Shadows & Dust

My spirit is feeling a bit more poetic today. It tends to get that way after a good spiritual kick to the head.  Which if you read the last post you'll know what I'm talking about.  If you did not read it click the pretty blue letters, here.

One of my all time favorite movies is Gladiator.  In this sweeping epic tale, Maximus, a general of the Roman army is betrayed.  He is captured and made into a slave/gladiator.  In one scene Maximus is talking with his owner/trainer, Proximo, right before a fight meant to kill Maximus.  They were talking about the intentions the now dead emperor had for Rome and how the emperor's son was ruining that vision.

Proximo: He knows too well how to manipulate the mob.
Maximus: Marcus Aurelius had a dream that was Rome, Proximo. That is not it. That is not it!
Proximo: Marcus Aurelius is dead, Maximus. We mortals are but shadows and dust. Shadows and dust, Maximus!

Much later in the movie Proximo repeats his words.  This time he had helped Maximus escape and soldiers were closing in to kill the old trainer.  Now the "shadows and dust," is not original to the writer of the screenplay.  It comes from an ancient Roman poet named Horace.  He's also the guy who gave us, "Carpe diem."


There is something here that is teasing me at the corners of my mind.

First the dust.  God created Adam from the dust of the earth.

"the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being."
                                                                                                     -Genesis 2:7

Our physical bodies are dust.  Here today, gone tomorrow.  I mean literally.  Part of the dust you just cleaned off your bookshelf (or maybe you need to) is some of your dead skin and hair particles.  God also tells Adam and Eve in Genesis that from dust they were created and to dust they will return.  So will we.  These bodies we have, are temporary.  We can use them wisely, or waste them.  The funny thing is that we are also told that our bodies are the temple of God.  So these bodies of dust are the temple of God.

That is awesome!


God made us.  He chose to dwell amongst us, within us.  There is no greater thought than that!  God's presence makes the dust into something more.  We are something more than ourselves when the Spirit of God is at work in our lives.

Which brings us to the shadow part.

What is the point of a shadow?  A shadow is an area that light cannot reach due to an obstruction.  So, if we as humans are shadows, we are an area that light cannot reach due to an obstruction.

Maybe not our physical being, but what about our souls?

Jesus is the light of the world.  When he shines on us there are shadows.  The obstruction?  Sin.  Self.  Anything we put before him.  Jesus says this in Matthew 6:23

"But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!"

Darkness exists because something is blocking the light.  Whatever that is for you, for me, we need to drop it at the feet of Jesus.  I know it is easy to say.  The dust side of us, the flesh, is strong.  And by strong I  mean weak.  Weak to the influence of sin.  It's easy to let those unclean words fly from our tonges.  It's easy to let our eyes wander and linger.  It's easy to (____fill in the blank___).

Horace and Proximo had it wrong.  We are more than shadows and dust.  We may do things wrong from time to time, look at pretty much every "hero" in the Bible.  They all made mistakes.  Abraham constantly lied.  Jacob was a manipulator.  Moses starts his story off killing a guy.  David...I don't have room to list all the things David did wrong (yet he is still mentioned as a man after God's own heart!)  Samson.  Jonah.  Paul.  Peter.  You.  Me.

Fill the dust of your being with the Spirit of God and let his light shine forth in you and eradicate the shadows from your life.

grace, peace + hope
-Jesse

Seedless, Part I

It was a typical Monday morning.  Wake up, get ready for work, rush out the door without breakfast.  But I did grab some fruit out of the fridge.  Fruits are incredible.  From apples to grapes, cantaloupes to tomatoes*, fruits just plain and simply rock. 

(*Botanically speaking a tomato is a fruit, the US Supreme Court can go sit on an egg.)

During my break I retrieve my branch of grapes and orange and begin consuming them.  It's going really well until I realize they are seedless.  Which normally would have made me very happy.  But I suppose something is changing in my opinion on the matter.

At a house gathering in Harrisburg (PA) last night we read through the Creation account in Genesis.  Then we watched Rob Bell's video Everything Is Spiritual.  Couple that with recent readings of the Gospels and I came to a conclusion.

There is something wrong with seedless fruit.

Look at what Genesis says:  (Chapter 1)

11Then God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.” And it was so. 12The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. 13And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day. 

Yeah.

God made plants and trees with intent of bearing fruit with seed.  Now, I'm no botanist, but if my memory serves correct, seeds are how plants reproduce.  With out apple seeds folklore legend Johnny Appleseed wouldn't have a last name or story.  I know there are ways to grow some plants by grafting and all that stuff.  But that is essentially cloning (and I'm not jumping into that today.)


The fact is that plants are supposed to grow fruit that bear seed.

I've decided that I don't like seedless fruit.  I won't be wasteful with what I already have.  But I'm not going to intentionally purchase seedless fruit any more.

Some might say to me, "Dude, you're being way uptight about this."  And maybe I am.  But there is another side to this seedless thing that bothers me.  Something that is at the heart of this revolution.

And that will have to wait for tomorrow.

grace, peace + hope
-Bear