Nature is broken

The world God made is so beautiful, sometimes it's easy to forget that it's as broken as the people who live in it.

If nature wasn't broken, loved ones wouldn't be born with illnesses that can't be cured. Mudslides wouldn't indiscriminately kill and leave families waiting for answers.

Stupid mother cats wouldn't ignore their kittens and let them die in the cold, even though they're right in front of her. And then people wouldn't have to wait, helpless, wondering which kitten will next go stiff and lifeless. And then try to rub life back into its tiny body, hear its tiny cry, and wonder if it even has the strength to suck its mother's milk. And realize they probably don't, and become resigned to waiting until they're all gone.

It wouldn't have to be that way. That mother cat could just as easily have licked them, warmed them, nursed life into them. But she didn't. No amount of hovering by people will fix it. Even if you could keep them warm, they won't live, because their mother won't take care of them.

I wonder if God sometimes feels this way. What does he think when we act selfishly, when we remain cold and heartless even though people who need us are right in front of us? Has he resigned himself to our free will, and waits, knowing that if we choose not to, no amount of hovering can change us?

They're just kittens. That's something you could fix without messing up free will, right? I ask.

Sometimes it all seems unfair. Sometimes my favorite hymn, This Is My Father's World, seems to be mocking.

This is my Father's world, and to my listening ears

All nature sings and 'round me rings

The music of the spheres.

But how much worse is it for God? He is omniscient. He can't put these sorrows out of his mind like we can. He knows when a sparrow falls. He knows when a kitten dies. He knows each person lost on the Malaysian flight more intimately than their own families do.

This is my Father's world; oh, let me never forget

That though the wrong seems oft so strong,

God is the ruler yet.

Some of the tragedies come from human selfishness. Others seem to be accidents—nature's rebellion manifesting in pain. Like us, nature is not immune to the effects of sin. It struggles, fights, and sometimes, by the grace of God, overcomes.

But still we wait, resigned, trying to remember what we know.

 

This is my Father's world. The battle is not done

Jesus who died will be satisfied

And earth and heaven be one.

Willing them to live.

Swallowed Up In Victory

He sought to counsel and calm the despairing man by pointing out to him the man of resignation, and transform the grief that looks down into the grave by showing it the grief which looks up to the stars.  -- Victor Hugo, Les Misérables

One of my favorite Bible passages is 1 Corinthians 15. I latched onto it in middle school mostly because of the grandeur of Paul's phrases. I'm not sure I understood it at all for a long time. I know I'm still working on it.

I heard the famous lines -- "Oh death, where is your victory? Oh grave, where is your sting?" in a service memorializing Josh Larkin last night. I only met Josh once. I was in a friend's video she was shooting for class. Josh was picking songs for us to dance to. Since then, I'd seen him around, but I never really knew him.

It's amazing the outpouring of love I've seen at Taylor since his death. Now, I feel like I really know Josh, at least as most people will remember him. Strangely, in all the tears, it's also been a time of real joy and awakening. This week has brought me back to another time of joy and tears -- the death of my speech teacher, Mrs. Petrie.

I've been to funerals before, but they were quiet, family things where I didn't really know the person who died. Mrs. Petrie and Josh Larkin were different. Their memorial services were both a giant outreach into the Christian community. They placed me in the center of a mass of grieving people with their arms around each other. When those they loved spoke, the were obviously grieving. But I am amazed at how deeply and truly these communities -- the Blairsburg Missionary Alliance Church and Taylor University -- worship God in the face of death.

Mrs. Petrie was the most gentle and loving Christian lady I have ever met. Josh Larkin embraced the life he'd been given and loved everyone he knew. Death is an opportunity to give a long and hard look at a person's life. And they live on.

Mr. Larkin spoke to Taylor yesterday about the death of his son. There is a word I hope stays in use around campus: Joshian. That was a Joshian thing to do. We should all have Joshian love.

Really, we should all love like Christ. Mrs. Petrie exemplified that. I'm learning that Josh did, too. And because of the things I've learned, I can see what Christ's love looks like. I can strive to love as they did.

And I will strive.

For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.”

“O death, where is your victory?

O death, where is your sting?”

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Peace, Love, Joy, and Dogs

Before coming to Taylor, the PA (equivalent to RA) on my floor emailed all of us, asking us to send pictures that reflected our decorating theme: Peace, Love, and Joy. I'm an artist, but I'm not very abstract. So I took some photographs of real things that make me feel peaceful, loving, or joyful. This was one of my pictures for Joy.

This is Kandy. Kandy's a Bernese mountain dog. My family had her for about five years. She was one of those giant dogs that thinks she's small enough to sit in your lap. She made an excellent pillow, and if you spent any amount of time loving her, she'd love you forever and ever.

I'm an animal person. My mom is a veterinarian technician, and I've worked at two vet clinics walking dogs and cleaning kennels. We now have two dogs and a cat at home, and I love both dogs and cats. The special thing about dogs, though, is how much they love people. They may be stupid or smart, obedient or ill-behaved, pretty or scraggly, but a dog that's been well cared for almost always loves its master unconditionally. Kandy was excellent at that. On a bad day, there were few things as comforting for me as sitting down next to her and giving her a big hug. She was a good dog.

But now she's gone. I've often complained that the worst thing about living in a dorm is you can't have a dog. But I think the worst thing now is that I won't be able to hug her when I go home for spring break.

A sparrow can't fall without God seeing, so His eye is probably on the great big lumbering Bernese mountain dogs of the world, too.

I sing because I'm happy
I sing because I'm free

His eye is on the sparrow,

And I know He watches over me.