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The writer must to some extent inspire
himself. Most of his sentences may at first lie dead
in his essay, but when all are arranged, some life and color will be reflected
on them from the mature and successful lines; they will appear to pulsate with
fresh life, and he will be able to eke out their slumbering sense, and make
them worthy of their neighborhood. Henry
D. Thoreau in his journal “I to Myself”,
February, 1859.
The idyllic snow scene in the
photo above
could have been many places in our United States, but it could easily be snow
on the Blue Ridge mountains from a point where I once lived high upon the Massanutten
looking eastward. It could have also
been a winter scene just west of where I now live facing the Appalachians. I
offer thanks to God and Providence that I have lived these latter years in the
midst of such beauty and tranquility. I
read the news and marvel that my life journey has taken me to so many places
where rumors of war and disasters now would make travel to those places fearful
or forbidden. I look backward on the
passages of my life with deep gratitude for all the crossroads and crucibles
that have given me so rich an opportunity to know the world uniquely mine on a
journey under the protection of God’s marvelous grace and goodness.
I am reading with intense interest Dallas
Willard’s book The Divine Conspiracy one reviewer for which places the
book in rare company alongside the writings of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, John
Wesley, John Calvin and Thomas Aquinas. A principal theme encompassing wisdom
for
meaningful life in the here and now as well as hereafter, is that we who are
Christians live in two kingdoms at once: a physical kingdom and a spiritual
world with Christ our Lord which began when we were reborn in grace and faith
in Jesus Christ. From that moment
forward we grow ever more mature in acquiring the spiritual gifts that Jesus taught his disciples. Willard shows us
that life in the spiritual kingdom is our destiny:
As we increasingly integrate our life
into the
spiritual world of God, our life takes on the substance of the eternal. We are
destined for a time when our life will
be entirely sustained from spiritual realities and no longer dependent in any
way upon the physical. Our dying, or
“mortal condition, will have been exchanged for an undying one and death
absorbed in victory.” Dallas Willard,
The Divine Conspiracy, Rediscovering
our Hidden Life in God.
Spring morning in the
Blue Ridge
“..It is not given to us to write
Gospels for the world to read. But think
again! Is it not? The fact is,
there is not one of us here
today who cannot compose a life of Jesus.
You can write an evangel, not in books and documents, but in deeds and
character. You can make men see
Jesus. You can live in such a way that,
even when you are not speaking about religion at all, you will be confronting
souls with Christ -- His ways, His spirit, His character – and making them feel
the power and the beauty of the Son of God.
And it may be that all unknown to you, one soul here or another there
will owe its very salvation to that gospel of yours; it may be that someone
will rise from among the throngs around the judgment-seat on the last day, and
pointing to you will cry; “There is the man to whom, under God, I owe
everything! It was reading the gospel of
Christ in that man’s life that redeemed me.”
And Jesus will turn to you with glad and grateful eyes. Come,
ye blessed of My Father – inherit the kingdom!” James S. Stewart in a
sermon “A Drama in Four Acts”.
“What
is most valuable for any human being, without regard to an afterlife, is to be
a part of this marvelous reality, God’s kingdom now. Eternity is now ongoing. I am now leading a life that will last
forever. Upon my treasure in the heavens
I now can draw for present needs. If,
with a view to my needs in this life, I had to choose between good credit with
a bank and having good credit with God, I would not hesitate a moment. By all
means, let the bank go.” Dallas
Willard, Ibid. 
Dallas Willard, Ibid.
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