Arise, shine!

David, age 5, visits Santa.

“Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon you.”- Isaiah 60:1

“The question is not, ‘Do you have a problem?’  The question is, ‘Does the problem have you?’ “- Joel Osteen

When I reminisce about second grade at Northeast School in Evergreen Park, Illinois, three distinct memories surface.  The first two are sitting in a circle singing “This Old Man” while waiting to go on a field trip to the circus and attending Miss Wilson’s wedding at the end of the school year.  Walking upstairs to the school library, located in an enclosed balcony at the back of the cafeteria/gym, for testing by the school psychologist is the third.

According to my mother’s most certainly apocryphal account, I was quite the chatterbox and Miss Wilson suspected boredom.  One question the psychologist asked was, “Which of these substances is the hardest?”  I answered, “An egg.”  My second grade brain reasoned if chicks could take nearly an hour to hatch in the Museum of Science and Industry’s incubator, an egg shell must be the hardest substance on earth!

Hard times prompt that age-old question: Why?  Laura Story points out that asking “why” can be an important help in processing grief.  However, focusing too intently on life’s whys is like running on a treadmill- one never seems to get anywhere and the end product is exhaustion.  The Message, in its paraphrase of John 9:3, provides the solution:

Jesus said, “You’re asking the wrong question.  You’re looking for someone to blame.  There is no such cause-effect here.  Look instead for what God can do.”

Arise, shine!  Ultimately, it becomes beneficial to stop asking why and seek ways to bring glory to the Heavenly Father.  Hope provides the foundation for revitalizing faith.  John Ortberg differentiates two types of hope:

“Hope comes in two flavors: hoping for something and hoping in someone.”

As a kindergartener sitting on Santa’s lap, my wish was for something.  Decades later, the purifying fire of adversity has forged a faith centered on hope in Jesus.  Even on the day of His birth, something about Jesus had a way of forcing people to take a stand.  Centuries ago, Blaise Pascal said:

“In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don’t.”

Arise, shine!  Your light has come!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHNTeX0eOIk

 

 

 

Arise, shine!

Z marks the spot

“No one lights a lamp and puts it under a basket.  Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand, where it gives light to everyone in the house.  In the same way, let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so everyone will praise your heavenly Father.”- Matthew 5:15-16

“In the gospels the very first step a man must take is an act which radically affects his whole existence.”- Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship

I settle in front of our vintage black and white television set, fortified with a Forever Yours (aka Milky Way Midnight) candy bar and a small glass of Coke.  The theme song strikes up:

“Out of the night,

When the full moon is bright,

Comes the horseman known as Zorro. . . .”

Mounted on his black steed Tornado, Zorro readies himself for another epic battle with the cruel, power-hungry Capitan Monastario- commander of the pueblo of Los Angeles.  The capitan and his men have no idea Zorro (Spanish for “fox”) is actually Don Diego de la Vega, who carries out his deception under the cover of his intellect and milquetoast personality.

The theme song continues: “This bold renegade carves a Z with his blade, a Z that stands for Zorro.”  The letter Z marks the spot, symbolizing that Zorro’s fully present, even though that may not be readily apparent.  For the invalid at the Jerusalem pool called Bethesda (John 5:1-9), Jesus was fully present.  Jesus asked him, “Do you want to be healed?”  To receive Jesus’ blessing and shine the light of Jesus on the world’s darkness, he had to give up his security mat.

Applying Jesus’ question to your ministry downsizing or vocation loss, how would you contemplatively craft your response?  An affirmative answer becomes the catalyst for a blessing from God that gives glory to the Father.  There’s only one true assumption: God is able!

A century ago, A. W. Milne was one of a band of brave souls known as one-way missionaries, because they purchased single tickets to the mission field and packed their belongings in a coffin.  The headhunters Milne ministered to had martyred all previous missionaries.  At Milne’s death thirty-five years later, they inscribed the following words on his tombstone.  May those words describe God’s presence in us:

“When he came there was no light.

When he left there was no darkness.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ty3ywPVYP-U

 

 

 

 

 

Z marks the spot