Good morning! The sun is shining and the rains have stopped. Thank you, Lord, for the wonderful rain. Every year I get a magazine showing what wonderful places to live exist across the United States. The photographs make your heart pop with envy. How's come we can't live THERE, Abba? The Lord granted me some experience with one of the little tricks the world uses. A photograph can be made to look like the world's version of Heaven. Tweak the light a little with a filter in the field; tweak it some more with Photoshop when you get home. The tricks once done in the dark room, are now done on the computer to a digital image. In Photoshop Lightroom, I can even select effects that mimic the special films of the old days. These days the photographer can turn a blue sky, bluer, or perhaps even green if he wishes. Whatever your idea of heaven on earth, we can probably come up with a place that looks much like it. The other question to ask is what that photograph of their ideal place to live does not show.
Out along the dirt roads, it is sometimes so quiet that I have heard a large swarm of mosquitoes tracking me. Hordes of little bloodsuckers do not say, "Great place to live, mate!" A photograph of a sunny day may take months to capture because the area experiences more rain than you might be comfortable with. Another area might be covered in snow 8 months out of the year, and you only see the image taken in July when nature is in full, but brief bloom. The green of a hay field surrounding the red barn looks so desirable that you simply must move there, but it only exists in the camera, lens, filter, lighting, processing, and digital bag o' tricks - hope you can find room to live amongst all of that! Enjoy the sunny days of your neighbor's garden, but wish some mountains framed the background? No problem, open up that computer program and stitch some photos together - presto! - heaven on earth. What does this made up photo not show? The stink of a feedlot wafting over the land like brown wave. Heaven is right where God keeps it, not in some fantasy made up in a computer. The photos don't show what the facts of the wonderful place also cannot show.
The place has 23,000 souls living there, that is, assuming each populate of the population has a soul. Some people you might have to wonder. And that is the point - you cannot know every one of those people from your armchair at home. Want to escape the shrill voice of that nosy neighbor? She might have a cousin out in that wonderful place to live that takes the shrill and nosy to whole new levels. Does Grover next door put the grump in grumpy old men? His counterpart in that town over yonder might win the curmudgeon grand prize. And the worst thing of all - the problems, shortcomings, sins, and the other side of those relationships that is me, all gets to come with me when I move to that paradise on earth. What a tragedy when that town that took first place this year is dropped off the list next year because I moved in.
Your situation right now might seem so bad that you look at that great place and think about a new name, a little plastic surgery, and I am living a wonderful new life. Hopefully, your situation does not involve U.S. marshals, warrants, and questioning the neighbors. We can get like that though. Wishing not only for the new place, but for a new 'me' to go there. Well, boy, right here and right now, God offers a new birth through His Son to everyone who will repent and believe in Jesus. We have enjoyed such a wonderful opportunity when we were born again in Christ. Right where I am, a new life unfolds every day. The change may be so small that I cannot see it, but the Holy Spirit grows my fruit a little, cleans up the stain of past sin just a bit, forgives a little more, and changes me for the better with each new trial. Right here, a new life emerges from an old tomb in my spirit under the love of God's Son. The grave cloths of the past life may cling, but a new robe of white is shining through underneath. We may look around, but the real change goes on right where you and I live in Christ.
Enjoy the day!Bucky
No comments:
Post a Comment