe it, Doug’s eyes got wide with excitement, “like a kid in a candy store”, I said later to my mom as I related the story. He launched into a detailed description of how he could fix it no problem, “Like it never happened!” He then led me back around his shop and showed me his own lawn mower deck, where he had cut out a large spot of rust and welded new metal on. At least, that’s what he said he did. The deck looked brand new to me, he is that good.

All told, I had an offer to trade half a mowing for the quick welding job, and a free lesson in welding to boot. But even more valuable, I gained a new friend and look forward to some more fellowship with a great brother in Christ. I am confident that I just “happened” to notice that crack yesterday morning, that I just “happened” To be meeting Doug yesterday evening, and I just “happened” to show him my mower because God was orchestrating a chance for me to engage with a new disciple of His. I can’t wait to see what God wants from me in this new friendship!

God cares about us deeply and wants to be involved in our day-to-day, ordinary lives. He has far more than “just” saved us from eternal damnation, but has carefully prepared good works for us, his children, to walk in. He’s gone before and cleared the way through the tangled weeds of care and worry this world so often seeks to choke us with, and we can’t help but wander down this clear path. May we more than wander, but walk step for step with our Lord in what He has planned for us! And may we, even in the little things, be awed by His sovereign hand and give Him all the glory. Amen!

8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

Ephesians 2:8-10