grateful for Christ

As I sat outside in my parents’ porch swing (which is actually on the lawn) this afternoon, I suddenly noticed texture.  No, I’m not an infant just beginning to explore the world; I mean that I noticed texture as something indicative of God, namely His great variety.  It occurred to me that, while textures do serve functional purposes, God could have created everything with the same texture, choosing instead to accomplish those purposes in a different way.  There is such tremendous variety in such a simple thing as texture, and God’s choice to create things with variety does not fit well into the practical, functional mindset in which I had been imprisoned until recently (even still I am like a butterfly just trying its wings).

Consider it:  God could have created a single species of plant and a single species of animal.  And He didn’t have to create DNA & genes that would allow for great variations within species.  All humans could have looked alike.  Colors need not have been created.  He did not even need to create us within a universe of physical matter.  We could have been created as mere entities which simply exist, with no concept of space or time at all–as though we all lived our entire existences within the same infinitesimally small point.  But He didn’t.  Why?

Somebody might say, “Well, why would He create it like that?  He is the Creator and, as such, enjoys being creative.”  Pretty much, yeah.  That’s the case.  But if you had been thinking like me, you would have said something like, “Well, God’s whole purpose after the Fall is to lead us to Christ, so why would He have extra/useless stuff hanging around instead of re-engineering the universe to bring people to Christ, throwing away everything that doesn’t directly serve that purpose?”

My old ideas failed in that they did not recognize a huge part of who God is.  God is creative!  God does things even though He doesn’t have to!  Sometimes He does things simply to delight in them.  Other times they serve very real, vital purposes.  Either way, everything about Him seems punctuated by variety.  Even His unity as God is composed of three Persons (the Trinity).  Variety is an essential aspect of God’s nature.

When God works, He seems to do things differently quite often.  Jesus healed blind men both instantaneously and by creating a spit-mud mixture and placing it on the eyes.  Toward religious hypocrites, He responded with judgment; toward the misguided, He spoke with compassion; toward the truth-agnostic Pilate, He had little to say at all.  Through the Holy Spirit, God grants a plethora of spiritual gifts to build up the church.  Everybody receives some gift that is necessary for the church and contributes it (or is supposed to, anyway), even if some gifts are more beneficial than others.

Before anything, we should stop and praise our Father for who He is.  Glory to the One who is Life Himself, by and through whom all things were created, and for whose pleasure variety exists!  And knowing the openness of God to holy variety (for there is also variety in sin–that is not the variety of which I write), so should we be open to variety in Christ.

Do not fear, as I once did, that serving God in this way must be better or worse than in that way.  It is not for us to judge that to which we are called.  Our place is to be faithful to what God gives us, but to also know that God is open to allowing us to love and serve Him in the ways our hearts desire.  Therefore, do not determine to serve God in a particular way because you think that is the only good way to serve Him.  If you do decide to serve Him in a particular way, only do it because it would delight your heart to serve Him in that manner.  And if it delights you, then it will delight Him unless He has a reason for you to do something else.  Finally, if He does end up having you do what would be your “Plan B,” then delight yourself in that as a wonderful way to glorify your Lord.  Have a spirit full of love for God and you need not fear.

In the same way, do not judge another’s service to God.  Obviously, if their service is in such error as to be sinful, pray for them and see if God would have you gently correct them in love.  By the same token, if it simply seems misguided, pray for them.  But if it just different than the service you or others around you engage in, do not condemn it.  God may yet have a purpose for it that you know nothing about.  This calls for wisdom, and wisdom comes from God through the Holy Spirit and prayer.