“We live by faith, not by sight.” ~ 2 Corinthians 5:7

In marching band/drum corps, a lot of what goes on has to do with trust.  You play your part and march your part of the drill and hope that everyone else does their part well.

Today it suddenly struck me that marching band is a good example of what it means to be a Christian.  I had never really thought about it until I went to my high school’s special exhibition for the parents at the end of band camp tonight.  It rained while they were supposed to do their show, so we went into the gym instead, and the band just stood still and played through the music.  Well, just as they were getting ready to play the fight song, lightning struck.  The drum line played the roll off: Dut dah crash!  Dut dah crash!  Drrrrr dut dah crash!  And suddenly the lights were out, right as the band began playing.  Now, this is a high school marching band.  Lowerclassmen make up the majority of the band.  The expectation in this situation—attempting to play the fight song in a pitch black gymnasium—is for the whole band to freak out, minus a few calm people.  Well, to everyone’s amazement, the whole band continued playing.  The band has only had the music for the fight song since Tuesday.  Of course, some of the upperclassmen had it memorized because they played the same part last year, but a lot of people had never seen their part before Tuesday.  Yet, they had enough of it memorized, and they were confident enough that they were able to continue playing along with the drum line keeping the tempo, even though they couldn’t see the drum major.

So it hit me as I was driving home that that situation is just another one of God’s ways of showing that He has everything planned out perfectly, and that everything works according to His will.  Just as the band continued to play, doing their own part to the beat of the drums, trusting that everyone else would do the same, we also live by faith according to the beat of God’s heart, trusting that the rest of the body of Christ will do the same.  And even on the field while marching, the marching band continues to march blind, unable to see anything behind them.  They keep their eyes forward and let the people behind them take care of themselves.  In the same way, we press forward toward the goal Christ has set before us, and we leave our past behind to take care of itself.  We remember the past so that we don’t backtrack and run into it again, but we never look back, always continuing forward.

Being a band geek, I just had to share this.  It’s cool how God uses everything to prove His existence and to show His people how to follow Him.

Three in One

What makes a triangle?  Its three points and three sides, right?  But it’s still one triangle.  The Trinity is like that: three identities, but just one God.  And water is similar.  It can come in three states: solid, liquid, or gas.  But no matter what state it’s in, it’s still water, even if it’s ice or vapor.  Whether you’re referring to God the Father, God the Son, or God the Holy Spirit, you’re still talking about God either way.  And what’s also cool about the states of water is that the Father is like vapor because He can’t be seen and He remains in heaven, the Spirit is like liquid water because He fills us and flows through us and around us, and the Son is like ice because He physically manifested Himself on earth as a tangible human being.

Limits

God gave us limitations so we could see that He has none.

The Eye of a Hurricane

“God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.  Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.” ~ Psalm 46:1-3

"With all creation I sing"

I don't regularly close my eyes during worship, but when I feel especially moved or when I feel especially detached and desperate for a Spirit of worship, I'll close my eyes to get into a posture of prayer. So tonight during worship at Freshley, I had my eyes closed when we started singing Revelation Song. When we got to the line, "With all creation I sing, 'Praise to the King of kings! You are my everything, and I will adore You,'" an image of birds chirping and the famous UGA North Campus squirrels flashed through my mind, and I thought of something. "With all creation I sing"— "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 1:20). All of creation is constantly testifying to who God is, revealing His power and bringing Him glory. When birds sing in the morning, most people think they are calling to each other or sounding out mating calls. But I believe they have another motive behind their singing. Dogs bark, cats meow, cows moo. All animals have their unique calls, and with those unique calls, all of creation praises the Creator. Sure, animals have mating calls, but consider this: Could it be possible that an animal's mating call is nothing but a song of worship to God that attracts the opposite gender of its species? I think animals show an even greater understanding than we do of the quote, "A woman's heart should be so lost in God that a man has to seek Him to find her."

Anyway, my point is that all of creation is always in a state of worship, bringing praise to God with their mere existence. Shouldn't we be the same way? God has made us unique and set us apart from the animals, but that doesn't mean we can't learn from them. After all, the Bible makes plenty of references to animals as examples when giving advice. The reason for our existence is to bring glory to God and to bring others to desire to do the same, and that's exactly what God's creation does, but we have fled from our purpose. "Go to the ant, you sluggard," Solomon says in Proverbs 6:6; "Go to creation, you servant of God!" We need to learn what it means to worship, and according to creation, to live is to worship and to worship is to live.

"With all creation [we] sing, 'Praise to the King of kings! You are my everything, and I will adore You!"

Everything is...

We've all heard someone say, "Everything is science," or, "Everything is music," or maybe, "Everything is language." I was sitting in my Music Appreciation class today, and my professor said, "Everything is math." And suddenly a light bulb went off in my head: If everything is math, music, language, science, history, art, and so on, everything is everything. That means everything is connected. If everything is connected, then there must be an original source of everything.

My mind is scrambling to sort my thoughts out into clear, understandable language, so I'll keep this short and simple. God is the original source of everything. God introduced science to humans. He introduced language to us, as well as history, music, math, art, etc. The very same God who gave us the breath of life, who gave us the ability to love, also gave us the ability to learn. And since we have the ability to learn, there must be something in the world for us to learn about. So God gave it to us. All of it. And all of it is contained in everything because God is in everything. Just as a composer leaves his stylistic mark in his music, God also leaves His mark on His creation. And that mark is Wisdom.

The Bible says in Proverbs 8:22-31 that Wisdom was the first creation, that Wisdom was with God when He formed the earth and that she (Wisdom) took part in the creation. All of the subjects mentioned above are a part of Wisdom. The Apostle Paul writes in Romans that we are all parts of the body of Christ (Romans 12:4-5). In the same way, all subjects make up Wisdom as a whole.

I'm still having trouble wording this the way I want to, but I think I've gotten my point across. If not, just leave a comment with any questions you might have. I'll try to make my answers more thorough than this blog entry.

Anyway, until next time, God bless!

Michael

—————————————————————
"I want men everywhere to lift up holy hands in prayer, without anger or disputing." ~ 1 Timothy 2:8

"I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. For to live is Christ and to die is gain." ~ Philippians 1:20-21