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Journals can be a wonderful source
of insight. We can learn from our experiences as we write privately about
them. Then when we find an insight that we want to share, we can take what
we've learned and write about it for all to see.
"Dawson Trotman said,
"Thoughts disentangle themselves when they pass through your fingertips."
The Bible has several examples of God telling people to keep a spiritual
journal. It says, "At the Lord's direction, Moses kept a written record of
their progress." Moses obeyed God's command to record
Israel's spiritual journey. If he had been lazy, we would be robbed of the
powerful life lessons of the Exodus.
Don't just write down the pleasant things. Record your doubts, fears, and struggles with God.
Sometimes the
greatest lessons come out of pain...In the middle of a painful experience, the psalmist wrote,
"Write down for the coming generation what the Lord has done, so that people
not yet born will praise him."
We owe it to future generations to preserve
the testimony of how God helped us fulfill his purposes on earth. It is a
witness that will continue to speak long after you're in heaven. (Rick Warren,
The Purpose Driven Life, p. 308-9).
The following newsletter article began as a journal entry. I
took the insight originally captured in my journal and rewrote it for
others.
Listening
Ears by Luann Budd (first published by NEWIM)
"For since the creation
of the world, God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine
nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made
so that men are without excuse." Romans 1
Maltbie
Babcock, like many of us, would find that he had had his fill of the
problems and pettiness of the ministry and would need a break. He'd
walk past the church office and say to his secretary, "I'm going to be
about my Father's world." His church was situated on a hill overlooking
a valley, so he'd go outback to listen to the Lord. Doesn't the Lord
often speak to us through His creation?
Last
January a storm came down from Alaska and cut across the San Francisco
Bay making the morning bitterly cold, at least by California's
standards. So I walked quickly, trying to hide inside the hood of my
coat. I usually enjoy my early morning walks across campus, but this
morning I was cold.
I have a
tree along my route, a favorite tree, easily a hundred feet tall and
over a century old. As I walk to my office, the sidewalk turns so that I
walk toward this tree for several minutes. Each morning as I approach
my gnarled old tree, it speaks to me of its Maker. This morning, I once
again reflected on my friend.
I was
shocked to see that my tree had been disrobed, not one leaf was left on
its silvery branches, yet still it stood as always though strangely bare
and frosty.
Jesus, too,
had been disrobed of his majesty, yet he continued to stand immovable
against evil's bitter blast. Abandoned. Shamed. He disrobed himself of
omnipotence and glory and chose to hang on that other tree for me. I
felt the chill of the wind and wondered what it would be like to stay
outside all day, exposed. Jesus stayed six hours, exposed.
Lord, may
we, too, stand immovable--even if stripped bear and beaten, even if
bitterly cold and betrayed, even if clamored after and successful. We
want to be like you, immovable, obedient, unshaken by storms or praise.
Pastor
Babcock died at the age of 42, but before he died he wrote the words to
a favorite hymn about how the Lord spoke to him on that hill behind his
church. "This is my Father's world / The birds their carols raise / The
morning light, the lily white / Declare their Makers praise. / This is
my Father's world: / He shines in all that's fair; / In the rustling
grass I hear Him pass, / He speaks to me everywhere." As we go about
our full days, whether stressed by the ministry or perplexed by the
world, may we hear his voice and listen as he speak to us, everywhere.
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