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- Written by: Don Goulding
Go to the ant, you sluggard; consider its ways and be wise! (Proverbs 6:6)
A spindly ant arrests a worm from destroying a farmer’s corn. As he carries the parasite away, the ant’s fuzzy legs transfer pollen to waiting silks. On the journey home, he cordially rubs antennae with a brother carrying a seed to a new place of germination. Our little friend places his worm deep inside tunnels that aerate the soil.
All said, ants are more civilized, more industrious, and more beneficial to the earth than humans. In many places they outweigh us in biomass. Yet, in our pride, we disregard the ant as a nuisance, while thinking our existence is essential.
If we could ask an ant his secret he’d say, “You humans rush over the outer shell and never get to the sweet nut of life. Slow down and discover God.”
In my quiet time this morning I experimented with the ant’s advice. I landed in the basic verses of Romans 5 about peace with God. I’ve read this passage so many times, my eyes tried to jump to what was next. Heeding the ant, I went back to process the words. The Holy Spirit sent fresh insights. I saw a deeper contrast between the dissension that once separated me from God and the peace I now enjoy in Christ.
We say we understand a concept like peace, and, because of the laziness of our minds, we shun further consideration. Our brains are restless organs that require discipline into a fuller understanding of familiar truth. The ant’s wisdom gives the Holy Spirit an opportunity to take us beyond our intellect and into true spiritual knowledge.
I can hear the ant now, his antennae twitching, “Let God sing miles of truth through millimeters of experience.”
Prayer: Lord, I repent of boisterous living. Grant me a quiet, attentive heart
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- Written by: Don Goulding
All of us had wandered off like sheep;
each of us had strayed off on his own path,
but the Lord caused the sin of all of us to attack him. (Isaiah 53:6)
My two-year-old granddaughter, Olivia, had a fifty percent chance of survival. She had failed kidneys, collapsed lungs, a viral infection, and I was part of the problem. Tubes and wires ran into her nose and mouth while others pierced her soft skin. Without the machines, she’d already be in heaven, and I’d be guilty of sending her there.
It’s tempting to look around for the culprit responsible for Olivia’s illness. Was it her negligent birth mother? some genetic mutation? or germs from the public sector? Somebody has to own the blame.
A hospitalized toddler was not part of God’s will. His creation was perfect, an expression of his passion for beauty. Adam and Eve, the garden, the seas, animals, and stars were part of a masterful harmonizing plan. From before time, God saw Olivia without a tear or struggle. Between creation and Olivia’s birth, what happened to God’s plan?
Sin happened. We are all sinners who downplay the effects of our naughtiness. When sin entered the world, a deafening screech tore across the cosmos. God is blinding perfection, and any human action or thought not in line with him brings a curse into creation. Genesis, Chapter 3, lists the curses triggered by man’s treachery—hostility, pain, broken relationships, and spoiled land. It only takes one sin to unleash random suffering into the universe and we’ve had more than 50 billion people contributing since Eden. The result is mayhem to unsuspecting innocents like Olivia.
I can’t point my finger at anyone because, I too, am guilty. But I don’t despair. Jesus Christ took my guilt onto himself, so that neither Olivia nor I will be punished eternally for my bad choices.
Prayer: Jesus, my God, thank you for the remedy.
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- Written by: Don Goulding
So then, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; what is old has passed away - look, what is new has come! (2 Corinthians 5:17)
God spoke to Moses from a burning bush, and he spoke to me through a manzanita bush. No fire or words came out. Nevertheless, Yahweh imparted truth through a shrub in California’s Sierra foothills.
Some past calamity, perhaps a drought, had starved the branches into gray skeletons, and yet, life sprang from the heartwood. Mahogany-red growth pushed its way around the dry bones. Each branch bore the two faces of a harlequin—ashen death on one side, and deep red life running parallel on the backside.
The bush was all the more wondrous because it held death in juxtaposition with life. God honored this heroic plant by giving it the ultimate color treatment—sage-green leaves set against cinnabar branches, and pink flowers dangling like Chinese lanterns.
That bush was a picture of my life. I ran my fingertips over the twists in the velvety trunk and expected a nature trail placard with my name on it. My past is a petrified record of reaching for temporal increase, resulting in gray death. Jesus touched my heartwood, and new life grew around the ruins of my sin. Like the bush, I became an amalgamation of death and life sharing the same body.
I envy the infant that dies before he learns wickedness from this world. He moves from creation to paradise with no evil thought tainting his soul. But the manzanita tells me that life overcoming death is more beautiful than untested life alone. God’s will for me, therefore, is that I should be made out of good overcoming the evil in me. It’s a painful, and at the same time, glorious fate.
Prayer: God who speaks into my life, let the new overtake the old.