Rain

"He sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous." --Matt 5:45b

Given its location in Matthew chapter 5, the famous "Blessed are the..." chapter, I suspect the rain depicted in that verse is considered a blessing. Taken literally, it is a dose of moisture in a dry land to produce a harvest. Figuratively, the verse implies that earthly blessings fall on the obedient and the disobendient, the just and the unjust.

I don't know about you, but I view rain as dreary. As a popular Christian songwriter says, "into every life a little rain must fall..." He depicts rain as burden. Refreshing? More like depressing. Rain rain go away, come again some other day.

You see, there are good things to be done out there, many of which have been thwarted by our recent rainy (and hail-ridden) weather. The logical question is this: "What purpose would nasty weather serve, if only to postpone those good deeds?" The best answer is that the rain falls on the just and the unjust.

Personally, I am hoping that the FIRST half of Matthew 5:45 will soon prevail and the sun will again shine. Until then (thank you Blind Melon), 'all I can do is just pour some tea for two, and speak my point of view...'

God Bless the Freaks

I actually saw a bumper sticker yesterday that read:

"God Bless the Freaks"

I searched for other stickers on the vehicle, hoping to judge the intent of the driver(s), whether serious or sarcastic, but alas there were no Jesus-fish emblems, no family stick figures, no "my child is an honor student" stickers, and likewise, no Election 2008 preferences, stickers of skulls or demonic smiles, Burton stickers, nor Indie botanical yoga-mat wanna-be designs.

Interestingly, I did a little search online, and found "Northern Sun, Products for Progressives," who sell this little item. Apparently, those who bought "God Bless the Freaks" also bought these other bumper stickers:

• "We can't cure the world of sorrows but we can choose to live in joy"
• "Treehugging dirt worshipper", and
• "Not all who wander are lost"

Hmmm. Based on those, I've decided to jump to my own conclusions. In the Old Testament, persons with imperfections (the "defective, disfigured, deformed, crippled, and diseased" a.k.a. FREAKS) were prohibited from making offerings or coming near to the altar for sacrifice. Only the unblemished sacrifice was considered holy (Lev 21). Sounds pretty politically INcorrect, huh?

Can you imagine a world where only the perfect gain access to God? Despite how unjust and unfair that sounds, those are actually the rules: "Be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect." (Matt 5:48). And we're talking genuine, unblemished perfection, not just the commercialized-Christian version of pretend-perfect or surface-perfect. Of course, none of us measures up to that yardstick-- even Mary Poppins only measured as 'practically perfect in every way.'

Thank God, literally, for standing in our place: "how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God." (Heb 9:14)

So no matter how FREAKISH we are, we can have the blessings of God bestowed upon us, not when we are perfect in and of ourselves, but when we accept the perfect sacrifice of Christ. God bless us freaks, indeed!

Awakening

Well, I'm not sure this is history in the making. Of course I am speaking of my inaugural blog entry.

You see, I've been resisting the call to "blog". Blog is short for web-log, for you non-techies... kind of a glorified online journal, but "out there" for the whole world to see (in my case, feel free to place emphasis on "out there"). Honestly, I am not certain that I have either sufficient time or energy to add to the growing library of collective online chatter, but, I am realizing that I do indeed have (thank you, Dave M.) something to say. So... Vamanos:

Wake up! (That is meant as a section heading rather that an imperative. Let's hope my first blog isn't already putting you to sleep). No, I mean to discuss "awakening". What better topic to launch my infant blog into the online world?

Call me crazy, if you will, but I feel God speaks to believers. Yes, through His Word, possibly through other believers, and occasionally through a direct message. (I've been directly spoken to only once, but that is a topic for another blog entry.) Most often I hear the voice of God only through "earthly translation". This blog entry describes one of those such encounters: the Heavenly alarm clock.

I have lost count of the number of times I've set my alarm, expecting to rise early for an important event/meeting, etc, only to awaken 2-15 minutes ahead of my set alarm. This occurs most often when I must arise before the sun, which is certainly unnatural for me, let me assure you. In fact, I've been known to head to bed, with great intention to arise early and hit the ground running, only to chicken out and set a late alarm, thinking, "Well, if God wants me to get up early, He'll just have to wake me Himself." And He does.

Sometimes my heavenly alarm clock takes the form of a fussing child in the wee hours, a passing truck outside, or strangely enough, silence. What's even more amusing is that I must also have a Heavenly snooze alarm, since my reluctance to arise is almost always answered by another summons, sometimes an incessantly-chirping bird, a purring cat that will not leave me alone, or a visiting child at my bedside. In any case, I consider these little summons to be my calling to arise.

I must obey and answer the call, for there is work to be done. It is more than just a spiritual morning greeting, but carries with it the tug toward action. I may not always answer chirpily, but I always answer, even if my answer is a growling, coughing, eye-wiping, half-stumble out of bed to the bathroom. Hey, no one ever said we had to be chipper when rising from the dead.

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Wake up, O sleeper; rise from the dead, 

and Christ will shine on you. 

--Ephesians 5:14 

And do this, understanding the present time. 

The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, 

because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed.

--Romans 13:11