I have always loved taking pictures of the beauty of nature and the countryside. A few years ago, while I was teaching at the University of Southern Indiana, there was a flowerbed that was always full of various wildflowers that attracted a variety of butterflies. For each of the six years I taught at U.S.I, the same cycle played out each spring, summer, and fall. By April, the first plants began to bloom, followed by what appeared to be an attack of caterpillars that lasted until late June. By the end of July, the campus was bursting in activity as the first of the butterflies shed their cocoons and took their first flight.
Since those early years of elementary school science we have all been taught that although each butterfly starts life as a caterpillar, will make a cocoon, and will emerge as a beautiful butterfly. Although the same insect from a biological viewpoint, it is a transformed creature that is no longer bound by the restraints of its former self; it has been liberated from its lowly estate and given the gifts of beauty and flight. This reminds me of what had been written by the apostle Paul, Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new (II Corinthians 5:17). Although I did come to accept the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal Savior in 1988, I have struggled nearly daily with the ugliness of sin and the memories of the person I was and when I fail and choose to yield to sin since accepting Christ. I have always found it easier to forgive others than it has been to forgive myself.
Since this past Saturday, I have been struggling with this very issue; what has made it different than any other struggle is that the Lord has used several different messages to reaffirm not only His word and promises but has shown me that I have reached a plateau in my spiritual walk where he cannot continue to bless me as long as I continue to hold on to the things of the past. It began as I was preparing the service bulletin covers for Gospel Light Baptist Church as a part of the printing ministry my wife and I operate out of the church. As I chose the picture featured in this post as the cover image, I began to criticize myself for not completing the printing sooner, the failing part within the printer, and how I had not prepared anything for our church’s quarterly second Sunday singing that took place last night. By the time that Saturday evening came around, I was well on my mental journey to criticizing and judging myself to a degree that was not only common, but spiritually dangerous as well.
Yesterday morning, our Sunday School teacher, Eddy Owens, offered a lesson based on Ezekiel 36: 23-26 – And I will sanctify my great name, which was profaned among the heathen, which ye have profaned in the midst of them; and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, saith the Lord GOD, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes. For I will take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land. Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you. A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. We have all had the experience where it seems that the preacher (or in this case, a Sunday School teacher) has been peering into the inner chambers of our heart and is teaching what we need to hear!
