Focusing

Doubts come in all shapes and forms, and often spring up from difficult circumstances or unexpected events.  But what do you do when you’re absolutely sure that God has placed you where he wants you, but it isn’t as easy as you had expected?  The following PDF file deals with that question as God challenged me once again to quit toying with a “back up plan.”  Nope, we’re to be here sink or swim, no plan B.  For more information please read Killing Plan B

Marla is in Kenya attending her best friends wedding.  It’s great that she can be there, and I’m having a great time with the girls… though it is a lot harder to do anything else during the day. Thanks for your prayers

It’s the thoughts of my wife that push me most to find an answer.  It’s the softness of her soul; the creativity of her humor and the purity of her gaze.  Things that I know few others will ever see.  Things that contain such beauty that I think it an absolute shame that others don’t also see.  Like a flower that blooms in absolute perfection that then withers without so much as entertaining one eye or a sunset of stunning colors exploding in the sky that no one beholds.  Like the quiet majesty of a mountain so remote that no climber will ever touch its summit or the intricacies of the smallest snowflake that falls on a mountain side that will melt with no one taking notice.  These thoughts of my wife, along with the thoughts of these other things; things that posses such beauty, push me for an answer.  What is the purpose of it?  What is the purpose of beauty?

As I know there is a Creator, so I believe that beauty was a created thing.  So why, I now ask, was it created if it wasn’t to be enjoyed by all?  After all, we have all seen beauty.  At one time or another, we have all been captured by beauty, caught simply reveling in its perfection.  And as beauty capture us, we try in our own way to capture it right back.  A flower picked and put in a vase.  A photograph taken and displayed on a wall.  A song sung, or a story told that has moved us to tears and was recorded.  These are all ways that we try to hold onto beauty and surround ourselves with it.

When we see things of beauty, often our first reaction is to share it with somebody else.  It is the nudge at your husband’s side, or accordion of pictures each grandparent shamelessly seems to have.  We assume the pinnacle of such sharing to be something that reaches the widest audience.  TV, radio, books, magazines; can all be attempts to translate and transmit beauty.  And in being translated and transmitted, it seems that beauty is used to endorse certain things. And in doing so; in being used or in hiring itself out, we see how beauty can become commercialized or twisted.  So when did the twisting happen?  And returning to the original question, what is the purpose of beauty?

Oh, the purpose of beauty IS to be enjoyed; to be reveled in; to hold captive.  But what I’ve learned recently is that the central purpose of beauty is not particularly for our enjoyment.  The principle reason that beauty exists is not for the created; but for the Creator.  Beauty was not created for the pleasure of the widest audience, but for an audience of One.  It is for Him to enjoy, to revel in and to be held captive.  That we also enjoy these things simply shows; that it is in His image that we were fashioned.  So the beauty of the intricate snowflake, the remote majestic mountain, the sunset and the flower, all have indeed been enjoyed as they were created to be; though not by human eyes.  And in the same way, the softness of her soul, the creativity of her humor, and the purity of her gaze are also fulfilling their created purpose for her Creator.  And I am truly blessed that He lets me share with Him the view; to revel in and be held captive.

“…for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.”  Rev. 4:11

In all of our traveling back and forth it used to be that “home” was where ever we were not.  If we were in Brazil, when we spoke of “home” we understood that we were speaking of our life in the US.  And like wise, when ever we spoke of “home” while in the US, we knew we were speaking of our life in Brazil.  But over the past several years a funny thing has started happening… though it is often accompanied by a very lengthy delay; “home” has started feeling like where ever we are currently at.

When we were in Brazil, about a year into our stay there, Brazil truly did begin to feel like home.  But then just a few weeks ago I commented to Marla that finally Newberg was starting to feel like home once again.  Perhaps it is the consistency of finally having a routine, or perhaps it is getting comfortable with where we are at. What ever the cause, for the first time in a long time, it finally feels like we are home.

Of course having a “home” and actually being there, brings with it all kinds of warm fuzzies, especially around the holidays.  Family traditions, cold weather, hot cocoa and Christmas trees all seem better when we are back in the United States.  And believe you me; we are sure going to enjoy it all while we are here.

But there, nagging in the back of our minds through all of the holiday cheer, are the one-way plane tickets that we purchased to Brazil.  It seems we are eternally leaving home.  It used to be that such trips always brought us back “home.”  Now it feels as if they continually take us from “home.”  These trips are getting increasingly harder to take.  To read more click the link “home…“