Pastor's Corner
March 2006
“…He rescued me because He delighted in me.”
Psalm 18:19b
I was returning from a hospital call in downtown Boise recently when I made a wrong turn trying to return to the church. (This after almost 18 years living here and still figuring out the downtown roads!) My detour took me behind some buildings where I saw a homeless man (I presumed) rummaging through a dumpster. That sight was sad enough for me. Then I noticed that the man had pulled something out of the dumpster and laid it to one side on a loading dock nearby. I realized it was a bouquet of flowers! They looked to be in pretty good shape, bright red in color and bundled nicely. My first thought was that as this was soon after Valentine’s Day, that someone either didn’t want to get these flowers or they didn’t get given (perhaps a jilted lover threw them there in frustration from rejection?). My mind then thought about why the homeless man took them out of the dumpster. Did he have someone to give them to? Were they just something pretty in his dark and dingy world? Would he hope to sell them somehow for a little money to live on, a next meal? Not knowing the answer of course my very next thought was of the picture (the metaphor) this painted with regards to our Christian life. In the garbage, the refuse, the discarded and “worthless” stuff of that bin one man saw beauty. One man reached deep into that rubbish and pulled out that beauty. The picture for me at that moment was of what God has done for us as Christians! The Lord reaching down into the “dumpster” of this world, full of lost, discarded and sinful humanity and choosing to see beauty. Choosing as the Psalmist says to “delight in me”. Why? Because God chooses to see the beauty in the ashes of our falleness. God chooses to look for us as flowers in a dumpster.
Is that not the beauty of the gospel? God rescuing us for no other reason than He delights in us? God choosing to call us to Himself in Christ! Herein is the hope of humanity and the help we have waited for! My little detour turned into a moment that C.S. Lewis called “the drippings of grace”. A moment where God in grace serendipitously got my attention. A moment when I saw grace illustrated with beauty taken from a garbage bin. A moment when I saw my life pictured. I was lost and discarded in sin and Jesus rescued me! He saw the “beauty” He could make in giving me the gift of salvation! As I drove away I thanked God for the brief detour and most of all I thanked Him for pulling me (and you) out of the “dumpster”, flowers not forgotten.
Serving with you,
P.S.
By now I hope you have heard that our former church treasurer is now our church secretary! That would be Teresa Dudley! Welcome Teresa as you serve in this vital and greatly appreciated church ministry!
