A sanctified imagination

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Judges 4-5; Psalm 71

TO CHEW ON: "'Thus let all your enemies perish, O Lord!
But let those who love Him be like the sun
When it comes out in full strength.'" Judges 5:31


Judge Deborah was a woman with a vivid imagination. The "Thus..." in the verse above refers to the details of her victory over Sisera as we find them in her song (Judges 5:1-31). This victory ballad is full of imaginative specifics.

She describes the incident of Jael, the tent peg, and the hammer in gory detail (Judges 5:24-27).

She imagines Sisera's mother waiting for her son to return from battle. When he delays, she envisions how this woman and her maids will explain his lateness to themselves:

"Are they not finding and dividing the spoil:
To every man a girl or two;
For Sisera plunder of dyed garments..." (Judges 5:30).

But Deborah's most inspiring use of her imagination is in Judges 4, before she ever had reason to sing that song. Then the situation was still dire. Israel under the thumb of Canaanite King Jabin (and Sisera, his army commander), hadn't seen a ray of hope in twenty years (Judges 4:3). Yet Deborah said to Barak (the commander of Israel's army):

"Up! For this is the day in which the Lord has delivered Sisera into your hand. Has not the Lord gone out before you?" (Judges 4:14).

Her faith in God fueled her imagination so that she saw the victory before it ever actually happened.

Deborah's use of imagination demonstrates three ways we can use our imaginative ability.

• To communicate the human experience in literature: Her description of Jael's actions is imagination put to use in the service of story and poetry. It is one God-given way we can use our visionary ability.

• To reassure ourselves: Deborah's speculation of how Sisera's mother was handling her son's delay shows how imagination can bolster feelings of well-being. However this kind of imagining can easily disintegrate into worry when we  fuel it with pictures of the bad things that could be happening.

• To affirm our faith: We sanctify our imaginings when we use them in the service of faith like Deborah did. This is building a visionary future on God—His person and promises—and then going into action to make it a reality.

May we have more of the kind of imagination that, ignited by God's promises and fed by faith, sees victory before the battle has even begun.

PRAYER: Dear God, thank You for my imagination. Please help me to fuel it not with fear but with faith in You. Amen.

PSALM TO PRAY: Psalm 71 

MORE: The gift of imagination

"Imagination is the greatest gift God has given us and it ought to be devoted entirely to Him. If you have been bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, it will be one of the greatest assets to faith when the time of trial comes, because your faith and the Spirit of God will work together" - Oswald Chambers, February 12th entry in My Utmost for His Highest.

*************
Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Deborah - anointed leader

"Deborah" by Ferdinand Max Bredt

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Judges 4:1-16

TO CHEW ON: "And Barak said to her, 'If you will go with me, then I will go; but if you will not go with me, I will not go!' Judges 4:8

We read here of a rare time when a woman led Israel. Deborah was the nation's judge. Her wisdom attracted the children of Israel to come to her for counsel and justice (Judges 4:5).

She was also a visionary who called for Barak to deploy troops and go to battle against Jabin.

Barak was willing to go. But he wanted Deborah to go with him. Was this a lack of faith or wise realism? Even my Bible's notes differ on what his reluctance to go without Deborah meant. The footnotes to Judges attribute this to a lack of faith. But I like the interpretation expressed in the sidebar article "A Woman Essential to Victory":

"Barak, a great man of faith (Hebrews 11:32) is a classic study in the wisdom of a man's acknowledgment of the potential power of a woman's contribution to a goal. Because of Deborah's godly and skillful leadership traits, Barak (as commander of Israel's armies) would not go into this battle without her, even when told that he would not get full honour for the victory (Judges 4:9). His priority was the welfare of the nation, and he knew that their combined efforts would ensure success as each brought their distinctive, God-given strengths to the challenge" - Jane Hansen, New Spirit-Filled Life Bible, p. 319.

Doesn't Barak's reaction help us recognize our own desire to be led by people—men or women—in whose lives God's presence and power is evident? Such anointed leaders are God's gifts to us as individuals and the church.


PRAYER: Dear God, thank You for the godly men and women who are the leaders in my life and my church. Help me to follow their lead and respect them as Your gift to me. May I be experience Your anointing as I lead in my small way. Amen.


MORE: Deborah in art

Canadian artist Donna Smallenberg uses art to depict inspiring Bible women and spiritual themes. Her painting of Deborah and the explanation of the painting give us even more appreciation for this Bible character. 

***************
Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Wisdom for creativity

Image: Pixabay

TODAY’S SPECIAL: Proverbs 8:22-36

TO CHEW ON: “The LORD possessed me at the beginning of His way,
Before His works of old …
Then I was beside Him as a master craftsman;
And I was daily His delight,
Rejoicing always before Him,
Rejoicing in His inhabited world,
And my delight was with the sons of men.” Proverbs 8:22,31

Today in our continuation of the Lady Wisdom poem we began yesterday, my attention is snagged by one of her strengths or functions—to inspire and facilitate creativity.

- Wisdom speaks here as an eye-witness of creation - Proverbs 8:22, 27-30.
- She especially delights in God’s created humanity (“… and my delight was with the sons of men” - Proverbs 8:31).

The video about the book of Proverbs that was on yesterday’s devo emphasized that the wisdom Proverbs speaks of is not only head knowledge but help in developing practical skills for living well in God’s world.

One of those practical skills is the wisdom of creativity and skill to make things. It’s the wisdom that God bestowed on the craftsman Bezalel and his colleagues to make the worship accessories for the Tabernacle (God to Moses: “‘See, I have called by name Bezalel … And I have filled him with the Spirit of God in wisdom, in understanding, in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship to design… to work… and I have put wisdom in the hearts of all the gifted artisans that they may make all that I have commanded you…’” - Exodus 31:2-6, emphasis added).

Do you like to make things? No matter what your preferred medium—wood, paints, crayons, pens, fabric, metal, glass, precious stones, clay, words, etc.—wisdom to create is a divine gift to you. Use it. Develop it. Embrace it. Joy in it. Put it to work for its highest purpose—to reflect glory back to God.

PRAYER: Dear Father, thank You for the wisdom of creativity. As I seek to develop my interests in this area, help me to use any talents you’ve given me toward their highest purpose—glorifying You. Amen.

MORE: Bible Journaling
I recently reviewed the book The Complete Guide to Bible Journaling and got hooked on a new-to-me area of creativity—meditating on Bible passages through art. If you enjoy activities like doodling, lettering, sketching, drawing, scrapbooking, etc., this might be an avenue of creativity you’d like to explore.

Check out #biblejournaling on Twitter, Instragram, and Pinterest to see some of the amazing art people are creating in Bibles formatted especially for that purpose. 


 *********
Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Wisdom and the Creator

"He drew a circle on the face of the deep" 

Sand artistry by Valentina Beyard (V. Nesdoly photo)

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Proverbs 8:20-36

TO CHEW ON: "When He prepared the heavens, I was there,
When He drew a circle on the face of the deep …
Then I was beside Him as a master craftsman
And I was daily His delight
Rejoicing always before Him."  Proverbs 8:27,30

Have you ever watched a sand artist perform? Using a table which has a shallow layer of sand on it (and which is usually lit from the bottom so observers can watch her movements), the artist's deft fingers and hands create scenes that become faces, then symbols, back to scenes as she draws in the sand.

That's the kind of picture I imagine here as God creates, only on a massive and real scale. He "draws a circle on the face of the deep" and we have earth (attesting to its roundness long before Magellan's voyage or satellite photos). He goes on to settle the mountains in place, craft the fountains, make a boundary for the seas. All the while Wisdom looks on "as a master craftsman; and I was daily His delight, Rejoicing always before Him."

Can't you just see it? The creative trinity (for Jesus, the Word [John 1:1-3,14] and the Holy Spirit were present [Genesis 1:2] at creation) feeding off each others ideas, adding their own, laughing in excitement, delight, and admiration at their ingenuity. In fact, some have suggested that "Wisdom" in Proverbs 8 is the Holy Spirit talking:

"She (wisdom) is speaking to God in Proverbs 8, on her own, and God is working through Wisdom in the creation of the world. They are one! The Father created the world through the Son in the power of the Spirit" - explains theologian Dr. Jurgen Moltmann (quoted by Trudy Beyak in The Mother Heart of God, p. 218. 

My Bible's commenter says about this section: "God's wisdom … has been likened to a woman, is identified as the Eternal One and the life-giver who, according to the New Testament, is Jesus (John 1:1,2; 11:25)" - John Garlock, New Spirit-Filled Life Bible, p. 813.

I take two things with me from today's reading:

1. We do well to explore and delight in God's creation.
One of the reasons I enjoy my camera so much is because it lets me capture images of this world's beauty. I have a photo blog where I share some of my photos. Come by sometime! Every aspect of God's creation we study—from the tiniest building blocks of matter to the vastness of outer space—demonstrates His wisdom and becomes reason to praise.

2. It's good to be creative.
When we are "creative," that is, organize images, words, and  matter in interesting ways (because we never truly create something out of nothing but reassemble things already made) we are demonstrating the image of God in us. I love the picture of Wisdom / Jesus beside God, "His delight" and "rejoicing before Him." Not criticizing or putting Him down but appreciating, enjoying, and cheering. It's an attitude we can cultivate toward the creative efforts of the people in our lives (and toward ourselves).

PRAYER: Creator God, I am in awe of You and Your creativity and wisdom in how You made this world teeming with life and beauty. You are AMAZING! Help me to nurture the creativity of those around me, and within myself. Amen.

MORE: Sand artist in action

Watch the sand artistry of Valentina Beyard. This is from a community Good Friday Service at our church on April 11, 2012.

The Holy Bible, New King James Version Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. - Used with permission.

How impartial are you?

 The Baptism of a Centurion" by Michel Corneille the Elder - 17th Century

TODAY’S SPECIAL: Acts 10:34-48

TO CHEW ON: “Then Peter opened his mouth and said: ‘In truth I perceive that God shows no partiality.’” Acts 10:34

Though Canadian society pays lip service to being impartial, discrimination is all around us. We make judgments about people on the basis of the color of their skin and their ability to speak the language of the country (here, English). We fawn all over entertainers and sports heroes while heaping scorn on folks in other professions simply because of the career they’ve chosen. (Currently it’s fashionable to dump on the police and politicians. Of course TV evangelists are always suspect, as is anyone who speaks out on the wrong side of subjects where political correctness reigns.)

Thankfully God sees through all veneers. He doesn’t give us more points if our skin is white or colored, speak perfectly or brokenly, dress with fashion savvy or in the dumpy clothes we’ve hung onto since the '80s. He sees past our variegated pasts, our personality quirks, and the lines, wrinkles and gray hair that declare us past our best-before dates.

Here he saw the sincerity of Cornelius’s heart. He saw how this Gentile had acted on the knowledge that he had, proving himself a man of prayer and generosity. As a result when God sent Peter to Cornelius to explain the gospel more fully and baptized him and his household with the Holy Spirit, He gave Cornelius a gift that was probably beyond anything this Roman centurion had imagined.

Impartiality is a godly attitude. God is:
- Impartial to worldly rank, power and wealth. Job 34:18-19
- Impartial in lavishing good natural gifts on all mankind. Matthew 5:44,45
- Impartiality regardless of nationality. Acts 10:34-36
- Impartial between Jews and Gentiles. Romans 2:9-11; Romans 10:12
- Impartial in ways we don’t always understand. Matthew 20:13-15

The standard for us as God-followers is to be impartial too. We are to be:
- Impartial in the face of wealth and position. Leviticus 19:15
- Impartial in judgment. Deuteronomy 1:17
- Impartial in the face of the temptation to make an unjust, though popular judgment. Proverbs 18:5
- Impartial in appointing leaders. 1 Timothy 5:21-22
- Impartial in loving and accepting our Christian brothers and sisters. James 2:1-9

Though we will never have the insight into people that God has, we can cultivate His generous, fair heart of acceptance and love. Showing impartiality (like God and Peter showed to Cornelius) is another way we can fit in with His grand purpose of helping to further His kingdom on earth.

PRAYER: Dear God, please help me to recognize prejudice and bias in myself. Help me to see others through Your eyes. Amen.

**********
Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Do your 8-12-year-olds have daily devotions? Point them to Bible Drive-Thru.

Healed on the way

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Luke 17:11-37

TO CHEW ON: "So when He saw them, He said to them, 'Go, show yourselves to the priests.' And so it was that as they went they were cleansed." Luke 17:14

I love how Jesus healed in so many ways. He was never predictable. He never healed according to a formula.

• He healed the centurion's servant and the Syro-Phoenecian woman's daughter from a distance (Matthew 8:13; Mark 7:25-30).

• He took Peter's mother by the hand, and lifted her up (Mark 1:31).

• He commanded the paralytic to get up from his stretcher and take his bed home with him (Matthew 9:6).

• A woman with a private bleeding problem was healed as she touched Jesus' clothes (Matthew 9:20-22).

• He touched blind eyes. (Matthew 9:29).

• He told a man with a shrivelled hand to stretch it out and when he did, it was healed (Matthew 12:13).

• He diagnosed and tackled the root of one person's problem (demon possession) and in the process healed him from being dumb and blind (Matthew 12:22).

• For the deaf man with a speech impediment, Jesus put His fingers in the man's ears, spit and touched the man's tongue, looked up to heaven, "...sighed and said...'Be opened.'" Then the man could hear and speak plainly (Mark 7:32-35).

• And in our story today, He healed ten lepers "as they went."

I could go on, but I'm sure you get the picture. It's as if Jesus was discouraging people from putting faith in a method. Rather, they were to put faith in Him.

Besides illustrating another mode of healing, this incident gives us other insights into divine healing:

1. Miraculous healings can be progressive.
As a sidebar article in my Bible explains: "...not all healing is at the moment of prayer. Instant healings are often expected whereas this illustrates the healing 'in process' over a period of time following prayer" - New Spirit Filled Life Bible, p. 1422.

2. Visiting the doctor doesn't mean we doubt what God has done.
Jesus told these lepers to show themselves to the priests, whose job it was to declare them clean (Leviticus 13:1-59). The priests were the doctors in that culture. Jesus here supports getting outside confirmation of a miraculous healing.

3. Giving credit to God and thanking Him should be our response.
Isn't it interesting that the one leper to return to thank Jesus was a foreigner. My Bible's footnote about this detail says, "Perhaps the others, who were Jews, felt that healing was their due, since they were of the chosen race" - NHSLB, p. 1422. But we know there are no entitlements because of race or lineage in God's kingdom, and no grounds to take any of God's grace gifts (like healing) for granted.

Does someone in your life need healing today? Maybe it's you. Be encouraged if you have prayed but your healing hasn't yet happened. You may still be healed as you continue on your way.

PRAYER: Dear God, I grapple with the fact that there are dear ones for whom I pray, and they are not healed. I have pledged that as long as there is breath, I will pray on. I know You can heal them in earth-time if that is Your plan. If not, I know they will be whole in eternity. Amen.

MORE: The story depicted in art

One of my favourite Bible illustrators is James Tissot (French 1836-1902). Here is his painting inspired by this story.

The Healing of Ten Lepers - by James Tissot

The Brooklyn Museum houses many of Tissot's works. From October 2009 to January 2010 they ran an exhibition of his paintings on the Life of Christ. View a sampling here.

Do your 8-12-year-olds have daily devotions? Point them to Bible Drive-Thru.