Young Buck Looking
John Miller
12/31/19
- Windstream Mail
R E F L E C T I O N S Thoughts on nature and the Christian faith - 12/30/19 ___________________________________________________________________________ "For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling," - II Cor. 5:2 |
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Jo and I came across this young buck looking intently across an overgrown field. What had captured his rapt attention? Here is a clue - it was during the rut. Yes, there were three does walking away from him. Sexual desire had made him unaware of my presence. He was consumed by his longing to mate. Afterward I pondered about what captures my attention, what I most desire. Age makes us shift what we consider most important, what we long for. Both Jo and I lately have had medical issues that have focused our desires toward heavenly things. Our tents, our houses, that we now inhabit are failing and we yearn for a heavenly dwelling where our faith will become sight, where our mortality will be swallowed up by immortality, where the curse will give way to the promise. I can neither add to, or take from my allotted days nor do I wish to. God has blessed me in this life with more joys than I can enumerate. But there is a certain wisdom that comes with age, a realignment of priorities. I have learned that pain and hardship, sickness and trials all have a purpose. They prepare us to loosen our grip on what is temporary and to yearn for what is eternal. When I look back across the field of my life I can see God's guidance even when I thought I was abandoned. I can see how God used even my sinfulness to redirect me to himself. And now, looking toward the next field that awaits me, I can see the faint outlines of my future dwelling, and what excites me the most is I can see the faint form of the one who waits for me there. He, not the trivial things that consume us, is the purpose and goal of life. Put your trust in him alone and he will guide you through this field to the next. Yearn for what is most important. You will never regret it. - John
