Loaves and Fishes

"Toward evening the disciples approached him. 'We're out in the country and it's getting late. Dismiss the people so they can go to the villages and get some supper.' But Jesus said to them, 'They need not go away; you give them something to eat'" (Matthew 14:15,16).

Jesus’ disciples were flummoxed by this request. A little boy gave his lunch to Jesus and by it fed the crowd (Matthew 14:13-21).

One school of progressive thought contends that the little boy's generosity simply moved others in the crowd to share their lunches, but Matthew clearly intends us to understand that it was a miracle and an important miracle at that, in that the story appears in all four Gospels.

What can we learn?

Family members, neighbors, friends, colleagues and others stand around me in various stages of need. Should I send them away to someone more capable than I.

Certainly some people’s needs exceed our ability to help them, but not always. "They need not go away," Jesus would say. "You give them something to eat.” Whatever you have—a hug, a kind word, a listening ear, a brief prayer, some wisdom you've gathered over the years— give it away and see what I can do."

Little is much when God is in it. Give what you have to Him and see what He will do (Ephesians 3:20)

David Roper

1.22.18

 Rise And Shine

“As long as it is day, We must do the work of him who sent me.”—John 9:4

If you woke up in this morning and saw the light of day, God has work for you to do.

Perhaps your work is to love and to pray, laboring fervently in prayers, that others "may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God” (Colossians 4:12).

Your work may be to listen quietly and attentively to those that are weary and speak words of comfort to them. Or it may be to endure pain with cheerful endurance, and gratitude for those who serve you. If you've done nothing more than this you’ve done the work of him who sent you. 

Do you think you're too old, too sick, too weary to do God's work? "He is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8).

Years ago I read an introduction to a commentary by Matthew Henry that states well my thoughts as I write: “If I may but be instrumental to make others wise and good, wiser and better and more in love with God and His word, I have all I desire, all I aim at.”

Who could ask for anything more?

David Roper

1.19.18

I Have a Dream 

“Delight yourself also in the Lord, And He will give you the desires of your heart” (Psalms 37:4).

Forty years ago I read J.R.R. Tolkien's short story "Leaf By Niggle" for the first time and was strangely moved by it, though at first I didn't know why. I've since read it a half-dozen times or more and each time have experienced a sudden awareness of truth, especially now that I'm much closer to my own long journey.

In the story, an artist named Niggle, longs to finish an enormous canvas of a great Tree in the middle of a forest. He invests each leaf of his Tree with obsessive attention to detail, making every one uniquely beautiful. Niggle ends up discarding all his other artworks, or tacks them onto the main canvas, which becomes a single embodiment of his dream—a dream he longs to complete before he takes his long journey.

But, despite Niggle’s efforts to accomplish the task, his crippled neighbor, Parish—who calls on him for help at the most inopportune times— endlessly interrupts him. At one point Niggle has to sacrifice part of his canvas to patch Parish’s leaking roof and this, along with other distractions, frustrates his great work—until he takes his long journey and reaches his final destination. There “before him stood the Tree, his Tree, finished. If you could say that of a Tree that was alive, its leaves opening, its branches growing and bending in the wind that Niggle had so often felt or guessed, and had so often failed to catch. He gazed at the Tree, and slowly he lifted his arms and opened them wide. ‘It's a gift!’ he said. He was referring to his art, and also to the result; but he was using the word quite literally.” [1]

In the end Niggle is rewarded with the realization (the making-real) of his great dream,[2] a far better thing than the flawed and incomplete form of his own desires.

Perhaps you too have a wondrous dream—a holy task to be completed before you take your long journey—but interruptions and distractions continually frustrate you. Be encouraged. “The Lord will perfect that which concerns (you)” (Psalm 138:8). Delight yourself in the Lord this day and he, in good time, will “make real” your desire—in this life, perhaps, or surely in the life to come, where all our dreams come true.

David Roper

[1]The story is largely autobiographical, reflecting Tolkien's absorption with finishing The Lord of the Rings in the midst of constant interruption. In a letter to a friend he wrote: "I should say that, in addition to my tree-love—the story was originally called "The Tree"—it arose from my own pre-occupation with TLOR, the knowledge that it would be finished in great detail or not at all, and the fear (near certainty) that it would be 'not at all.'"

[2] Or, if you prefer, Niggle's Tree was ultimate reality and always existed; he simply reflected it in 

Our God is a Consuming Fire

"The ‘fire’ that will consume sinners at the coming of the Kingdom of God is the same ‘fire’ that will shine with splendor in the saints. It is the ‘fire’ of God’s love; the ‘fire’ of God Himself who is Love. ‘For our God is a consuming fire’” (Thomas Hopko, The Orthodox Faith).

MacDonald’s old Scot, David Elginbrod, had a similar take: “Watever may be meant by the place o’ meesery, depen’ upo’t…it’s only anither form o’ love shinin’ through the fogs o’ ill (our misunderstanding) and sae gart leuk (so made like) something vera different thereby (George MacDonald, David Elginbrod).

Material fire cannot afflict a spiritual being, so the “fires of hell” may be symbolic. Thus the torment of hell may be God's love reigning down o those that don't want it.[i]

It occurs to me that this may be one reason we’re called, as God’s beloved children, to love our enemies (Romans 12:21). They cannot endure the torment of our affection. Perhaps Paul had that idea in mind when spoke of love that heaps “burning coals” on the heads of our enemies.

There may be a reflection of that idea in the first Harry Potter book—the only one I’ve managed to read so far. Lily Potter, Harry's mother, so loved Harry that she impregnated her love into her son's skin, somewhat as God does when he pours his love into our hearts. When Harry’s opponent, Professor Quirrell, touched Harry to harm him, her love, the love that ennobled her son, shattered the professor.

Paul agrees: “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” (Romans 12:21).

David Roper

---

[i] It’s significant that our Lord’s word for hell was Gehenna, not Hades, the usual word for the nether world. Gehenna was a geographical location, a valley located southwest of Jerusalem that was the refuge dump for the city. Early in Jerusalem’s history it was set on fire and burned continually, producing billowing clouds of acrid smoke. To our Lord it represented a powerful symbol for hell as a “cosmic garbage dump,” a place of ruined, wasted lives (Cf. Mark 9:43 et. al.).