Through a Glass Darkly

What do you make of a character that loiters around your house and waits for an inconvenient time to get in your face about something; you know like a zit, an ugly tie or a bad hair day. I think he sits on the edge of the tub on the other side of the wall and jumps up when he hears me coming and throws himself up against the glass about the time I arrive. There’s a person who looks just like you who hangs out in your hall and insists on giving you his approval before he lets you leave the house. Sometimes he looks worse than you do and causes you to start feeling like he looks. Or at least until you come to terms with the moment.

What does he do all day while I’m at work? I can tell he’s not a good housekeeper. I think he comes through the glass and goes through my personal affects while I’m away and then when I see him he acts like he didn’t do anything wrong. And what’s with that stupid grin when he thinks he’s come up with an original thought? I’ve come to believe that this curious yet suspicious fellow has been following me around. I saw him at the mall the other day on a surveillance monitor stalking me. He even showed up at church on several occasions observing my reflection in the vestibule window. When I go to buy clothes I seldom go into the fitting room because I’m concerned that he’ll make me out to be fashion deprived and obsolete style wise. And there is an added insult. This dude’s picture is on my drivers’ license. If he gets into trouble with the law, I get to hold the numbers during the photo portion of the arrest process while he remains unaffected. So if you see any resemblance to a person like this in your mirror, be advised that you’ll have to come up with your own alibi. He’ll expect you to cover for him.

In that other scene behind the wall people come and go from time to time near and around that window in between two worlds. When you are there next time see if you really recognize that person who has claimed your facial features. He might attempt to convince you that he can understand what makes you anxious and can feel your pain; you know, like Bill Clinton. But don’t take it too seriously if he just makes a face at you. That’s what he does for a living. Sometimes you just have to turn your back on him and he’ll go away. He will of course return occasionally to remind you to adjust your self esteem methodology. When you were younger it didn’t matter that much but now that time has had its way the truth may have become an unkind opportunist. You must do business with that image and face the fact that you may not know that person at all. The apostle Paul said in one passage; For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. 1 Cor 13:12. If you turn off the light the person in question doesn’t seem to be so threatening and doesn’t have an opinion or any recognizable features at all. But in order to make those suitable repairs one must have the light on and face the future head on.

But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed. James 1: 22-25

This is the day that the Lord has made.. now go out there and make something of it too.

Here’s looking at you, T. LaVigne

What's In A Seed?

There is a parable* in the New Testament that mentions wheat farming from an ancient perspective that is still practiced today. Assured that a piece of property has been cleared of stones, plowed and fit to accept the seed, we can begin. The inexperienced often throw seed in every direction thinking they are sowing but the knowledgeable farmer goes into a prepared field to begin sowing. Tomatoes or potatoes require a different cultivation format but the Lord used wheat in a few of His parables. Jesus implies that some seed found its way to the extreme or curious fringes along the very edge. The stones from the field were piled near an access road where bramble bushes would grow and the birds would have had a field day. No pun intended. Every seed has a life of its own and in a different toss would have landed in the good ground. You don’t see the farmer focusing on the desolate areas but what we observe is an inadvertent loss of a precious item; the seed. In that seed is a future and a hope. It has all the potential of any other seed in the sack but where it lands is up to the inadvertent action of the sowing. Time and chance happens, as Solomon would say. Eccl 9:11-12

Of all the landing zones mentioned, the thorny patch is worthy of examination. A shallow start or a bird snack is one thing but the thorn garden has a classification of its own. In this sticky situation the dirt is suitable enough and has depth, sunshine and a built in security system. It may produce an attractive flower or a fragrance like a rose and of course is part of a community of assorted weeds and briers. When good seed ends up in undeveloped territory, it is unfortunate but then it happens all too often.

The root in the ground is the heart of the problem. At first a basic sprout is like any other conversion to any other religion but the rich soil of American Christianity lends itself to the environment of achievement and expectation. A prosperous preacher who drinks and beats his wife can still be seen on Sunday with a sack of seed, so let’s not credit the farmer for crop failure or a bountiful harvest and how others handle their germination process is of little concern. As the roots of the good seed get entangled with the root of the weeds it soon becomes difficult to consider leaving that plot of dirt. The riches of this world are being offered wholesale to many church members today. Twisted among the roots are scriptures that seem to imply that the Lord is pleased with much activity, many friends and a social or environmental agenda. Patriotism, politics and moral causes along with Christian fiction, contemporary gospel music and Jesus movies are implemented as nitrate additives to insure a false nutrition in the early years of this Purpose Driven garden party.

In our modern age the thorns are longer and the roots go deeper into the world, the world that is about to be destroyed by fire just before the last wheat harvest. In the outside chance that a stalk of wheat survives all of this and grows to maturity, the chances are that that stalk of wheat would not be part of the harvest. It’s a, ‘being in the wrong place at the wrong time’ scenario. It’s so out of character and is one of those oddities of nature that happens rarely but today the way the gospel is being presented you would think that it is a field of thorns that is the desired crop. In another parable Jesus speaks of such an agenda. Thorn seed is being sowed by many evil evangelists, and is sprouting up unnoticed in the fields of what were once amber waves of grain. The ideal scene would be a thorn among the wheat. We could handle that with a hoe but we are beyond that agricultural anomaly now.*

T. LaVigne
*Article based on the parables found in Matt 13:1-23; Mark4:1-20; Luke 8:4-15