I’m not a poet. I woke up the Saturday morning before Easter, 2020 and a poem just spilled off my tongue. I didn’t say it out loud exactly, but I said it as clearly as I would have if I was saying it out loud, in my head and it was really beautiful! I was just amazed at how strange it felt as it poured out of my mind. I remember it having something to do with cattle in the last verse and just as I jumped up to write it down, it was gone. Vanished from my mind. I cannot remember a single word but the beauty of it lingers in my memory.
This irritates me tremendously and happens to me often. I feel like God is giving me a gift or a message and if I don’t write it down immediately, I lose the gift. Then I feel guilty because I feel like I’ve let Him down. Maybe He had a message for me to share with you and I’ve just lost it by being too lazy to have rolled over and jotted it down. Well this day, I felt a little bit different. What if this was just a gift to me, from Him? What if, He was showing me His glory? A private showing, just for me. Or what if it wasn't about me at all? What if it was all for Him? From Him, through me, to Him?!
I like poetry but I don’t always understand it. I understood that one perfectly. I’m not even sure that it’s fair to say I “like” poetry. I like some poems. I’m not sure I have ever had a favorite poem also I love the Psalms and I believe they are poetry. Strangely enough, this Easter season, I mailed the children in my youth group class and my immediate family, an Easter poem that I’d copied and pasted from some Easter poems and things that I found on line. I thought it was really beautiful. I found it so odd that I would send a poem and then the day before Easter, wake up with one so vividly in my mind. That just had to be a God thing.
I’ve been doing a Bible study this week called “Breaking Free” by Beth Moore. If you read much of my stuff, you know by now that I read a lot of Beth Moore. I love the way she writes, talks, thinks and mostly the way she does all the grunt work for me. I just read her stuff that she’s taken years to research and tell it to you. I’m a slug.
In this book, she was talking about how “according to the book of Isaiah, God has graciously extended five benefits for his children. The benefits are as follows.
1. To know God and believe Him
2. To glorify God
3. To find satisfaction in God
4. To experience God’s peace
5. To enjoy God’s presence”
Well, this week, I was studying number 2. She goes on to say, “God’s glory doesn’t just reflect Him. It is also part of who He is! In each of these Old testament references, (Isaiah 6:3, Numbers 20:6, Psalm 19:1, Psaml 29:9) the Hebrew word for “glory” is kavodh, meaning “weight, honor, esteem.” The word kavodh comes from another Hebrew term that greatly increases our comprehension. The word kavedh means to “be renowned…to show oneself great or mighty.” In other words, God’s glory is the way He makes Himself known or shows Himself mighty. God wants to reveal Himself to humans. Each way He accomplishes this divine task is His glory. God’s glory is how He shows who He is.” He does this to me every single week, sometimes every day, with inspiration and ideas to write about. Sometimes I just know it’s Him and other times I have to wrestle through it.
Beth goes on to say, “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven” (Hebrews 1:3) “Christ is the very glory of God.” Christ is the very glory of God and yet, He still wants us to be in all of it! Peter conveys the idea with a bit more application to our lives: “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.” (2Pet. 1:3). Not only is Christ the representation of God’s glory, His glory supplies our needs.” Stay with me here. I know this is deep. She goes on to say, “the Greek word for “glory” in these New Testament references is “doxa.” It is “the true apprehension of God or things.” The glory of God must mean His unchanging essence. Giving glory to God is ascribing to Him His full recognition…The glory of God is what He is essentianlly.” God’s glory is the way He makes Himself recognizable.
Look at Isaiah 43:7 once more: “Everyone who is called by my name, / whom I created for my glory, / whom I formed and made.” Based on what we’ve learned from our Scriptures and definitions, I believe being created for God’s glory means two marvelous truths to those who are called by His name:
1. God wants to make Himself recognizable to us.
2. God wants to make Himself recognizable through us.
First Corintians 10:31 declares, “Whatever you do, do it for the glory of God.” God desires that He be recognizable in us in all that we do! Living a life that glorifies God is synonymous with living a live that reveals God.”
Can you see now why I keep reading her stuff? Wow! I’m almost done quoting Beth but here’s a little more. “How are we to help others recognize something about God just from watching our lives and knowing us? Consider another portion of the definition of doxa that relates to human beings: “The glory of created things including man is what they are meant by God to be, though now perfectly attained.” We all fall short right? We can’t do any of this without Jesus! “The apostle Paul announced the mystery that Christ Himself dwells in the life of every believer. Christ in us! Romans 8:9 tells us that “if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.” In other words, the moment each of us received Christ as our Savior, the Holy Spirit of Christ took up residence in our inner being.”
“Do you see the key? We have no hope whatsoever of God being recognizable in us if the Spirit of Christ does not dwell in us. If we are not occupied by the Holy Spirit, we have nothing of God in us for Him to show. Christ is a human being’s only “hope of glory.”
Here’s my favorite part and then I’ll use my own brain I promise. “We were created for the purpose of giving Christ’s invisible character a glimpse of visibility.” Whoa. Well here’s the thing about me, I don’t want to give you a glimpse. I want you to get the FULL MONTY. I want you to see Jesus and God’s glory every single day of your life! I want it to ooze out of my mouth and my body, just like that poem did yesterday morning for God’s glory and His glory alone! Gosh that gets me fired up! I love the idea of all of that! It sounds wonderful doesn’t it? But it doesn’t work that way does it. It’s not always that simple, for any of us. We get off track. Life happens. Things happen. Bad things happen. The snake crawls in. Evil things…like a virus.
Well we can still show God’s glory in all of it. We can let others see Jesus in us by the way we act, how we treat others, how we live, how we stay home and mostly, how and what we share. In things trying times, we must stay positive, good and full of hope. Encourage others and don’t tear them down. Be kind and not rude, generous and not selfish. We are the only hope of showing God’s glory!
Easter at our house has been the same for years. We have different people in attendance at different times but the core people are usually always here. We sometimes go to church the night before for the Easter vigil, sometimes Easter morning and sometimes both. We certainly prefer the Easter morning service and usually don’t make the sunrise service due to the farm chores having to be done. The vigil is brutal and we are not great at staying up late, again, blame it on the animals. I try to attend most, if not all, of the Holy week services and almost always practice some kind of Lenten discipline over the 40 days prior to Easter. Some of the practices during Holy week freak me out but after this year, probably never again. It’s amazing how a large dose of absence makes the heart grow fonder.
Holy week involves the sedar meal (I’m not sure I’m spelling that right), the veneration or kissing of the cross, the washing of the feet, and both of the last two have always freaked me out. Kissing the cross seemed like idolism to me and washing my feet? No thanks. The Easter vigil is dark and full of incense and then a huge joyous Agape feast full of Greek food follows. The next morning starts with the flowering of a giant cross. This has always been one of our most favorite Easter morning rituals. Everyone brings flowers from their own yards and we decorate the cross with them. It’s a gorgeous sight, year after year. Then we all sing and it’s a beautiful service followed by an Easter egg hunt for the children, that I usually have some part in.
This year, the priests were in the church alone. They were trying to be television evangelists, which they are not, and they completely forgot about the flowering of the cross. We forget that they are human too. And, I kind of loved it in that it means that they need us. We need each other to make it all work. We ARE the body of Christ!
Last week during one of the sermons of Holy week, Father Steve talked about how we are the church and how the church has managed to go on and survive in times such as these, without a priest or a building. He was giving us a wonderful pep talk and trying to encourage us and help us to realize, we don’t really have to have him and the building. We can forge on! By all of us continuing to worship in our homes, we are still the church. We can do this! We are doing this!
Will the church survive this? Of course it will! I believe it’ll be stronger and larger than ever before after we are all allowed to reunite. And you know what else? I’ll probably do the creepy cross kissing and feet washing next year just because I can! Yes, the church will survive and yes, we can do this. But gosh I miss my people.
Dear Lord,
We don’t know the answers to most of life’s mysteries, but we know You. We are trying not to be scared in these unsure times Lord but we are unsettled. Please give us peace. Please give us comfort. Please continue to let us see your glory. Let us be a small part of your glory. I want to be a giant part for you Lord. Use me. Use us! Let our church explode with new believers and add millions to your mighty army Lord. We will fight this evil Lord! We are with you! We are never against you! Be with us always Lord. In the mighty name of Jesus…Amen!
Comments