God Sendings

HELIOTROPISM

Last week’s blog on PURPLE led me into a whole insight about HELIOTROPISM, which you probably know all about because of your Green Fingers. To me, that "compelling" of the flower bulb to seek the heat, to break through the earth into the Light, is a metaphor of human yearning. Roobie has asked me to replace her regularly scheduled Pet Theories column because I am so excited about this concept, and she says her Pet Theories can wait until next week. So here it is.

First, think of a bulb. Let’s make it a tulip bulb just for the sake of argument. Some nice person plants it in the ground and gives it water, and the little bulb (unless it’s a dud) does the rest, actually sensing the sun and seeking it, eventually pushing through the earth to bloom in the open air, which is what it was purposed to do. That amazing process is what scientists call heliotropism.

Like Carl Jung, I think there's such a thing as human heliotropism, though some who seek get lured into fake light (manmade tanning salons or “grow lights” that can only get you so far). Many never seek at all, just smothering their niggling seeker beepers with ever more dirt or digging deeper into it.

Those who break through the earth and manage to persevere past all the artificial lighting systems emerge into the Light and receive Life with a capital "L." God says, "I give you blessings and cursings, death and life... choose life." Thanks be to God, I was compelled toward the Light and pushed through the hard ground and past the offers of lesser beams and into the full Sonlight, where I have found my purpose is to bloom in the Son.

Sonflowers!

God Sendings

PURPLE

What is going on with PURPLE? It started when Oswald Chambers compared forgiveness to the fragrance emitted by a violet when it is crushed under someone’s foot. Well, violets are purple. So this fragrance of forgiveness is the color of royalty -- purple, which would be God.

Then I went to a someone’s house to pick up some papers, and his wife invited me in to see her back patio, because, she said, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, purple violets had been springing up everywhere -- even in between the flagstones. I told her about the fragrance thing and the purple thing and she told me that her mother recently died. We talked about whether they might have been sent from heaven.

Last but not least, I went into the office, and guess what? Each staff member’s files were going to be color-coded from then on. And guess what color was handed to me? PURPLE!

God Sendings

I was looking at a postcard-sized picture of Jesus with His arms wide open, beckoning to me (and anyone else!). I had been asking Him about the jailer in Acts – the promise that he and his household would be saved. At the time, my beloved husband was “pro-God” but lukewarm about Jesus and definitely anti-Bible. I was praying for his salvation and knew he had been set apart because the unbelieving husband is sanctified by his wife. Sanctified? Set apart?

Then this postcard. Suddenly I saw what Jesus wanted me to understand: His Body, covered with jewels. And the jewels were believers. Us! We are living stones! Precious jewels in an unimaginable array of varieties and colors! I drew a few in for my own sake… you can see my dots on His sleeve.

I suddenly understood that, when we accept Christ, we are placed into settings as though we were diamonds put into golden settings. Like my engagement ring. And I understood that, whenever I worship Him with my whole heart, I become radiant. So do all the other gems that are set into His Body like precious gems. In this way, His Body is glorified in the throne room of heaven.

It’s literal! The Body of Christ is literal! Imagine Him, sitting at the right hand of the Father, literally encrusted with jewels. Those jewels are us. Saints. Individual believers. In addition, there are empty settings. These are the places reserved for those who are set apart, sanctified to become believers. Their settings await them in His Body.

Thus did the Lord provide me with guidance about the true Body of Christ and how His Body is glorified even now, by us who are IN CHRIST, who, in turn, is seated at the right hand of the Father in the throne room of heaven! Does anybody else find this absolutely mind-blowing?

God Sendings

An old friend of mine who grew up in Chicago remembers that it was a goat who led the sheep into the slaughterhouse. My reply was to say, "I guess it matters who we follow."

I know what I meant. Do you? I'd be interested in hearing what you think about this Matthew 25 idea...

P.S. To comment, click on the word comment, not on the icon that looks like an envelope, okay guys?!?