Ancient Skies

The Greek word for ‘creation’ is ‘poema’, the root word for poem.

If you look at the sky on a crisp, clear night and begin counting the countless twinkling stars; or if you feel the fading warmth of a day’s heat on your face as you watch the sun dip under the dusty horizon of the grand canyon; or if you stare in disbelief during a solar eclipse  -  the sky is an amazing part of God’s poetic creation.

I’ve never thought about creation as a poem before.

Poems need rhyme, meter, rhythm, lyrical hooks, themes and originality. Some poems are obscure and difficult to ‘get’. Others seem child-like and too superficial to have any impact. But other poems can touch you deeply.

Creation should touch us deeply.

The sea touches me deeply as do songs and melodies and peoples’ words and BBC classics like The Frozen Planet. But it was the sky that touched me this Christmas.

DARTMOOR SKY - DECEMBER 2011

It is like a canvas onto which God projects all manner of colour and shade and cumulus form. And clouds concealed Jesus when He left planet earth and it will be the clouds that are his foot-stool when He returns.

To me, the sky represents heaven touching earth. If there was going to be a portal to touch and walk through to enter the other heavenly reality, it would be the sky. It seems so ultimate and ethereal in that it can’t be touched, too high and lofty to fully appreciate. But one day Jesus will split the sky.

Finally, it is virtually impossible to think about the sky without thinking about clouds,  in the same way it is impossible for a Christian to think about God and not think about grace and love. Skies contain clouds and clouds represent the presence of the Almighty.

I hope when you next look at the sky or a cloud, or the waters of the sea, or even a flower bed on a busy roundabout, that you remember that ‘creation’ all around is a ‘poem’ to be read.

What is the poem of the world around you saying, today?

“Do You Trust Me?”

When David Brent repeatedly asked the Swindon lot, ‘do you trust me?’, we laugh because of course they didn’t! Brent is the last person in the world that you would find yourself trusting. The Swindon crew’s resounding silence tells the story:  ‘No, we do not trust you” – even when Brent makes them say that they do.

One particular verse has kept me sane recently from Romans, (15:13). It goes like this:

“May the God of hope FILL you with all JOY and PEACE as you TRUST in Him so that you may OVERFLOW with HOPE by the power of the HOLY SPIRIT”

I love this verse for many reasons. One of them is the flowing exuberance of experience that Paul is writing with and another is the word AS.

This tiny word points to such a crucial principle in our lives of faith – i.e. that actually in the process of trusting we experience the joy and peace and overflowing hope of the God of hope who pours into us to the point of filling up and the point of overflowing. As we trust we are filled by the power of the Holy Spirit with hope, joy and peace.

Again, Isaiah 26:3 – “For You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast because he trusts in You“. This steadfastness of mind is to do with the trusting of God’s reality in our lives, by the Holy Spirit, above all other things…all other temptations, trials and difficulties…the things of situations and contexts that press in and flex their muscles around us so that this word AS might be done away with, the very link with the hope we crave.

If we don’t trust we become like the Swindon lot and our God is dishonoured. Even when we say we trust He sees if we truly do. When we choose to trust, despite it all, He is honoured and we know the link to limitless and supernatural joy, peace and hope.

Our great Abba longs, longs, longs for us to experience this hope, joy and peace and to overflow into testimony of it, not just theoretically agree and nod our heads.

“Do you trust me?”

Divine Mitosis

When the Bible shows us Jesus praying it’s a big deal. When the Bible gives us a whole chapter of Jesus praying this is an even bigger deal.

I think we all struggle with prayer to some extent and at different points in our lives. Feelings can rise up in us like: “But I’d really rather watch the football…or I’d rather chill out at the movies or watch x-factor…or have an hour more in bed.”

At the root of this is the issue of our desire to pray. Are we fulfilling some kind of obligation because we know it’s good for us much like going to the gym or eating brussel sprouts?

One verse in the Bible that I think is really helpful with this is where Jesus asks Abba that we would be granted the love in our hearts for Him that Abba has in His heart for Jesus. JOHN SEVENTEEN VERSE TWENTY SIX.

This is one of the most stunning thoughts of the Bible. It shows that Jesus really wants us to love Him and enjoy relating to Him (THIS IS PRAYER) and that it is possible for prayer to become for us a pleasure, not like going to the gym or eating vegetables, but like eating a Christmas dinner or enjoying a vintage glass of red wine. David said ‘My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods” (Psalm 63:5).

As cells reproduce kind for kind (via Mitosis) organs grow, skin is reproduced and red blood cells are born. The significance of mitosis is that each cell formed receives chromosomes that are exact in composition and equal in number to the chromosomes of the parent cell.

Divine Mitosis is what Jesus saw as He knelt and prayed as John listened in. Jesus saw a future Bride upon the earth, His people, who loved Him with the SAME all-consuming love that the Father has for Him.

Imagine that picture above as a spiritual picture of your heart becoming the heart of God and your prayer becoming Jesus’ prayer.

© Nick Franks, 2011