"To Him be glory forever": beauty

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Appearances

Yesterday was Veterans Day and we were at the Grand Canyon National Park. We live about 370 miles from the canyon and had made an overnight trip there to be able to spend a day with one of our older daughters and her children.

After breakfast I was waiting outside the lodge while our grandchildren and our youngest daughter played together. I was wearing a sweatshirt bearing the name of the ship I served on while in the US Navy, and a hat from an outfitter in the boundary waters of Minnesota and Canada. And that was when someone came up to me asking me to show him on a map how to get from the lodge to the canyon. He said that he thought I worked there.

In my head I thought, "What is it about my appearance that suggests I work at the Grand Canyon? Navy sweatshirt? Outfitter hat? Not even an employee nametag. Anything?" I kept all of that inside, glanced at the map, which I didn't quite understand myself, gestured with my hand and said, "The canyon is that way. You can’t miss it."

And that got me to thinking about appearances and how we take care to present ourselves publicly in a particular way, a way that may or may not be an accurate representation of who we really are. I had made a conscious choice to wear my Navy sweatshirt on Veterans Day, in part to obtain any benefits that might have been available to veterans at the canyon or on the way home. I did wind up having some conversations with other vets I met at the canyon, but that was all that came as a result of my clothing choice.

But of infinite more importance than how I appear on the outside is my inside appearance, or the condition of my heart. In calling out the Pharisees for their diligence in outward appearances and neglect of the state of their heart, Jesus says this in Matthew 23:25-26:

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean."

Jesus is telling the Pharisees that they need to pay attention to what is going inside of them first, and then the outside will take care of itself. He may have been speaking to the Pharisees, but when I read those words I know that He is also talking to me.

Just before that section of Matthew, when Jesus was asked what the greatest commandment was, He replied:

"And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

There is a way that I really want to present myself to the world, and that is as a servant of Jesus, my Savior and Lord. I could do that in a begrudging way, because I felt that I have to, even though I may not want to.

Or…I could first love the Lord my God, with all my heart and with all my soul and with all my mind. Loving God first is what will truly let my actions show His beauty and goodness to the world. And it is His appearance, not mine, that is of infinite value.

Thursday, May 2, 2013

A Glimpse of Glory

“Oh my gosh it’s beautiful!”

Those were the first words Robin spoke as she looked out our bedroom window this morning. I had been outside to run and she asked me what the conditions were like. I told her that it was snowing and piling up pretty fast, so much so that I had shortened my running plans. She looked out and was taken aback at the beauty of what she saw.

Now it isn't unusual to have snow, and lots of it, where we live in Minnesota, but to have it happen in May is virtually unheard of. And it was coming down fast. As I write this post, three hours after my attempt to get to work, it still is. Today is the first day where we had so much snow that I couldn't get through the driveway. I got both cars stuck, and given that the neighbor is stuck on our unplowed street I likely wouldn't have gotten anywhere should I have reached it.

My feed on Facebook is filled with pictures of the yards of friends, yards that look like ours does now, showing patios that were delightful places to sit last weekend and which are now covered with 6-8 inches of snow. And who knows when it will stop?

This late season blizzard isn't fun for everyone. Schools are closed, children are home and parents who can get to work may be scrambling to find child care.

Some people have lost power to their homes. And while they wait for their power to be restored there are people who are out and working in the storm regardless of the conditions, such as the power crews, police, plow drivers and others. Their perspectives on the storm are likely more varied than mine.

But I keep coming back to Robin’s early exclamation of delight, “Oh my gosh it’s beautiful!”

I think that the delight that she had in seeing the unexpected May blizzard is similar to the delight that Christians will know when they see the beauty of heaven. As we read the Bible we see glimpses of it in Isaiah and Revelation. Revelation 21:18-21 gives a rich description of the beauty of the New Jerusalem, a beautiful place prepared by God for those who will be there with Him.

And that is what will really make heaven beautiful, not what is there, but Who is there. Revelation 21:3 says:

“Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself with be with them as their God.”

In the snow that has surprised us today we get a glimpse of unexpected beauty, a beauty that points us towards the glory of God. Heaven’s true beauty will not be in its physical appearance, as wonderful as that may be, but in the presence of the Living God.

And in God’s presence I suspect we will proclaim, with infinite more delight than Robin found in this morning’s snow, “You are beautiful!”