Tag: autumn

Reality Just Beyond the Glass

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I sit behind a polished windowpane
Hearing the hum of heated air through vents.

On the other side of the glass
Lie trees in autumn splendor on a hillside.

The gentle breeze takes yellowish foliage
To a carpet of gold and green below.

Wafting in every direction under sunlight,
Drop beautiful leaves.

On goes a gorgeous shower of what was,
Making room for what will be.

The sunbeams on the shimmering trees
And the continual dance of the season proceeds;

As I sit behind glass panes in a building made by man,
Peering out at the artistry of God.

On the wall beside me hangs a framed photograph
Of an autumn scene.

While beautiful the picture is,
It does not compare to the reality just beyond the glass.

What comes directly from God
Cannot be adequately reproduced by man.

Chairs, buildings, heating systems, automobiles,
Framed art, calculators, tennis shoes, cherry pie, basketballs.

All these reflect the mind of our Creator,
Who designed our minds to design these things.

Yet, for all we make,
Nothing compares to what God creates!

Galaxies, mountains, antelopes, apple trees,
Sunshine, emeralds, sharks, bluebirds, waterfalls.

I appreciate the comfortable library in which I sit.
I enjoy looking out its windows when the ice of winter comes.

But my soul longs for the day
When I will not be separated from any of the handiwork of God.

I wait for the day when the city in which I walk
Will not have been manufactured by the hand of people.

Come quickly the day when everything about existence is as beautiful and rich as God intended,
Untainted by the messiness of humanity.

I wait for . . .
“The holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.”

A city that comes from Heaven, right down from the throne of God!
This will be my home!

In that day, nothing will be unsatisfactory
Because nothing will be “once-removed” from God’s perfection.

All will be as He desires,
Which is – in our heart of hearts – what we, in fact, desire.

We will work beside Him then,
For He will finally and fully dwell with us.

The work of men will be the work of God,
For then we shall completely please Him.

All creation will be new – and uncursed –
Never wearing out, never growing old.

We will create and enjoy and explore forever
Because of the grace of precious Jesus . . .

When we finally enter the reality just beyond the glass.

“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face.” (I Corinthians 13:12, KJV)

“I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.” (Revelation 21:2, ESV)

Autumn Reminders of an Eternal Kind

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‘For “All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands forever.”‘ – I Peter 1:24 (NIV – 1984)

Fall. It is a season that reminds us of endings. Once thriving leaves now drop from their branches bursting with color, but dying. Beautiful summer flowers have lost their grandeur and now succumb to hues of brown and gray. Colder temperatures flow in and bright, long days full of sunshine move out. We are inundated with change. We are regularly reminded of our helplessness to stop the flow of God’s creation. We are caught between summer and winter in the fleeting uniqueness of autumn. Though the season brings its own joy with fabulous scents and colors of orange, yellow, and red; we know it is the end of summer and the start of a period of dormancy and cold.

As we enjoy the changes of fall, let it remind us of a vital truth. I believe God intends for us to see with physical eyes something that points to a lasting, spiritual truth. When you look at a fallen leaf or disintegrating, summer flower; think this thought:

    “All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands forever.” (I Peter 1:24, NIV, 1984)

Let crinkling leaves and fallen blossoms remind us of something God wants always at the base of our thinking – we are finite and fallen and soon to pass. Any glory we claim to have is as transitory as summer leaves. We live and we die. We seek to accomplish much, but in the end we disappear from this earth. We cannot prevent our own demise. We stand helpless before our “fall.” Except for one thing!

Notice the severe difference God highlights between people and His Word. People wither and fall as the grass. God’s Word stands forever! God’s Word never bends, stoops, or loses its glory. Its beauty never fades; it’s “color” never wanes. No season comes that stops God’s Word. It endures, and endures with full dignity – “standing,” as it were! No weather pattern knocks God’s Word down. No disease causes His Word to waste away. No disaster or tragedy causes His Word to twist or weaken. Through every change, through every heart break, through every earth-shattering event, through death itself; the Word of God stands!

I believe God purposefully showed us the drastic difference between our glory and His Word here in I Peter to remind us to stay focused on Him and not our own selves. I believe one of the reasons for autumn is to demonstrate through His creation an important reminder about human nature when compared to God. Our Lord graciously desires us to live with a constant awareness of our impermanent nature and His eternal nature. Of our failing attempts and His trustworthy ways. Of our sinfulness and His holiness. Of our dependence and His self-sufficiency. Of our need for His Word at the deepest and broadest levels.

You see, God reminds us at the end of I Peter 1:25 (NIV, 1984), “And this is the word that was preached to you.” This is no small or incidental statement! The Word that stands forever can be accepted into your own heart! The seed of God’s Word can be planted in your soul so that the death of you is certainly not the end of you!

God expresses this hope very succinctly in I Peter 1:22 (NIV, 1984), “For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.” Do you see it? We can be born again of an imperishable seed through God’s Word! When I put my hope for forgiveness and salvation in Jesus Christ, I am born of a seed that cannot be abolished – a seed that lasts forever and ever. The enduring Word of God gives me eternal, unbending life. Come seasons, winds, storms, difficulties, even death itself; but I will survive and live forever because the everlasting Word of God has been preached to me. And I have gladly and humbly accepted!

Burst of Brilliance at the Death of Me

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The radiance of autumn leaves
In all their warm grandeur
Strikes at the core of me.

What a burst of brilliance
Comes rushing to the scene
As the air grows cold.

Reds and oranges and yellows
Demanding to be admired;
We are drawn to their glory.

Burst of brilliance
You come
As death proceeds.

Oh, little leaf of green,
Your color changes
And gushes forth as gold,

Only as you die.

Colors hidden formerly
Erupt boldly on the scene
As the leaves prepare to drop.

Burst of brilliance at death;
As it is with leaves,
So it is with me.

Burst of brilliance comes
When I recede,
And Jesus advances.

Burst of brilliance comes
When I die to self,
And Jesus lives in me.

And for all the burst of brilliance known on earth,
None will e’re compare
To the radiance we’ll see

When death takes us finally.

Color there – indescribable.
Creation there – perfected.
People there – as they ought to be.

God, remind me that both now and then –
the burst of brilliance comes
at the death of me.

The Scent of Autumn

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Sitting in my backyard on a gorgeous autumn afternoon, I reached down and picked up a handful of leaves from the ground. As the brown and yellow leaves crackled in my hands, I remembered days of my childhood. I would rake a pile of autumn leaves and carve out a hole in the center. I would then sit there, delightfully surrounded by the leaves as I read book after book. Days seemed simple then, and my memory of reading in the leaves is amazingly vivid. As I lay in the pile of leaves consuming my books, my heart would leap as my imagination ran wild with all the possibilities of life.

Now a grown adult, I was tempted to smell the crackling autumn leaves in my hand. Knowing that our sense of smell is greatly related to memory, I took time to hold those leaves close to my face and breathe deeply. Ah . . . the comfort of childhood days came rushing back.

What amazed me was the constancy of the smell of the autumn leaves. Though my childhood reading in the fallen leaves occurred decades earlier, the scent of those leaves is exactly the same. I know not much of the biology and chemistry behind dying leaves, but I know this: they smell the same today as they did then.

Much else has changed in the decades between my experiences, but the scent of autumn is constant. God promised in Genesis 8:22 (NASB), “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.”

The changing of seasons and all the accompanying details continue on unhindered because God is a God of constancy.

He is a Savior on whom we can fully rely. The God who said, “Let the earth bring forth vegetation, plants, and trees” is a God we can trust. His way of cycling the leaves through life and death – and all the reactions producing the smell of autumn – will continue on as long as the earth endures.

And when earth no longer does endure – when this broken planet has to flee from the presence of a righteous God (Revelation 20:11) – our Savior will still be reliable. He is the one constant in all of life. He will re-make this earth into a home of righteousness for the redeemed.

As the earth and its current regularity remind us of God’s constancy, so the return of Jesus and His re-making of this old earth remind us that only God is unchanging. Though the scent of autumn goes on and on in this life, the God who created autumn will outlast this world.

He alone is the One on whom we can depend to usher in the next world, and carry us there.