From The Desk of a Geek: Broken Promises

From The Desk of a Geek:

Broken Promises

 What you see here in the picture below is something rare, and that's being described as what happens when a rainbow falls apart, or a "broken rainbow"

It’s actually a rainbow being diffused by scattered raindrops which reflect off the clouds behind it. If the clouds were gone it would just be a regular rainbow.

Have you ever broken a commitment to someone? Was it easy to explain? Or did it leave the relationship tense and in jeopardy?

When someone breaks their promise, it hurts. Small promises that are broken we can easily forgive, but bigger promises, if broken, can destroy a relationship.

The Bible tells of how Abraham starts to have doubts about his calling. In response, God tells him to find a number of animals to be sacrificed and displayed in formation. This may seem like an odd command, but a little ancient history sheds light on this custom.

These days, when we formalise an agreement, or an important promise between two parties, we usually sign contracts. The contract might say that if one party fails to keep their agreement, they will be subject to a fine and/or the deal is off.

There are documents that have been found, from ancient cultures, in Abraham’s day, that describe the custom at the time for formalising covenants.

The two parties would sacrifice animals and cut them in half. They would then both walk between the animal carcasses. In doing so they were invoking a curse on themselves, effectively saying “if I break my promise, let me be dead like this animal.”

Abraham understood God wanted to formalise and confirm his promises, so he set to work, and what hard work it was. He cut the animals and lay them out, then chased away birds of prey till sunset.

A deep sleep falls on Abraham and God confirms his promises to him, explaining how and when they will come about. Then Abraham has a vision.

Abraham sees a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch pass between the pieces of cut animals.

In other passages in the Bible, it is evident that smoke and fire represent the very presence of God. For example, in Exodus 3:2-4, God appears to Moses in a burning bush. In Exodus 19:18, we read that when God appears to Moses on Mount Sinai, the whole mountain is enveloped in smoke and fire.

So it seems that God himself was stepping down into the blood soaked desert, between the animal carcasses, to assure Abraham of his promises.

But where was Abraham?

In normal covenant-making, both parties would walk between the pieces and invoke the curse on themselves. But, in Abraham’s vision, only God passes through the pieces.

God was doing something that no rational person ever would. He was saying, I will pay the price of death whether you or I break our promise.[

The promise depended only on God’s faithfulness, grace and power. Not on Abraham and his descendants’ ability to obey God.

In that moment, creator God committed himself to dying on the cross.

God never breaks a promise. Abraham had a son. His descendants grew into a large nation, and in the book of Joshua we read they were given the land that had been promised to them.

However, we read how Abraham lied about his wife, saying she was only his sister, allowing other men to try to take her for their own wife. Abraham was not able to keep his part of the covenant-promise, which was to be holy. And many of his descendants after him failed too.

The truth is none of us are able to keep all of our commitments to God. We have all said and done hurtful things; we have broken promises.

Our broken promises matter to God. They damage our relationship with him, just as our own relationships are affected, when we break promises to each other.

But God, in his grace and love, keeps his promises to us, regardless of our continual failures. His promises to us are secure because he has already shouldered the cost of our failures, by coming to us as a man, 

Jesus, and dying on the cross. All we need to do is look in faith to that cross and our relationship with God will be restored.

Lonnie

From The Desk of a Geek

From The Desk of a Geek:

Father’s Day Celebration 

“My father didn’t do anything unusual. He only did what dads are supposed to do—be there.”

Just like there is no guidebook to becoming a parent, there is no guidebook to losing a parent. It is a confusing path that we are forced to navigate as time goes by, marking our progress by how well we handle the random reminders of the profound presence that is missing from our life.

I refuse to let Father’s Day be one of loss and grief. Instead I did the only thing I knew how to do; I asked my father for help. Almost as instantly as I said “Hey Dad, how do you want to celebrate this day?” I received my answer.

It was in that moment I realized that, for those of us without a father, by changing how we approach this day we can feel a deeper sense of connection to our loved ones rather than the overwhelming loss we may otherwise feel on Father’s Day.

One of the most healing actions we can take as we approach this day is to be willing to release the reality in which our dominant story is one of loss. Yes, my father is no longer here in the physical form, but if I attach myself to that reality it seems almost impossible to find any sense of joy in the day.

Instead, I choose to rewrite this story.

To own as truth that my father is gone forever is to completely neglect all of the wonderful things he left behind his stories, the people he loved, the home he created with my mother and our family -- the things which are the essence of what his time on earth was all about.

Rather than owning a story of loss as our truth, we can choose to focus instead on all of the incredible experiences, people and things we have gained as a result of their existence in this world.

The truth that we often forget is that the love we feel in our hearts for our fathers is just as real as the love we felt when they were here with us in the physical form.

By tuning into the joy that we created with this amazing presence in our life, we can again experience the guidance and wisdom that they will always have to offer us.

The beautiful part about this process is that by discovering the symbols that help us tap into their eternally existing presence of joy, we begin a journey of remembering all of the wisdom our father’s left behind. This allows us to carry their presence forward each day that we choose to consciously connect with their spirits.

When my father passed, the Rumi quote “the wound is the place where the light enters you” played loud in my brain as if the Lord was shouting “remember this!” 

I trusted at that time that the heart-shattering grief I felt was allowing for the spaces between the broken pieces of my soul to be patched together by holy, wise, and loving light. 

It is this light that I am able to carry forward every time I speak about him, or when I enjoy his favorite foods or activities. It is this beautiful light that is a part of us forever, inspiring us and connecting us with our loved ones in every moment that we choose to remember. It is this light that allows us to witness that our loved one's presence truly is everlasting.

In order to support myself in the process, I chose to rely on my family, my ministry,.my friends, and the love they brought to me.  As you approach this Father'sDay, always remember to lean on the support of your family, friends and faith.

In times of grief we often forget that loss never occurs alone. If we are willing to see it, loss is always accompanied by an outpouring of love, support, community, and memories. It is this miracle of positive sight that allows us to walk into the shadows of our life with fearlessness and grace, knowing that we will be carried into the light by a force much greater than ourselves. 

 This Father’s Day I encourage you to make a commitment to celebrate your father with love. I look forward to the incredible experiences I will create with the memory of my father.

For those of you celebrating Father’s Day in the spirit of his legacy I encourage you to start your day off by dedicating an hour of your morning to connecting with his memory in whatever way that turns out to show up; it may be writing him a letter, talking to him, going for a walk or looking at old pictures.

This simple act of quality time is a way to connect with their memory, by once again allowing yourself to experience all of the amazing times you shared together.

From there you can carry on the celebration in your own unique way; whether that is spending the day with family and friends, enjoying activities your father used to take part in, or simply taking the time to be by yourself and cultivate a loving experience in whatever way is meaningful to you.

At the end of the day, what is truly healing is that you beautifully keep alive the tradition of your father as you hold him in deep in your heart.

The ones we love will never truly leave us. Our fathers did not really die, they simply changed forms, and went home

They have become a part of all of the other limitless souls that inspire us and teach us how to make our time on earth more meaningful. 

When we really look at it, Father’s Day is an important reminder of the power and beauty of keeping the ones we love alive in our hearts forever.

Lonnie..

Daddy

From The Desk of a Geek:

Daddy

The Christian faith acknowledges Jesus Christ as the one and only Son of God. Yet Jesus taught His disciples to address God as “our Father in heaven.” Since Jesus is the only Son of God, why did He invite us all to call God “Father”?

Obviously, Jesus holds a unique position as God incarnate, the second person of the Holy Trinity. Consistent with His teachings, however, believers have always used the word Father when referring to God. One of the most important creeds in Christian history begins with the phrase, “We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.” 

This simple affirmation carries several important truths our children need to understand.

Our earthly fathers are an important source of our genetic makeup. But God is the ultimate source of our lives. He knew us before we were conceived and formed us in the womb.

Fathers find joy in giving to their children. That’s because a chief role of fatherhood is to provide. Jesus used this reality to explain the goodness of God when He said, “If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” 

Children don’t like discipline, but it fosters security knowing Mom and Dad love them enough to correct wayward behavior. Good parents mirror the fatherhood of God when they administer the short-term pain of discipline to shape a child’s long-term character. As the Bible says, “The Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son

As a parent, you’ve probably received a small taste of how God feels as “our Father in heaven.” When parents look into the face of their newborn baby or adopted child, they know they will love the child no matter what. That’s exactly how God feels about us.

I've learned that I can’t always protect my kids. I am not with them all the time. Even when I am present, I might not be fast enough, strong enough, or smart enough to help them. I am not the superhero father I wish I could be.

By revealing himself as our Father, God compares himself to something we experience as fallible. Jesus even refers to the flawed goodness of earthly fathers to highlight the perfection of our heavenly Father. As much as we earthly fathers want to provide for and protect our children, our Father God does all the more.

And he is able. As the perfect Father, he is never too slow or caught off guard, never a helpless bystander. He is never too busy. Unlike even the best earthly father, God’s motives are always perfectly good, even when we don’t understand his actions or lack of intervention.

Jesus relied on the Father throughout his ministry. The strength and intimacy of that relationship is offered to all who believe in Jesus. In a world of uncertainty and danger, we need a perfect Father.

Lonnie