faith

The Eye of the Artist

/ pastorpete51 / Leave a comment

My stepfather was an artist and I often remember standing behind him watching in wonder as He worked. With just a few brush strokes He could create an astonishingly lifelike painting. When I asked him how he could be so precise Rudy explained that a realist paints neither what others think they see or what they hope to see but what truly stands before them.

In the same way the canvas of a life must be painted by the eyes of faith. A true faith is born not by our wishful thinking or someone else’s imagination, but in the moment we see Him who has seen us from the beginning. That is when His light can shine into our hearts and reveal to us the face of Jesus Christ.

Fallow Ground

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Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the Lord , till he come and rain righteousness upon you. Hosea 10:12 KJVFallow – a state in which a field is unplowed, unplanted and unused.That a field is left fallow in no way implies that it isn’t lovely or that it is useless. Fallowness is a state of rest during which the ground can regain its strength after years of crop bearing.But the same God who chooses our seasons to lie fallow also decides when it is time to plow again. We are most able to hear the plowman’s call when we rest in His timing and plan. He has not chosen us to decide the seed or the season of planting. We are called to abide quietly till the new crop must be put in. Then we can awaken with joy because the roughness of a plow dragging across our field means a harvest of mercy is dawning on God’s horizon!