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Fruit of the Spirit-Longsuffering

19 Monday Apr 2021

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“But the fruit of the Spirit is…longsuffering” Galatians 5:22

Longsuffering made for an interesting study.  I’m an avid reader and I can’t count how many times I’ve read the phrase, “a longsuffering sigh.”  To me, longsuffering carries the connotation of deep sighs, eye rolls, biting one’s tongue, and attempting to control one’s temper.  Longsuffering does not immediately equal fruit of the Spirit in my mind. 

Different translations of the Bible translate this word in different ways.  The King James has “longsuffering” while the Amplified has “patience” and expands that with “even temper, forbearance”.  Both the New American Standard and New International have “patience” while my New International Version Journal Bible has “forbearance”.  I can’t say forbearance is any more appealing to me than longsuffering and neither is patience, really.  I can’t shake the feeling of negativity associated with these words.  Whenever I think of longsuffering, forbearance, and patience; I picture someone stiff, almost frowning.  Why?

I find the beginning of an answer to that in The New World Dictionary’s entry for patience.  After the definition, I found a section on synonyms which states: patience implies the bearing of suffering, provocation, delay, tediousness, etc. with calmness and self-control…endurance stresses the capacity to bear suffering or hardship…forbearance implies restraint under provocation or a refraining from retaliation for a wrong…stoicism suggest such endurance of suffering without flinching as to indicate an almost austere indifference to pain or pleasure.

Austere is a good word and that helps me to understand what I’m picturing.  While I read the words patience, longsuffering, forbearance, I am actually thinking stoicism.  This is why I find study so necessary to my Christian life.  I bring preconceived meanings to scripture when I read it and I often find words do not mean what I think they mean.  I did not find any surprises in the definitions for the Greek word translated patience but was able to begin looking at it in a different way.  I did unearth some buried treasure as I dug deeper into the word which I’ll get to in a moment.

Impatience is something I struggle with.  I did not think my struggle was having patience with people although, while conducting this study, I am thinking the Holy Spirit does have some work yet to do in this arena.  I do struggle with being patient with God’s process.  It takes such a long time.  There have been many times I have been frustrated with God because His will is that I know him, my will is that I know Him, let’s get on with it!  Zero to Overcomer in less than 60 seconds.  He is not a God of the Zaps.  No, He is a God of process.  (See 2 Corinthians 3:18)

One of the most difficult words I receive from my Heavenly Father is “Wait.  Be still.”  It is especially difficult when I’ve been waiting years for some answers and His response is still “Wait.  Be Still.”  Obedience to My Father can become a burden rather than my delight and I am relieved when I realize patience is something that flows out of His life within me because it is not something I am capable of having on my own. 

The meanings of “wait” and “be still” are a help to patience bearing fruit.  “Wait” and “Be still” are not commands to thumb-twiddling.  The “wait” as in “Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart; Wait, I say on the Lord!” (Psalm 27:14) is the Hebrew word qavah (H6960) and means “to bind together by twisting, to expect”.  “Be still” as in “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10) is the Hebrew word raphah (H7503) and means “slacken, abate, cease…let alone…be slothful”.  That does sound a bit like thumb-twiddling but that’s not the picture I see.  I see a letting go of my need for things to happen in my NOW and, instead, I focus on entering into Jesus’ rest.  I choose to look at the waiting time as opportunity to be knit together with Jesus through the work of His Spirit and the time is not spent in idleness.  I see that patience is not passive, neither is it stoic.

Now, for the buried treasure:

I tracked the Greek word for patience (makrothumia G3115) to its root words and found makros (G3117) and thumos (G2372).  Under Strong’s entry for thumos was the suggestion to compare with 5590.  I did so and found 5590 in the Strong’s concordance is the Greek psuche.  There is a long line of definitions for psuche but, put simply, it means breath.  This struck me because of how closely an even temper and patience is associated with the breath.  Even as I read the entry, I couldn’t help taking a deep breath.  I caught myself doing it and thought, “That’s exactly what I do when I’m keeping my temper.”

I recently completed a round of Physical Therapy and my therapist wanted me to focus on diaphragmatic breathing.  She told me I could do a lot for pain management if I focused on my breath.  I remembered that as I was struck by the connection between breath and patience.  I can change what’s happening in my body and how I’m feeling by changing my breath.  When it comes to fruit of the Spirit like patience, it isn’t my breath I need.

1 Corinthians 15: 45 says, “And so it is written, ‘The first man Adam became a living being.’ The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.”  The word for “being” is sometimes translated “soul” and is the Greek word psuche.  Genesis 2:7 tells me how this was done: “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.”  Jesus breathed on the apostles after His resurrection and then said, “Receive the Holy Spirit” (John 20:22).  The word used for the Holy Spirit is pneuma (G4151) and, while it doesn’t mean exactly the same thing as psuche, it does carry the meaning of breath.

The Newsboys have a song titled “Father, Blessed Father” on their album Adoration.  The song contains the lyrics, “Breathe on me, Breathe Oh breath of God.  Breathe on me, ‘til my heart is new.”  That is my prayer as I wrap up this study and walk into a new week.  Breathe on me, Oh Spirit of the Living God.  Be my very breath. Create in me a clean heart and may your patience bear fruit in my life.

Amen.

References:

Unless notes otherwise, scriptures are quoted from the New King James Version of the Holy Bible, Thomas Nelson, Inc. 1982

The Comparative Study Bible, The Zondervan Corporation, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1984

Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, 2nd Edition, William Colling + World Publishing Company, 1976

Strong, James, LLD., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990

Fruit of the Spirit-Introduction

15 Monday Mar 2021

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My blog counter ticked over 100 followers!  Thank you. 

It has also been a year since I decided to start blogging again.  I wasn’t sure what I was going to blog about but, like Jeremiah, words burned inside of me and I couldn’t hold them in (Jeremiah 20:9).  I spent a great deal of time in prayer before deciding to return to blogging because it was then and still is important to me that any words I write be ones My Father would have me write.  I have sought the leading of the Holy Spirit and, I mention it in my bio but am stating it here; this blog has not gone according to plan.  At least, not my plan.  My prayer continues to be that the Holy Spirit guides me and that each post will be only ever what He would have me write.

To that end: I am initiating a new study series on the Fruit of the Spirit.  I did not intend to.  I planned a series on the Epistle to the Hebrews.  I would also like to do a post on the Hittites!  I am certain each of my readers is just as fascinated as I am with ancient world cultures. 😉 One day, perhaps, if Father wills it so.  As that time is not now, I will be devoting the next several weeks to the Fruit of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5:22-23: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control”.

What do I hope to achieve by this study?  A greater understanding of the Holy Spirit.  A greater understanding of what His work in my life looks like.  I want this fruit to come to maturity in my life.  The list is an incredible one.  I am awed if I pick just one and stare at it.  For example, peace.  Is it possible to have peace in my life when I am in the midst of such upheaval?  Yes, it is.  More than that, peace is not something I have.  To clarify: it is something I have because I do not have it in myself but it is not some attribute outside of me I have to somehow lay hold of.  What I want this study to cement for me is that I have peace because peace is a person.  I have peace because I have Jesus who is my peace and I partake of the peace He is because of the Holy Spirit living in me.  Therefore, I do not seek to get peace.  Rather, I seek to come to rest in the knowledge that One who is peace lives in me and I live from Him.

It has been seventeen, maybe eighteen years (time starts to run together a bit for me) since dissatisfaction with the state of my spiritual life caused me to go to my mother and say, “I want to learn more about the Holy Spirit.”  She wanted that as well and so we started…where to start?  What is the Holy Spirit?  I had a few answers from my church-going background.  He’s the Third Person of the Trinity.  What does that mean?  Here’s where answers would get hazy and vague.  As I listened to those who ought to know attempt to tell me about the Holy Spirit, I couldn’t help but get the idea he was a great deal like the Force: He was everywhere and He was power.  I learned nothing that helped me.

I find Him so very interesting as I look back:  my mother and I expressed a wish to learn more about the Holy Spirit and within a few weeks a friend shared with us a series of writings that blew our tiny religious worlds apart.  Within a few more months, I had experienced a crisis that left my life hanging in tatters.  I was devastated.  I didn’t know what to believe or if, indeed, I believed anything at all.  It was at once a horrendous and wonderful place to be in because I discovered the Holy Spirit.  I say “discovered” but it really isn’t like that at all.  I suppose it’s more accurate to say He opened my eyes to see Him.  To know Him.

In the midst of my shambles, I learned He was everything Jesus promised He would be in the 14th Chapter of John’s gospel.  He revealed Himself as Comforter.  He was so gentle with my broken heart.  He didn’t turn from me because I’d made mistakes but made Jesus alive to me in a way He’d never been before.  Jesus, the One who bore my shame and who cleanses me from all sin.  The One who enables me to stand before the Father unashamed, certain that I am accepted.

When my eyes were opened to His Presence, I was able to look back over the dark, lonely, and frightening bits of my past and see that He was always with me.  I was not ever alone, He hadn’t abandoned me in that moment when certainly I deserved for Him to have done, and I’ve lived every moment of every day since then aware of Him.  He will not ever leave me.  He cannot for He is not separate from me.

So, who is the Holy Spirit?  I’ve addressed the word another before but, again: Jesus said he would send “another comforter” and the word another here means, another of the same sort.  (See Allos G243 in Strong’s Concordance and “Another” in Vine’s Expository Dictionary).  Another: different and yet the same.  In Ezekiel 36:27, God says “I will put My Spirit within you” so the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God and, indeed, I see as much in Acts 13:2 where the Holy Spirit speaks as God. 

How do we believers explain the nature of God?  He is Triune, we say: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Three and yet One.  Impossible, I have heard some say, and the term “Trinity” isn’t in the Bible.  No, I agree that it isn’t but I don’t know of a better word unless I use “Perichoresis”.  It’s a beautiful word used to describe the relationship Father, Son, and Holy Spirit share with each other.  I have another word I like to use when I think of the nature of God: paradox.  He is (in my opinion) the ultimate paradox.  He is Three distinct Persons but exists in such perfect love relationship union that it’s impossible for Him to be separate. My spirit, in union with His Spirit cries in joy, “The Lord Our God, The Lord is One!” (Deuteronomy 6:4, Mark 12:29).

I know this post is a bit long but I want to make clear what I believe and where I stand as I begin to study the Fruit of the Spirit.  I hope I have done so.  If not, I hope it becomes clear as I begin, next week, looking at the first fruit: love.

To be continued…

Great Expectations-Part Three

20 Tuesday Oct 2020

Posted by in Walking in the Way

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I had to laugh at myself.  Within two hours of Part Two posting to the blog, I found myself in a situation exactly like the one I described: perhaps some relief from pain but it was going to require a doctor’s visit, a referral, no doubt more co-pays…my insides tightened and I could only think, “great.  I’ll just pay for all that then, shall I?” Then the thought came, “didn’t you just post on how God has taken you through medical stuff and financial hardship?”  Indeed I had.  Had I learned anything from the experience?  Yes, but I have to admit my first inclination is usually stress and anxiety and THEN remembering the goodness of God.  And so, I write these for my own edification. 

In part two I did write about a series of unfortunate events and how I expected my Father to reveal Himself to me as the Lord who healeth me and, instead, found myself face to face with the Father who loved me and wished His name hallowed above every other on earth.  I am still learning all this means and it’s a theme I hope to explore in the future.  For now I wish to answer the questions: if I am to expect that all the promises of God are Yes in Christ yet experience has taught me God rarely does what I expect in the way I expect it, what am I supposed to be expecting when I pray? Is there a secret to a victorious life in Christ?

I believe there is and that the secret isn’t so secret.  I believe the answer is found in the Indwelling Spirit.  1 Corinthians 1:20 says “For no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ.”  In Christ.  Two words that appear over and over again throughout the New Testament.  If God’s promises are In Christ, then it must follow I must be in Christ in order to receive them. 

In part two, I also quoted; “But seek (aim at and strive after) first of all His kingdom and His righteousness (His way of doing and being right), and then all these things taken together will be given you besides. (Matthew 6: 33, Amplified)  In Luke 17 verse 21 I find, “Nor will people say, Look! Here (it is!) or, See (it is) there!  For behold, the kingdom of God is within you (in your hearts) and among you (surrounding you).  (Amplified)  Acts 17: 28: “For in Him we live and move and have our being…” and the second half of 1 Corinthians 1:20: “And so through Him the “Amen” is spoken by us to the glory of God.”  In just these few scriptures (I could quote more but I’d end up copying the entire New Testament) I see how important it is to understand “In Christ” and that there must be something in me that shows me what this means and enables me to say “Amen.”  That something is a Who: the Holy Spirit.

There are two beautiful passages about the Indwelling Spirit found in the Gospel of John.  I can’t choose between them so I’m quoting both:  “I have told you these things while I am still with you.  But the Comforter (Counselor, Helper, Intercessor, Advocate, Strengthener, Standby), the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father will send in My name (in My place, to represent Me and act on My behalf), He will teach you all things.  And He will cause you to recall (will remind you of, bring to your remembrance) everything I have told you.” (John 14: 25-26, Amplified)

And then: “But when He, the Spirit of Truth (the Truth-giving Spirit) comes, He will guide you into all the Truth (the whole, full Truth).  For He will not speak His own message (on His own authority); but He will tell whatever He hears (from the Father: He will give the message that has been given to Him), and He will announce and declare to you the things that are to come (that will happen in the future).  He will honor and glorify Me because He will take of (receive, draw upon) what is Mine and will reveal (declare, disclose, transmit) it to you.  Everything that the Father has is Mine.  That is what I meant when I said that He (the Spirit) will take the things that are Mine and will reveal (declare, disclose, transmit) it to you.  (John 16: 13-15, Amplified)

Because I know the risen and ascended Lord Jesus Christ, His spirit dwells in me as me teacher and guide.  As Paul says, “But if you are guided (led) by the (Holy) Spirit, you are not subject to the law.  What is the law?  The law, or Old Covenant, was based on IF/THEN.  Now, under the New Covenant and the Indwelling Spirit, I find there is a different way to live.  Rather than trying to please a remote God and earn blessings from Him with my good behavior and the fact that I (mostly) keep His commands; I live from the fountain of His life within me. 

But, I know some of you will ask, aren’t you taking some of these scriptures out of context?  Doesn’t John 14 also say, “If a person (really) loves Me, he will keep My word (obey My teaching); and My Father will love him and We will come to him and make Our home (abode, special dwelling place) with him.”  (John 14: 23, Amplified).  Doesn’t that sound like it’s an IF/THEN?

It does and I hope to explore the meaning of these scriptures in more depth in later posts.  In closing this one, I say truly, Our Father’s promise in Ezekiel 37 is made reality with the Holy Spirit:  “A new heart 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 give you a heart of flesh.  And I will put my Spirit within and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you shall heed My ordinances and do them.”  Paul assures me in Philippians that, “(Not in your own strength) for it is God Who is all the while effectually at work in you (energizing and creating in you the power and desire), both to will and to work for His good pleasure and satisfaction and delight.” (Philippians 2:13, Amplified)   

I wasn’t sure how to describe living from the Indwelling Spirit but I chanced to listen to Malcolm Smith’s Webinar # 340 and he put it perfectly.  Now that we have the Indwelling Spirit, we no longer live from IF/THEN but now BECAUSE/THEREFORE.

I love that.  However, with shifting my focus from If/THEN to BECAUSE/THEREFORE, what do I expect from God?  The answer is everything and nothing.  I do not expect specifics.  Rather, I expect that He will keep His word that all His promises are “Yes” in Christ Jesus.  I don’t expect that nothing painful or hurtful will never happen to me.  I do expect that He who lives in me will be everything I need at all times: All in all.  With Paul, I will all the more gladly glory in my weaknesses and infirmities, that the strength and power of Christ (the Messiah) may rest (yes, may pitch a tent over and dwell) upon me! (2 Corinthians 12: 9b, Amplified) His joy fills me and, through Him, I say “Amen”.  May He and He alone be glorified.

An excellent study on the Indwelling Spirit.

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/indwelling-spirit-andrew-murray/1111009163?ean=9780764202278

Here’s Malcolm Smith’s webinar if you are interested.

Just a Butterfly

31 Monday Aug 2020

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By the Water at the Reservoir

I like symbols.  I enjoy how symbols can open my eyes to truth I had not yet perceived.  I do try not to get carried away looking everywhere for symbols and hidden meanings and I especially am careful about looking for signs from God.  1 Corinthians 1:22 has always felt like a warning about looking for signs so I have sought to know God’s voice for myself, therefore rendering null and void any need for a sign.  And yet, what about those times when God is there-I know it because His presence is always with me-and yet He is remaining silent?  There are few things more frustrating in my spiritual journey than when God is remaining silent as it usually happens during a time when I need to hear from Him the most.

 I mentioned before how a crisis some seventeen years was merely a catalyst for Jesus to reveal Himself to me in a different way and set my feet on a new path.  Coming to know Him in greater intimacy has not happened all at once. It has been an awful painful wonderful glorious journey: one I’ve survived by relying on Him day by day.  I recently realized I have seen aspects of His character He has been bringing me to see over the course of the last three years. I can look back now and see how it all worked together for me to KNOW what I know today but, at the time, the butterfly was just a butterfly. 

It all started three years ago when my doctor found a lump in my breast.  I hadn’t noticed it.  It truly felt like it had appeared overnight.  My doctor was concerned but not overly so.  She thought it could be a result of an ongoing hormonal imbalance and I was to come back in a month and she’d see if it had changed size or gone away.  I prayed every day of that month, asking He who is my Healer to take it away.  I went back for my follow up visit knowing it hadn’t gone away and having no idea what was going to happen next.  Painful and invasive exams were what happened next, culminating in a biopsy.  I had to wait a few days for the results of my biopsy and, while there was an enormous chance my lump was benign, there was a chance it wasn’t. I couldn’t think, felt numb, and sought the peace I normally find in nature by taking a walk at the reservoir.

It was a beautiful, warm day but I felt I was carrying ice around in my very marrow.  The what if was a whirl-a-gig inside my mind and, although I knew He was with me, He wasn’t making me any specific promises.  I didn’t know what to pray for.  He is my Healer-I believe that with everything I am-but I couldn’t deny He hadn’t healed me-the lump was proof of that- and I felt my foundation of faith was rather shaky beneath my feet.

I managed to make it to my favorite bench placed right by the water before I felt I couldn’t go any further.  I sat there in the warm sunshine, listened to the insects in the long grass, the birds on the water, and just waited in His presence.  Surely, alone in this place, He would speak comfort to me.

As I sat, a small yellow butterfly appeared, flitting from flowers to blades of grass.  I have always thought butterflies symbols of spiritual truths: their beauty, the way the gland at the base of their skull consumes their caterpillar life and the butterfly emerges from that death (our death swallowed in His life!); they have so much to teach me about walking with God.  Thus, I always enjoy seeing butterflies and have never had a moment where I did not feel closer to God when I saw one.  I watched that tiny creature, so yellow it looked like sunshine come to life, and waited for a message from God.  There was nothing. 

 I couldn’t help laughing at myself.  Perhaps I was looking for too much.  Were it a story I was writing, the butterfly would have been the harbinger of great peace and spiritual growth.  Instead, it was nothing more than a creature doing what it was created to do.  A pretty creature, certainly, but nothing more.  The butterfly was just a butterfly.  I was not living inside a book. I had no promise from God that I did not have cancer.  I had no idea what I might be facing in the coming days.  I still had to go home and wait for my test results.  I rose from the bench and made my way home.

My results arrived and I did not have cancer.  My relief was beyond my ability to describe.  Still, the presence of the lump meant my hormone imbalance was more serious than I thought and I could potentially develop severe problems.  I turned out I already had and I ended up having a major surgery only a year later.  I had not developed cancer but though again I prayed, it was a surgery I was not spared. 

And yet, there was never a moment when He was not with me.  It wasn’t that I was not afraid nor in pain.  It wasn’t that I lied to myself and assured myself there was no reason to be afraid.  There was every reason and there were some I hadn’t even considered until I read through and signed my pre-surgery paperwork.  Rather, there wasn’t a step I took He didn’t take with me.  That fact was something I only truly realize now as I am having some painful complications from that surgery, am having difficulties getting treatment for those complications, and have no fear at all.  Irritation at the roadblocks-Jesus does not make me superhuman-but He infuses me with His strength to look into the unknown without fear. How is such a thing possible?  I don’t think it would be if I hadn’t had it cemented in me through experience that He keeps his promises and does not ever leave me nor forsake me.  Whatever my next moments, days, and years hold, I know that I don’t face anything alone.

Oddly, that little yellow butterfly has never been far from my mind.  I was so sure then it meant nothing and yet it has come to be important to me.  Perhaps I don’t have to look for signs or symbols.  Perhaps He gives them to me and then gives me recognition and understanding when the time is right.  I do know I will never again see a butterfly as just a butterfly.

Icons and Idols

17 Monday Aug 2020

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Madeleine L’Engle is one of my favorite authors.  I was 9 or 10 when I first read “A Wrinkle in Time” and was thus and forevermore hooked on her writing.  Through the years, I’ve moved from her-would they be considered Young Adult books?-to her adult fiction, to her journals, to her essays.  A short time ago, I found “Penguins & Golden Calves: Icons and Idols in Antarctica and Other Unexpected Places” and, I must admit, had a knee-jerk reaction to the words “Icons and Idols”.  I believe I’ve mentioned before I don’t have an extensive religious background but that doesn’t mean those beliefs haven’t made their way into my mental processes.  Aren’t icons wrong?  Aren’t icons and idols synonymous?  Do I have to stop reading one of my favorite authors?

 I had already read the The Genesis Trilogy by Ms. L’Engle and had found them beautiful.  My faith had grown reading these books and so, trusting Ms. L’Engle wasn’t about to let me down now, bought this book.  I have never been sorry that I did so and, like every other book written by Madeleine L’Engle I have read, this one made me sit down and peruse my own life.  Did I have icons in my life?  If I did, was that wrong? Did I (gasp) have idols?  How could I know?  What was the difference?

In my attempts to answer these questions, I first, I looked to the dictionary definitions of icon.  My Second College Edition New World Dictionary of the American Language give me: “an image, figure, representation.”  The Webster’s New Reference Library: An Encyclopedia of Dictionaries stated “a religious image painted on a panel.”  I have seen icons fitting these definitions and appreciated them as art but they’ve never inspired me to pray or worship.  There is nothing in those painted images that remind me of the vibrant apostles who were flogged, jailed, stoned, driven from cities and towns, and, in some cases; killed.  Neither have I been transfixed by any image of Jesus.  How could I possibly be so?  What image could ever compare with He who is utter livingness as revealed in Revelation 1: 10-18?  The answer then is no: by these definitions, I have no icons.

Madeleine L’Engle has a personal, more extensive definition of Icon.  She writes; “What do I mean by icon?…I am not thinking of the classic definition of icons so familiar in the orthodox church, icons of Christ, the Theotokos, saints, painted on wood and often partially covered with silver.  My personal definition is much wider, and the simplest way I can put it into words is to affirm that an icon, for me is an open window to God.  An icon is something I can look through and get a wider glimpse of God and God’s demands on us, el’s mortal children, than I would otherwise.” (Page 8)  And then: “If something does not lead us to God it is not and cannot be an icon.” (Page 10)

By this definition, there are many things I would consider icons.  Waterfalls, rivers, oceans, mountains, ravines, the sky overhead…all at one time have revealed some aspect of God to me that sent my heart soaring in worship and praise at the greatness of His love. On a smaller scale, I suppose I would say turtles are an icon.  From their shells to their slowness to their determination, I see in turtles something that reveals who God is to me on this spiritual journey.  So then yes: considering an icon as an open window to God, I have many such icons in my life.

If I say I have icons, do I then have idols? Just what is an idol?  Can an icon become an idol?  It seems that yes they can because Madeleine L’Engle also writes, “You may not turn an image into God, because that is to turn an icon into an idol.”  (Page 14).  Before I can worry about whether or not I’ve been turning my icons into idols, I must understand what an idol is.

Returning to my dictionary, I find the following definitions for Idol: “an image of a god, used as an object or instrument of worship.”  It seems to me that, to turn an icon into an idol, the heart of the matter (literally and figuratively) is worship.  The Second Commandment says “You shall not make for yourself a carved image-any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall now bow down to them or serve them.” (Exodus 20: 4-5a)

I suppose the fact that I have a turtle pendant would mean I possess a graven image but it was not given to me as such nor do I worship it.  I see aspects of God revealed in nature but that doesn’t mean I become an Animist.  Do I then believe that, as long as they do not become idols, icons are acceptable?  I live in a world I perceive with my senses.  How else is an invisible God going to reveal Himself to me except through the works of His hands?  Romans 1:20 says “For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world.”  It is not idolatry to find God in His Creation as long as, I think, I do not stop with the creation but continue to look through that window to Him.

Madeleine L’Engle writes “Jesus should be for us the icon of icons.  God sending heaven to earth, ‘Lord of lords in human vesture.’”(Page 93). 

Jesus as The Icon.  I admit to a bit of knee jerk reaction at that thought as well.  And yet, Colossions 1:15 does state, “Christ is the visible image of the invisible God” so perhaps the thought isn’t sacrilegious after all.  While it doesn’t hurt to give my life a thorough examining, perhaps I will merely thank Him for revealing Himself to me no matter how He chooses to do so.  And, I can thank Him that I don’t have to stop reading one of my favorite authors.

The quotes were taken from “Penguins and Golden Calves: Icons and Idols in Antarctica and Other Unexpected Places” by Madeleine L’Engle published by Shaw Books in 2003.

Hello! Thank you for reading. I have written another post where I have expanded on some of the ideas touched on in this one. If you like, you can read it here.