A Show Of Grace

It is a concept that is hard to put into words. You know how I have this "hobby" of defining words? Well, grace is one word that I have yet to define. It is just a concept that you need a whole book to grasp its entire meaning. In fact I once told a friend that there is a book on grace--the Bible. Sure, it is not just a "book on grace" but you cannot deny that grace waters the roots of many an account found inside its covers. And need I mention the essence of Christ's message--or His life's purpose? But how would you define grace? Some simplify it to mercy, some to forgiveness, some just don't worry about it, and they keep on sinning. My pastor has said that people "use" grace like a credit card (he calls it a grace card). He also says that it's wrong. Mainly because that is abusing grace. . . but I need to define it so that you can know what it means to abuse it. So here is my attempt at defining grace: (a) All encompassing forgiveness; having mercy and looking past all failures of the object or person. (b) Giving the forgiven strength to reach beyond their failure(s) and achieve greater things. (c) Looking at the object of failure and seeing them as without fault--forgetting. Yes, God does actually "forget" your sins: 'Then he says, "I will never again remember their sins and lawless deeds"' (Hebrews 10:17). So, if we are all saved "by grace" why do we not fall on our knees daily in the mighty presence of the One and Only? I believe it is because we haven't defined it. Think with me for a few moments. . . if grace is what I just stated above, shouldn't we realize that it is not anything Someone less than everything can just give--freely? It makes me conclude that only a loving, holy, and almighty God could even--truly--comprehend, not to mention giving it for nothing. Reminds me of how the word love--if we follow 1 Corinthians 13--becomes a lifestyle. Shouldn't grace also become a lifestyle? If someone offends us can't we simply realize all that we have done to God and yet he forgot it. He remembers it no more. As far as the "east is from the west"--they are gone. Yet we pull out that old and broken promise made thirty years before--that we knew no one could keep--and refuse to even consider forgetting. Maybe, just maybe, if we see the depth of God's endless grace we would never hold a grudge. Maybe we need to fix our perspective. Maybe we need to show grace.

~TDH

Lewis, Heaven, and a Paradox

One of my favorite writings on heaven is the very last Narnia book by C. S. Lewis The Last Battle. It is my most beloved mainly because it plays and pulls on your imagination but describes just enough that you don't feel as if something is missing. Its . . .its. . . here why don't you see what I mean? 


*Setting: The four children of the Narnia series have just passed through a door that appeared as a stable. And have been running into great Narnian heroes in a beautiful land. They then meet Aslan:*


Lucy said, “We’re so afraid of being sent away, Aslan. And you have sent us back into our world so often.”

“No fear of that,” said Aslan. “Have you not guessed?”

Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose within them.

“There was a real railway accident,” said Aslan softly. “Your father and mother and all of you are--as you used to call it in the Shadowlands--dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning.”

And as He spoke He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.

I have nothing else to say (except that I have nothing else to say . . . . . PARADOX!).

~TDH and an excerpt from C. S. Lewis' The Last Battle.


Look up this: tlation.blogspot.com

Hail Harry vs. Tlation (arr!)

It was a warm balmy day sometime in June. Tlation never could tell you what day it was--he is a ship after all. All he knew was that the seasons changed and he most defiantly preferred the summer (even if the mollusks grew quicker on his hull). His captain was bringing a heavy load of tobacco over to Bristol where it would be traded for the colonist's favorite drink--(until a certain party) tea. He enjoyed the rush of the playful wind in his large open sails. They were traveling quite quickly and Tlation overheard the captin--who's name was Raim--tell the crew that if the wind stayed steady they would make it to port within two days. Tlation had done this trip many a time and had grown to trust captain Raim and knew his judgement was true. Even so, Tlation longed to stay out on the vast sea awhile longer. He relished the expanse of the ocean and enjoyed the company of dolphins and fish. He had made many friends in what he believed was his realm. But he was about to realize that it was, in fact, not his realm--there were many a vagabond roaming throughout the wide sea, and Tlation was about to be rudely reminded of this fact. For as his red and blue flag was snapped to-and-frow in the rushing wind some scum laid their telescope upon his emblem. Let us take a little trip aboard and over-hear the pirates: "Captn' there be a ship flyin' the royal colors to starboard," Gheim spit out, with a little of his tobacco (for Gheim loved tobacco). "That be so?" replied the captin' with a rough and deliberate drone. "Eye! And she be a-goin' steady east to-ward her homeland," for Tlation was a very British ship (even though he was made in Providence) and was always wishing to be either at sea or at port in Bristol. "Well, how is she riding in the water?" the captin' questioned Gheim. (Tlation hated being called a she...) "She be a riding as if she be carrin' a heavy load," Gheim snorted back to the captin' "and I hope she has some tabacce" he muttered under his breath. For Gheim was almost out our his weed and was pretty sure that Kleim was stealing it, but since he had been stealing Kleim's ale, he didn't want to say anything. "Well let's us go and have a-look-see," drawled the captain' as he abruptly brought their vessel (called the 'Hail Harry') to the starboard. This nearly threw Gheim from the bow and he just barely kept his temper from flaring red-hot at the captn'. The captain was not a man to recon with--even if you had the bigger stick--because he always won. So Gheim drew himself up again and muttered something along the lines of "...a ship of my own," before he wheeled out his telescope again to make sure that, his hopefully tobacco laden ship, had not strayed far from the time it took for his pride to be throughly wounded. Now we will go back to more pleasant surroundings--Tlation. "Captain!" Jable almost screamed, "there be a strange vessel coming over toward us--fast!" "What colors is she flying Jable?" the captain un-worriedly replied. "I cannot quite make them out. . . wait they are black and, and, white!" "Blast!" the captain muttered--just loud enough that Tlation could overhear him. "Prepare to defend!" the captain roared from the depths of emotion, "we musn't let these brutes take us easily--if at all!" Tlaion felt the whole crew scrambling throughout his whole expanse gathering swords, cannons, and guns. Tlation's heart--if ships have a heart--leapt with excitement and fear. "I hope that we can fend off these felons!" he said to himself because he didn't talk to the crew or even the captain. Since he is a ship, Tlation felt as if they would pay much better attention to sailing if they didn't feel watched by the very vessel they were riding the wild waves upon. So the crew--Raim, Jable, Snape, Lem, Oric, Divk, Eyril, and Hyro--prepared the cannons, loaded their guns and hunkered down a-waiting a brutal battle. By then the vagabonds were nearly upon them. The pirate captain hollered across the sparse area that separated the two very different ships, "All ye high and mighty King's men want to give all you're cargo so that we might spare ye lives?" (he almost spat out the words 'King's men.') But Raim replied, "never, even if it were a thousand to one we--or in that case I--would stand my ground to you ruthless villains until I had not a single breath left in by sea worn body!" Of course the worthless scum were almost hoping that the captain would say something along those lines and chucked their grappling hocks across the frighteningly small distance between the two vessels. They landed true and caught on Tlation's newly washed deck. Then those uncivilized brutes hauled the two ships together and jumped onto Tlation, brandishing swords and scowls. THe pirates were hoping to give the Brits an onslaught they wouldn't soon forget. Thankfully Oric had been able to fire one of the cannons and put a sizable hole right in those pirate's ugly--my apologies to Hail Harry--hull. But that wouldn't have stopped those marauders any easier that you could stop a freight train teen feet away that was going four-hundred miles-a-hour. After they leaped onto Tlation the real battle begun. The pirate captain went right for Raim's throat and missed it by a whisker. But Snape shot him in the shoulder and brought him to his knees before he could say 'ginger ale.' Raim then quickly disposed of the heartless captain as easily as if he had been a little guppy caught in a net. Once the rest of the outlaws saw the demise of their--very un-beloved--captain, they cut the ropes that intertwined the two ships together and jumped back aboard the Hail Harry quicker than it takes a father to think of a pun. And Tlation's crew was quite happy that they were rid of the beasts but they wished they could have killed the scum so that they would not be a threat to the 'King's men' any longer. And Before the hour glass was turned twice, the lop-sided vessel was out of sight from even the sharpest eyes. Tlation was reminded that he did not, in fact, 'own' the sea and would try remember that it's not just his story but one much larger that his little ship mind could grasp with even a thousand years of revelation. So he was content to remember that his Maker was the great master planner and that his part was to obey--no matter the tempests, tyrants, or villains that tried to 'get in the way'. But, this was only one of many adventures that Tlation encountered. More are to come. . .

~TDH

My Plan or His Plan?

      Purpose. God is a God of purpose. He has planed ever since He first spoke the wonder that is creation into existence--no even before. You could say that he is obsessed with His plan (because He is). Every single person ever born is a part of the greatest story ever told, that is, the story of Life, Death, and Humanity. God put specific people in specific places at specific times. In fact I would argue that He has done that with everyone. His aim was the furthering of Truth--the Truth of is His Son and His Son's ever-relentless love. And His love and ambition is seen in many a man's life. One of my favorite stories is of a broken man who felt as if his part in the Epic of humanity was no part at all. He was a blind man; blind from birth.
      His story can be found in the Bible. He isn't even given a name. He is just simply "the man born blind." But he played a masterful part in Life's Epic. I bet it wasn't easy though, in that culture it was thought that something like blindness was a "curse." And that it was brought about by sin. Even Christ's disciples asked "who sinned, this man or his parents?" (John 9:2). They thought that this blindness was a curse. I bet the "blind man" especially felt as if it was a curse. Imagine everyday knowing that you cannot see and that you have to beg others to give you money so that you can even eat. He must have often groaned in his spirit, I bet he even asked God "why did you have to make me blind?!?" But Christ tells us that it wasn't a curse--far from it. Jesus tells his disciples “this [blindness] happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him" (John 9:3). Now wait, this blindness was a good thing? I doubt that the blind man had even considered this beautiful possibility. Ponder with me what this man felt after he heard these freeing words. If I were him I would leap for joy knowing that God had made me blind on purpose. That my piece in the play of Life was to be blind SO THAT Jesus could heal me--and show the world His freeing power. That would have been the best day of my life if I were that blind man.
      If you think about it we all are (in a way) blind men. You might wonder why you just can't speak in front of more than twenty people without all your words tearing away from you faster that a hungry cheetah (I do). Or maybe you falter through a disease that haunts you constantly. You might be screaming out "why?!?!" You might be like me and feel as if it has no purpose. But we can look at this blind man and realize that God has a plan. And you know what? His plan is perfect. (Yes we mess with it but it is still a perfect plan) We all can take solace that God is our God. And we can know that our God is just waiting to tell us "no, you didn't mess up, it was My plan all along."

~TDH

Timely Heaven

I used to think that whenever people talked about Heaven it "ruined" it. Why did I feel this way? Well, whenever someone brought up heaven they always made it too small. The always said "seeing God will be beautiful," and then they just moved on like nothing really happened. Or they might have gone on, and on, and on, about what you thought Heaven can't possibly be like. I believe that most of us are just plain misinformed. We try to put Heaven into a box labeled "That one place without time or space." But it doesn't belong there. Wouldn't it be impossible to exist without time and space? It's how God made us--to occupy time and space (not wall street). Heaven will be so much more than just "passin' on to somethin' greater," but it will be experiencing the face of God--with others and without sin. In fact Heaven is in a way two places. In the Bible it talks about what is the present Heaven and a "new" Heaven--the New Earth. It is very important that we remember this. In this present Heaven we most likely know what is happening down on earth. And why not? Sure it might make us sad but we will be with God. Why would He have to shield us from hurt for it to be paradise? (But I don't know for sure.) And the New Earth, that will be when forever will "start." After Christ returns and judges everyone he will re-create the earth into something without any sin. And we will no longer even be able to sin. Why? How? Well we will remember what it was like back on sinful earth and know that we do not want to ever live through that pain again. Pretty amazing huh? Honestly I can't wait! I hope to see you there.

~TDH

p.s.
I learned all this from Randy Alcorn's book Heaven. I highly sugest reading it. (Like right now. So go find it and read it.)