The Cocoon

The Cocoon

One of the most fascinating things I’ve learned in the last few years is the process of a caterpillar in a cocoon. I had always thought of the couple of weeks a caterpillar spends there as a little nap while their body sprouts wings, and that is the furthest thing from the truth.

After eating copious amounts of leaves and growing to the maximum, a caterpillar forms a cocoon around themselves in order to become a butterfly. Once inside, the caterpillar literally splits its skin apart, and then its own digestive juices digest and liquefy its body. Inside the cocoon, it is just goo—nothing remains of its old structure other than the liquefied, digested slime. Then, the cells reform as an entirely new being.

When the butterfly finally works its way out of the cocoon, it has been completely transformed in what has to be one of the ickiest processes. It comes out beautiful, but, man, did it ever go through it to get there!

Share

Dismissing Distractions

Dismissing Distractions

Every day a thousand things clamor for our attention, yelling to us about how important they are. Almost everyone in our lives are happy to tell us what should matter to us, what our focus should be. We can so easily live distracted, which also means we live exhausted as we get judged from every side about what should be our primary focus and how to make it so.

I have been rejected and beat up by religious people more than nonreligious. I know it’s because they have decided that the religion they hold is what’s saving them, what’s making God happy and they are terrified I’m doing it wrong. I have often said (as my mentor and friend Mike Wells taught me to do) that I will say things that are wrong, even downright blasphemy. God will allow this because He wants to draw people to Himself, not to follow me. It also keeps me in a place where I know my weakness, and I know I need Holy Spirit to interpret the very words that come out my mouth or my laptop.  He is the great interpreter, and He is able to translate and speak through whatever is said to bring His message to the person.

I will be the first to state that I can get it wrong, and I never want to stand up as someone who has all the answers. Because I don’t. All I have to offer is Jesus—a Life who gently invades our hearts and heals us from brokenness. I don’t want to get distracted by whatever program or theology someone has decided is preeminent. I want to be the person with the one-stringed banjo who keeps playing that one string over and over, because it’s the only string that matters to me. There are days often where people accuse me of being affiliated with all sorts of broken people. Isn’t that funny? We are all broken, but have arguments about who is more broken and judge and condemn others to try to make ourselves feel superior.

Freedom in Love

Freedom in Love

Especially around holidays like July 4th in the United States, I think of all the sacrifices that have been made over the years for our freedom to do all the things we are able to do. No, the United States is not perfect, but we do enjoy much freedom that so many other countries do not. I get teary often as I think of others laying down their lives for complete strangers to them. I could never deserve or earn that gift. This thought always leads me to an even bigger sacrifice of love in which God engaged to free us from slavery to sin and death.

I was reading Titus (which I honestly haven’t read in quite a long time) and found this gem of a few verses that stood out. Apparently this is believed to be a part of an early church hymn or poem, and it sums up the story so beautifully.

When the extraordinary compassion of God our Savior and his overpowering love suddenly appeared in person as the brightness of a dawning day, he came to save us. Not because of any virtuous deed that we have done but only because of his extravagant mercy. He saved us, resurrecting us through the washing of rebirth. We are made completely new by the Holy Spirit, whom he splashed over us richly by Jesus, the Messiah, our Life Giver. So as a gift of his love, and since we are faultless—innocent before his face—we can now become heirs of all things, all because of an overflowing hope of eternal life. How true and faithful is this message! Titus 3:4-8

In this passage, the whole Trinity—Father, Son and Spirit—are involved in this great rescue plan. I love that this idea was birthed in extraordinary compassion and overpowering love. This was not motivated by guilt or fear or duty. God wanted relationship with us, and that love reached out to save us, no matter what that cost.

We can’t deserve or earn this sacrifice because we can’t be virtuous enough to earn it. Instead, He had extravagant mercy and saved us, birthing us again as a new creation (2 Cor 5:17). We have been made new, and are being made new. I think this refers to the renewing of the mind and sanctifying us that happens by the Holy Spirit’s work in us. We are new creations through Christ’s sacrifice and blood, and now we are constantly being freed from sin’s effects and control through the Holy Spirit’s constant splashing on us.

Walking with the broken to find hope in Jesus