On Life, Death and Beauty

Death....  It forces our attention to the irreducible minimality of life--the stark reality that often what we consider important in life is really not important at all.  A confrontation with death awakens us to the fact that the movies we have watched, the music we have listened to, the games we have played, all the things we have done out of a selfish motive have absolutely no value.  Two things become of paramount importance when death faces us.  First, our relationship with our Heavenly Father.  Second, the legacy we have left behind.

Death....  Its beauty really is in the eye of the beholder.  For those who squandered their life selfishly and wastefully, death is an ugly monstrosity--a beast to be feared and loathed.  For the Christian who has given his life completely to the Father and has endevoured to live selflessly and circumspectly, death is a beautiful creation.  Not a thing of bondage but a thing that frees us from mortality and introduces us to eternal life with those we love the most, first of whom is Christ, our Saviour.

Death....  It is the final step of our pilgrimage.  It is the vehicle that transports us to our final destination.  That destination is dependent upon the course we have chosen for our lives--essentially selfish or selfless.  In Philippians 3:20 Paul speaks a powerful message to Christians.

But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior.  (NLT)

We are citizens of Heaven!  That means that even though death is often portrayed as a thing of power, a thing of loneliness, a thing to be feared, as Christians, we need not fear.  We are citizens of Heaven.  Because of this our hearts may rejoice with Paul when he says,

For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.  (I Corinthians 15:53-57 KJV)

There is one last verse in that chapter that is a powerful encouragement and admonition.

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.  (I Corinthians 15:58 KJV)

We labor not in vain!  Death has no victory!  The grave will hold only our mortality.

Death....  Its beauty really is in the eye of the beholder....

To Lose My Self

Self.  It is the problem of every temporal man.  By nature we are all "self" oriented.  We are by nature very self-protective.  The basic instinct of man is to survive.  If you look at society around us today, and sadly, much of the church world, selfishness is rampant.  We want to do what we want do, when we want to do it, in the way we want to do it, and we don't want anyone else telling us what, when or how.  We have gone far beyond the survival instinct into a mode where all that matters is what the individual desires.

The muse for this post came from a friend who made a statement that caught my attention in a paper about the problem of suffering in the world.  She was talking about the Buddhist approach to suffering--the four noble truths, which basically acknowledge that suffering does exist and say that it is a result of desire and may be eliminated by eliminating desire.  The "ultimate Buddhist" basically trains himself out of himself by suppressing all desire and focusing on the elimination of self.  This friend, however, made the statement that to eliminate self completely is to do away with "the self that loves as well as the self that hates."

This struck me.  Obviously I am not a Buddhist, but how close is our own teaching to this idea of self-elimination?  As part of the Conservative Holiness Movement, I grew up hearing about the "death route," "dying to self," "dying like an ol' yeller dog," etc., etc.  You get the idea.  Quite honestly, though, these terms are extremely unattractive, and if you take them purely at definition value, you have what looks like an attempt at a shortcut to destination Perfect Buddhist.  Wow...I know...heresy.  But read on; all is not lost.

What, then is the answer?  If we lose our self-identity, do we lose the self that loves as well as the self that hates?  The answer for Buddhism is yes.  It seems to me that the Buddhist attempt at self-eradication is in itself a selfish desire.  This pursuit focuses only on the person.  There is no love for others.  One person feels that they must attain a certain level of spirituality; therefore, they put aside everything and everyone else and focus only on themselves, or rather, eliminating themselves.  While self is eliminated, it is for a selfish purpose...which defeats the purpose.

So what about Christianity?  If we, as Christians, lose our self-identity, do we lose the self that loves as well as the self that hates?  I would be so bold as to say yes.  There is, however, an extremely important nuance that makes all the difference in the world.  We lose our selves for the purpose of gaining Christ.  Paul said,

My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.  (Galations 2:20 NLT)

See, in reality, our human love is so temporal and self-centered that it really counts for very little anyway.  This is the reason we see so much strife and hatred prevalent in our world today, so much divorce and so many broken families and relationships.  Selfish people cannot love unselfishly.  So it is that even Christians must lose the self that loves along with the self that hates.

The beauty of it is that we lose ourselves so that we may gain Christ.  When that happens we gain His ability to love, which is far greater than any that we could ever have on our own.  It is the love of Christ in us that enables us to love God, our neighbours, friends, family, spouse, children, enemies, etc. as we ought.  Human nature says that I love as long as someone is worthy of that love.  Christ nature says that I love no matter what.  Human nature says that I take care of my needs above anything else.  Christ nature says that I take care of the needs of others first and let Him worry about my needs.

The core idea of the elimination of self is necessary.  The Buddists got that right.  But the problem is that they eliminate self without replacing it with anything.  Christ calls Christians to a "death route," to put it in classic terminology, so that there is space for Him to fill us and flood us with Himself.

I mentioned earlier that some of the familiar terms of the CHM are rather objectionable and hard.  While this is not always bad, perhaps it would be better communicated this way.  Christ calls us to a completely surrender ourselves to Him so that He may break us, remold us, shape us and fill us with Himself.  Though it may be painful at times, when He is done, we will be friends of the Father and images of Christ to the world.

So don't hold back.  Lose yourself.  Lose the self that hates.  It will be freeing.  Lose the self that loves, and find yourself filled with the One who truly loves.

Big Him; little me....

I'm laying on the ground looking up at the stars. It's funny, really, because I had no intention of doing so, but I took a mistep on some stairs and somewhat less than gracefully floundered my way to the ground. Since I was here anyway, I just started looking at the stars and watching the clouds blow and my mind began to wander. Looking at the stars makes me think about how big God is. He created all of these things and keeps them running in order every day. When I catch just that small glimpse of the big picture of who God is, it makes me realize about how small and really insignificant my problems are. The amazing thing is that even as big as God is and as many "major" things as He takes care of, He still recognizes my problems and concerns and takes them on as personal concerns of His. But it makes me think that perhaps they should concern me much less than they do. And it give me a little glimpse into why saints long so much for Heaven--a place where we can finally be truly identified with Who God is and not concerned with earthly things.

Words

Just a simple observation tonight. Words are so important. Obviously words are the primary way we communicate with each other. They are how we express the emotions we feel, the ideas we have, even the basic, everyday things of life. But words are tricky. While they are very effective and necessary to communication, they have a tremendous capability build up or tear down. I have experienced this in my own life on both the giving and receiving ends. I have built up, and I have torn down. I have been built up, and I have been torn down. There are encouraging things that people have said to me, that I still remember. There are things said in simple correction, or observations not even directed at me that still affect the way I act today. There are things people have said from years ago that hurt then and that I still remember today. Those things are healed over with time, but some have scars. There are many verses in Scripture dealing with words. I picked three that communicate the thought well. On the positive side is Proverbs 16:24, which says,

"Pleasant words are as an honeycomb, sweet to the soul, and health to the bones."

That's a great word picture that illustrates the power of positive words!

On the negative side are a couple of verses later in the same chapter. Verses 27 and 28 say,

"An ungodly man diggeth up evil: and in his lips there is as a burning fire. A froward man soweth strife: and a whisperer separateth chief friends."

The power of words is incredible. "A whisperer separateth chief friends." It doesn't take a loud person. All it takes is a quiet rumor. And it says that an evil man has fire in his lips.

I have caught myself recently not being as careful with my words as I should be. There is enough talk about words in the Bible that I believe it is extremely important to God; therefore, I want it to be extremely important to me. I want to be a speaker of pleasant words, not someone that tears apart friendships and who people fear because I have "fire" in my lips. It's a funny mental image, but the results are not amusing in the least.

Make a conscious effort this week to build people up with your words!!

A Growing Beauty

There's something quietly strong about nature. Tonight the ocean once again became my muse. It is constantly changing and yet it is always the same.

Tonight started out as a dark evening with a plethora of stars strewn across the sky in complex patterns that God Himself designed and knows. But the "crowning moment" of the evening came when the moon boldly rose up from the darkness of the ocean as an ever-brightening orb of pure, orange beauty. As it rose it cast a path across the water almost to my feet. And if the simple, incredible beauty of the moon was not enough, two shooting stars coursed their flaming trails through my vision.

There two things the made the evening even better than the pure incredibleness (yes, I make up words)of nature. One was the fact the I was with friends. I am so blessed with friends. The ocean was unquestionably amazing tonight. But to share it with friends who enjoy it equally as much, is so much better.

The second thing is that those of us there tonight know the One Who created all of those things. That fact is incredible and adds so much to the experience of the evening. It was almost as if God said throughout the evening, "Oh, you think that was beautiful?! Wait til you see this!" And each thing was successively more amazing. To know that God is so big and powerful the He can create such amazing displays of beauty with no effort at all is to know that He is completely trust-worthy when it comes to my life.

We had to wait for awhile tonight before the moon came up. But when it did come up, it was completely worth the wait. Though I have only lived a relatively short time, I have a deep seated belief that God has a long-term plan for me. I don't know what it is. I can't see the full beauty of the whole picture yet. I don't feel like the "moon has risen" in my life yet. But I believe that as I walk with God, He will guide my walk and shape me into something beautiful so that at the end of my life, people will see an amazing picture of God's incredible grace that will point to Him and glorify Him in the same way that the moonrise did tonight. It's an amazing privilege to be on such an incredible journey with such a powerful, trust-worthy God.