39 Days of Break

My life as a homebody

My past experiences of winter break always start off with lofty ambitions of productivity. I think of the weeks of free time and decide—yes, I will start projects! Finish them! Run everyday! Read through my entire library whilst visiting everybody that I know!

The reality? Sleep in until 11AM or later, mope around the house until dinner, repeat.

This time around, though I definitely didn’t complete an entire to-do list or schedule, I feel like I rested well, and got a healthy dose of Southern California before I leave left for the East again.

Noteworthy moments (in random order):

Divine Lineage

Amidst drowning in a bout of self-pity, resentment, and even anger towards the Lord for the hard circumstances life throws at us, the Lord graciously reminded me of my divine lineage:

         ”We have a Father,
            Whose heart is full of love toward us. 
            His heart is so rich, 
            And His love is so unlimited.
            Even when we sin,
            We can always go back to Him.
           This is our Father’s great love toward us.”

He seemed to say:  You have a Father in the heavens. I’ve done everything to get you. I’m bringing you into glory. Look at the multitude of brothers and sisters you have around you. You are my daughter, and I love you. 

We love because He first loved us. Amazing, blessed fact.

The Perfection of Beauty

Today, I was struck by description of beauty in the Psalms.

“Beautiful in elevation, The joy of the whole earth, Is Mount Zion, the sides of the north, The city of the great King.” Psa. 48:1

Fair enough, I thought. God’s city is beautiful in elevation. Right.

But then, I got to Psalms 50:2.

“Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God shines forth.”

Wow. What in the world could possibly be the perfection of beauty? Could we even fathom, point to something on Earth today that’s the perfection of beauty? I suppose we could point to the great wonders of Nature, like the Grand Canyon. Maybe the changing leaves of fall. We could think of celebrated artworks, famous supermodels or impressive city skylines. All of these hold a definition of beauty in their own right, but don’t quite grasp per-fec-tion.

Fall foliage stays for but a time, and eventually shrivels into dead leaves. One massive earthquake could change the entire Canyon. Art work is subjective, skylines are subject to natural disasters, and supermodels…well, they get old.

But Zion is all together the eternal work of God. Zion is the body of overcomers, the believers in the church who are matured in His life.

And though I feel like I’m only touching a teeny bit of the richness of these verses, I realized that there is beauty in God’s transforming work. That in such a dark background, in which we, children of wrath, walked according to the age of this world, dead in our offenses, and alienated from the wealth of Israel, even enemies, have been made alive with Christ! We have been raised up together with Him, and seated with Him in the heavenlies! (Eph.2-3)  And now, He is making us into precious stones for His building. From enemies to His co-kings! From strangers, to His Bride, His counterpart!

Amen, and amen, hallelujah!

Only the Lord could take something so ugly and make it into the perfection of beauty. In fact, He is the most Beautiful One in the whole universe.

And though we have pretty things to look at today…

 

It’s only a shadow of what’s to come.