Cleaning House

Pastor Obvious is cleaning house today. The combine has finished harvesting the field next-door to the south of our place. This morning they are disking the stalks into the dirt to decompose. The wind is blowing in our direction and the sky is hazy with dust and chaff. Most of us have forgotten what it means when the Bible speaks of the wicked being like chaff that the wind blows away. We just buy our cereal, flour and bread, and like Justin Trudeau, (the Prime Minister of that giant farmland to our north), we think that it doesn’t come from the farm, it comes from the grocery.

But getting the bread to the grocery is dirty work. That haze in the sky will soon settle on to our yard, our porch, our patio furniture. We'll have to keep the dogs outside and the windows closed for a while to keep it out of the house, but even that won’t work. The chaff dust seeps into the smallest cracks. It will take a few days of housecleaning and a clean wind before it’s all gone.

Evil and Sin work in much the same way. They blow around in our atmosphere looking for a place to settle, a crack to invade, a furry back to carry them in where they might not otherwise find easy entry. It doesn’t much matter if you are not looking for them, they find you and dump on you and become ingrained and then you must clean house. It helps if you can invite a fresh wind of the Spirit to help with the deep cleaning. And then you can enjoy a new season of relative cleanliness for a while, but you can be sure that another harvest and another disking is coming and you will have to do it all again. The Bible calls this kind of soul-cleaning “repentance.” It’s the least we can do for the house where the Spirit dwells.

Fuzzy Sight

Pastor Obvious is a blind guide today. I went out this morning without my contact lenses. My soft lenses are really comfortable and lots of times I don’t remember if I’m wearing them, until I realize that I can’t see something that I ought to be able to see. I don’t have really awful eyesight - mostly that means that I can’t read a street sign at a good distance, but I can see well enough to get along. I can still see that a tree is a tree, a fence is a fence, a cow is a cow, and I’ve never had any trouble finding my lunch. I can even drive if I know the neighborhood and I won’t run over you. So I thought it would be OK to walk in the country without going back for my glasses. The thing is, that while I know where I’m headed, the country is fuzzy territory. The colors of grasses and trees blend together; trees and shrubs that are growing right next to each other look like a single plant (a real problem if one of them is poison ivy), ditches and other indentations have tall grasses in them and you don’t realize they are holes to be avoided - the details are mushy.

We read the Bible to learn about God. John Calvin said that Scripture is “like a pair of spectacles” - that when we neglect to read the Bible we forget what God looks like. We might even begin to think that Morgan Freeman knows what he’s talking about. God’s details get mushy. And when we read the Bible regularly, the glimpses that we get of God help us to develop a correct understanding and picture of who God is.

But sometimes reading the Bible can be like walking in the country without your glasses. If you’ve never been there before and you don’t know where you’re headed, you may not be able to read the signs that make things clear. You can understand the words of the story, but even if you read it twice it may not make sense in a life-changing way. And if you are familiar with the Bible, you may read a passage or a story several times, but do it too quickly because you’ve done it many times before and you think you know what it says and how the story ends. But you miss the details. The ones that are revealing or life-changing. Jesus said that the Holy Spirit would lead us into all truth. So it’s good to remember that we should “put on our spectacles” of the Bible before we set out to walk through the day; and we should ask the Holy Spirit to take us by the hand and lead us through the tall grass.

Merciful Warnings

As I walked along alone this morning - my fair weather and delicate four-footed friends Frankie and Rosie having deserted me about a mile back as we passed the gate to the farm, with the porch looking more inviting than another mile with me – I was lost in my thoughts and prayers. You know, those things that everybody thinks are worthless in times of catastrophe. So I wasn’t very alert and I wasn’t prepared when a huge blue egret swooped up out of the creek about a foot from me. His wingspan was easily 4 feet across, and his beak was a foot long and sharp, and I could feel the wind as he flashed by. For just a second before he banked away we made eye contact and his look seemed to me to be less one of surprise and more a bit of warning. As I caught my breath, it occurred to me that this is a bit what it might be like when we “cross over to meet Jesus” - Die. Even if we are expecting it after a long illness, I imagine the moment to be a bit of breathless surprise, followed by recognition and amazement. It’s kind of God to send these little warnings into our daily lives. They help us remember that one day we will catch our breath in heaven. Or perhaps not. If you are someone who sees a warning today, take it as it is offered – as a mercy.

Temptations and Weaknesses

Today’s sermon from Pastor Obvious: 

As we were headed out on our walk today there was a nice fluffy skunk in the same spot where Frankie encountered the rabbit the other day. I said before that Frankie was so focused on getting home that he ignored the rabbit temptation in his path. But today he was full of energy and doggy confidence at the beginning of our walk, and knowing his weaknesses, I thought it would be a good idea to get his attention and take him around the skunk with a wide margin! It’s always good to travel with a friend who will point out deadly Temptations and take your hand and guide you pass them. We are stronger – and smarter – when we are together with another believer.

And such were some of you...

 This caterpillar on my garden fennel will become a swallowtail butterfly if he escapes the birds.  I Corinthians 6:9-11

Half-Believers

“Unable to alter the course of foreign policy and torn between two countries, the Setos in 1994 declared for themselves a new, unified entity: the Kingdom of Setomaa.” They practice both paganism and Eastern Orthodoxy, and so are known as “half-Believers.”

A Fairytale Kingdom Faces Real-Life Troubles

Focus

How tired was Frankie after our 3 miles in the heat? He walked within a foot of this rabbit without even turning his head. We should be so focused on getting home after our hard work in the Lord’s fields that we’re able to walk right past the temptation in our path 

#ButGoogleSaid

Nearly every day on my walk I see one or two cars continue past the road closed sign. The bridge is closed a third of a mile past it and the barricades are clearly visible from the intersection. Nevertheless, cars and trucks turn here and drive down to the barricade and then try to figure out how to turn around on the one lane dirt road. Some people decide just to move the barricade, Which is a problem for future travelers. We humans are a perverse lot. We just can’t believe our lying eyes. Sin works pretty much the same way. The Bible tells us not to turn that corner. The Bible tells us what will happen when we reach the barricade. But we turn anyway. We move the barricade. And then when we discover we are on the road to nowhere, it’s too late to turn around.