Legacy

Recently the thought has been rolling around my heart and mind that it’s a lot harder to make a mark on this world than I thought. I’m not as sure as I used to be that we can measure lives by outcomes, and if we judge a book by it’s cover, mine is looking kind of beat up. I don’t think I’m alone in this. Life is hard. Between making a living, time wasted on poor decisions, and time spent putting out fires, real life seems to slip past, and the river of days appears to have only cut a deeper canyon in my own heart. Where I wanted to water and nurture, I see a landscape that looks barren save a scraggly bush here and there. Where I wanted to help and heal and love, I see discord and tension and weeds. How did this happen, I wonder, and what are God’s purposes?

I’ve pondered the desert and the wilderness a lot in my spiritual journey. I’ve asked God why he would chose such places to call his beloved out of slavery, to shape and teach a people, to be a place of testing for his own son. I would have chosen Colorado or maybe Montana, or the coast of Maine. Something with beauty enough to distract the eye from the heart’s distress. But the wilderness of the Sinai seems so uncompromising and hard. An occasional oasis in a world of mirages. How many times I’ve thought God was delivering me to the land of milk and honey, only to find I’m only marching around the same 40 miles of hot sand again.

But…my shoes aren’t wearing out and God is faithfully providing “what is it,” the literal meaning of the word manna. I am reminded of my favorite passage from Hosea (if there can be such a thing), 2:14-15:

“Therefore I am now going to allure her;
    I will lead her into the wilderness
    and speak tenderly to her.
There I will give her back her vineyards,
    and will make the Valley of Achor (meaning trouble) a door of hope.

Perhaps something more is happening in this wilderness than what I see when I look around. Maybe I’ve grown too tired, or too scared, or too jaded to listen well for that tender voice, and trust those tender promises. I’m reminded that God won’t share his glory with another. Paul, who was probably looking pretty beat up too, said we have this treasure in clay pots — vessels that crack and eventually return to dust — so that God’s glory can be seen, and not our own. So, it’s my hope that if I pass by you on another loop around, you’ll be able to look past the grit and grime to the treasure of God, stored between the covers of a book that’s beat up, but still being written.