The Business of Heaven

We Must Choose:

Why is God landing in this enemy-occupied world in disguise and starting a sort of secret society to undermine the Devil? Why is He not landing in force, invading it? Is it that He is not strong enough? Well, Christians think He is going to land in force; we do not know when. But we can guess why He is delaying. He wants to give us the chance of joining His side freely. I do not suppose you and I would have thought much of a Frenchman who waited till the Allies were marching into Germany and then announced he was on our side. God will invade. But I wonder whether people who ask God to interfere openly and directly in our world quite realize what it will be like when He does. When that happens, it is the end of the world. When the author walks onto the stage the play is over. God is going to invade, all right; but what is the good of saying you are on His side then, when you see the whole natural universe melting away like a dream and something else- something it never entered your head to conceive- comes crashing in; something so beautiful to some of us and so terrible to others that none of us will have any choice left? For this time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every creature. It will be too late then to choose your side. There is no use saying you choose to lie down when it has become impossible to stand up. That will not be the time for choosing: it will be the time when we discover which side we really have chosen, whether we realized it or not. Now, today, this moment, is our chance to choose the right side. God is holding back to give us that chance. It will not last for ever. We must take it or leave it.

C.S. Lewis

2 Peter 3:3-10

Fearfully and Wonderfully

I saw the most beautiful thing I have ever seen yesterday. Black and white, it was a small image; only 2-3 inches big on the monitor. I stood in the darkened room and tried not to cry. The nurse practitioner on the other side of the exam table turned the screen so that the patient could see. "do you see him?" she asked. "That's your baby".
My clinicals this semester are at a small women's clinic that does pregnancy tests, STD checks, Pap smears, and ultrasonography. Their main emphasis is on counseling, recognizing that their patients need a lot more than just a solution to their crisis.
This baby was unexpected and the single mother did not want to be pregnant. She thought that she might be 5 or 6 weeks along; as it turned out she was 12. I stood by her side, watching the little tiny figure as it bounced up and down, waving its arms, stretching its legs and generally protesting our pushing and prodding with the ultrasound probe. The fuzzy image was so captivating and yet so very vulnerable.
I cried out to God as I stood there. He is the only one that know the days of this child's life. He is the only one that knows their name. All their days are written down and the end will not take Him by surprise, although it may grieve his heart. Just like the babe though, he loves that Mother as well. He knows her heart, her thoughts, her fears; he has been there the whole time. He knows what to speak to her heart; he knows that she is created for His purpose. He Loves her.
He knows all of them...every single person broken by the lies of this world. Hurt, crying out, betrayed and confused. He loves them.
Father, send out workers into your harvest field! The harvest is ripe and plentiful- and so very fragile.