becoming a faith gumby

I have a new job. And I am learning a thing or two about muscle tension and stretching. My boss' mascot is Gumby the claymation figure of a tv series from the 50's. While strength is important, he holds the opinion that the body is less susceptible to injury when the soft tissues are actually able to absorb energy and change lengths.

If he says to you "holy toledo, you're tight!" you know that you're in for a bit of stretching.

What I am learning is that the length and tension of muscles has a pretty big impact on the supporting frame, our skeletons, and that stretching the muscles can change, for the better, our posture, our body positioning, our pain.

Now, it's no secret really, that stretching is not so comfortable. It can be downright painful. However, it is a good and necessary pain that will prevent and perhaps reverse damage to the body. So I see that if I will not take care to stretch myself, either things will continue in the current direction, or I may have to hand myself over to be stretched.

My faith is sometimes like a tight muscle. And I can tell you that like the others, the stretching of my faith is often quite uncomfortable.  Once it becomes a little less tender, more supple, more willing to trust in one direction, I am often stretched in quite another direction... one in which I never knew I was so tight.

So as I am being stretched, I'm learning, and trusting that like physical stretching, this stretching of my faith is also beneficial. For God is good. And not nearly so smug as I am when others are at my mercy.

Son exposure

Ah, a new day! The sun is shining and the trees are all prettily laden with snow. It's a beautiful, if cold (-20) day.

Yesterday was messy. Snow falling in various states throughout the day. Sometimes wet and heavy, sometimes small and sharp. The roads were sloppy and greasy and unfortunately decorated with the flashing lights of police cars, tow trucks, snow plows, fire trucks and ambulances.

Sometimes your mood follows that of the weather. Or maybe we just reflect the amount of sun exposure that we get. Today will be a good day.

what do I know of trust?

Two thousand and twelve! A new year! How exciting!

I like to start my new year with a list. And one of the things on my list this year is to learn more about fasting. And I'm really excited about something that I learned so I want to share it with you. (I learned it in one of John Pipers' sermons from http://www.desiringgod.org/)

You may or may not know that Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness after He was baptized.

Matthew 4:1-4

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him,"If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread." But he answered, "It is written, 

'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"

Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness.

Jesus had fasted forty days and forty nights.

Jesus was hungry.

Jesus is the Son of God.

Jesus can turn stones into bread.

Is it wrong to turn stones into bread?

Jesus answers the tempter from Scripture.

Deuteronomy 8:1-3
"The whole commandment that I command you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land that the LORD swore to give to your fathers. And you shall remember the whole way that the LORD your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that He might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. And He humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD."

Israelites led by God forty years in the wilderness.
Israelites humbled and tested through this experience.
Israelites were allowed to be hungry for a time, but then were fed.
Israelites were fed with manna, a bread which they had never experienced before, which was made by God.

What do I learn from this?
Well, I know that God can make bread from nothing, that making bread is not wrong.
And I also come to know that making the bread is not the point.
That the real point is trust God to satisfy your hunger and meet your needs.

WOW!

Isn't that huge!? That God may allow me to be hungry for a time, but that He is more than able to meet my needs, and not even necessarily in the way that I might expect Him to. That the goal is not the manna, but a deeper trust in my God.

Don't need bread, need God. Don't trust bread, trust God.

The steadfast love of God is better than life.