Beautiful. Both of them.
Resting in Mom's love
I wonder how much we can rest in God's love. The Bible says we are to find shelter under his wings. That we have entered into the rest of Christ. I think that's what it looks like. Resting on the chest of someone who will absolutely love, absolutely protect. There's no place for anxiety. No place for worry. Just peace, because there's no reason to mistrust Him.
Luke doesn't worry about whether we will hold him. He doesn't fret about whether we'll be there when he wakes up. Not when he's sleeping. He knows nothing other than to give in to loving arms that surround him. He finds rest there, because of the full trust he has, not in spite of it.
How many of us rest in God like my son above? That's what rest in Christ is. Total trust in loving arms that we have no reason to believe will not be there. Letting him do the protecting and the work and just falling asleep.
You have no reason to worry. God's an even better parent than Angela, above, is. He's perfect. He never slips. Never fails to clean up our mess or feed us when we need it. Heck, he turned a few loaves and fish into a meal for thousands the other day in the reading. He has a compassionate heart that doesn't say, "Send them out to get food." He says, "You give it to them." And then he breaks it and hands it to the person next to him. 'Til every last one is satisfied.
We don't have an incapable God. We don't have one on whose watch we need to stay awake to make sure nothing happens. We have one, like in the photo above, in whose arms we can fall asleep and in whose care we can forget where we are, forget everything, and just know that it will be all right.
Only, you may want to clean your own diaper from time to time.
Genesis 46:1-47:31, Matthew 15:1-28, Psalm 19:1-14, Proverbs 4:14-19
Mama...mama...I'm (not) coming ho-o-ome. Jacob leaves the place near where the promise was given to his descendants. He travels to a foreign land to stay for what would be 420 years. As a people. Israel's body would be taken home to rest with his ancestors. It's just another reason that God knows what he's doing. He leads his people to a place, for their survival, from which he will later have to liberate them. And eventually, mama...[they're] coming home.
(Or going. Going would be appropriate grammar. But, uh, it wouldn't fit with the _____ reference. Wouldn't you like to know what ____ is? *Sticks tongue out,* on a Christian blog, but quickly apologizes, so it's cool. Was imitating a frog. *Sticks tongue out* again. Because now we're friends and friends can do that.)
Jesus is all real. So real. He is the ultimate unhypocrite. He neutralizes hypocrisy in the world by his radical unhypocritical-ness. He chastises the Pharisees for following rules without the right heart. They don't care about the right reasons and therefore end up with the right rules for the wrong reasons or the wrong rules for the wrong reasons. It's a sliding scale away from godliness without the heart thing. Then, in a seemingly different example, he meets a woman to whom the right rules (God's) say Jesus isn't to minister. But guess what? She has the right heart. So he gives her what she asks. Is God saying do whatever you want by your own rules (with the right heart) and you'll be pleasing to God? No! That's not even possible when you're making up the rules. But he is saying your heart is what matters. If that's in the right place, the rules that should be bent will be. 'Cuz it ain't about them anyway. They aren't what God came to save. But the heart is precisely the heart of what is. And it's what God cares about. So where's yours?
Psalms serves up another sweet worship sesh. Things burst forth. Things proclaim. The glory of God shows up. The soul is revived. Hidden faults are cleansed. It's a might-uh pleasin' med-uh-tation of da heart and-uh word of ma mout' (Their Eyes Were Watching God style).
And if you want to be wise, if you've been following this year through the Bible just to become wise, Proverbs gives a simple plan: don't even go near the path of evildoers. They don't know what trips them BECAUSE THEY'RE IN THE DARK. PSST! Who turned out the lights?? So...simple math. If you don't want to be asking later how that happened, what tripped you up, don't walk in the dark. It's only in the dark that they don't know. And you know that path. So stay away from it.
To read along:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%2046:1-47:31,%20Matthew%2015:1-28,%20Psalm%2019:1-14,%20Proverbs%204:14-19&version=NKJV
