Pruned Like an Azalea

I wrote this as a submission piece which was rejected. I’m just publishing it here, ‘cause I can.

When I was younger, around the age of 6 or 7, I was left at home without enough supervision to keep me from wandering into the garden. Not alone, but also in a different time from what we live in today. As with many memories we have of that age, the specifics of the whole are fuzzy, but I had presumably recently seen my Mum pruning back the roses and other plants, because of what I proceeded to do on my own.

There was an azalea out the back, and I must have decided that it too required pruning. I did not understand the reason or the necessity for pruning, but Mum had done it, so I would help out.

Mum came back up the driveway to find this beautiful azalea pruned to within an inch of its life (and very possibly beyond). From what had been a plant easily my height, and probably taller, this poor azalea was now maybe half its original height and very devoid of leaves, not to mention flowers.

Here’s what my Mum said about the azalea;

“…it didn’t look well for a while, but it grew and blossomed more than it had before!”

An even wiser source than my Mum says this about pruning;

“I am the true vine and my Father is the gardener. He takes away every branch that does not bear fruit in me. He prunes every branch that bears fruit so that it will bear more fruit.”

John 15:1,2

We’ll Always Need Pruning

Here is what the Oxford English Dictionary has to say about pruning;

trim (a tree, shrub, or bush) by cutting away dead or overgrown branches or stems, especially to encourage growth:

Just like a rose bush needs to be pruned to help it grow, so we do as well. Leave a rose and never prune it, and you will get flowers, but not as many as if you had pruned it, and as time goes by there will be fewer and fewer of them. As with us, we may bloom in the good times, but if we don’t encounter adversity, then we won’t change and grow, and over time we will bloom less and less, eventually dying with a whimper.

One of the Bible’s most inspiring verses is found in Jeremiah in the 11^th verse of the 29^th chapter.

For I know what I have planned for you,’ says the Lord. ‘I have plans to prosper you, not to harm you. I have plans to give you a future filled with hope.

It is a wonderfully affirming verse. It is a verse that has helped countless numbers. God not only has plans for us, but he has plans that will prosper us, ones that will not hurt us, and ones that are filled with hope.

However, immediately prior to this beautiful verse we see the Lord asking Jeremiah to tell the exiled people of Israel that they must spend seventy years in Babylon. Not only that, but in verse 7 the Lord tells the Israelites to work for the good of the city, and to pray for the prosperity of that city. There is no suffering in silence going on here; God tells them not complain at all. This is His plan for them and only at the end of seventy years will He “fulfil [His] gracious promise to [them] and restore [them] to [their] homeland.”

What had the Israelites done wrong to deserve this treatment? And from their own God as well?

But what do we see happen following their return to Jerusalem? The walls go up to defend from the many that would tear them down, and not long after the temple is rebuilt. The nation of Israel goes home.

Rejoicing In Adversity

Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.

James 1:2,3

Just as the Israelites in the time of Jeremiah’s ministry were told to prosper their new masters, so James brings us this very tough message. “Consider it pure joy … whenever you face trials”? Really? Joy in trial?

But what I left out in the verse from Jeremiah was that the Israelites would prosper as the city they worked for prospered. God would not only bring them from their trials, but He would prosper them as a result.

As Jerry Bridges points out in his wonderful book, Trusting God, James asks us not to rejoice in the trials themselves, but “because of their beneficial results.”

Paul addresses the same idea in Romans;

Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.

Romans 5:3,4

Both James and Paul make a very clear distinction; whilst we are pruned, whilst we suffer in trials and adversity, we are to take joy for the growth that will come next.

How can they make such promises? Because God already did so in Jeremiah. Here is the full context;

“For the Lord says, ‘Only when the seventy years of Babylonian rule are over will I again take up consideration for you. Then I will fulfil my gracious promise to you and restore you to your homeland. For I know what I have planned for you,’ says the Lord. ‘I have plans to prosper you, not to harm you. I have plans to give you a future filled with hope.”

Do Not Be Anxious, Be Strong and Courageous

Roses are not the only plants that benefit from pruning. The productivity of fruit trees relies upon regular and effective pruning. Allowing a fruit tree to go unpruned will simply see flowers appear, but will not push the plant to use its life and energy to produce fruit. Only when you start cutting away the dead and unproductive parts of the tree will the remainder start not only to flower, but to bear real fruit.

There will be a time when the apple tree will look a little morose, somewhat worse for wear. It’ll be devoid of leaves and will look bare and small.

When we are encountering those same trials, when God has set us aside for pruning, we too may look a little worse for wear. That’s OK! We were never intended to be creatures that would enjoy and desire pain. Having your leaves and branches lopped off is supposed to hurt. And just as a tree doesn’t regrow immediately, so too will we take time to come back to be fully ourselves. As someone wise once told me, if our problems were solved immediately, what would we learn?

But just as the tree doesn’t stop living when its branches are trimmed away, we should also learn to keep living through our own pain. Wallowing in what has happened, in the leaves that were torn from us and the branches that were cut away is not only unhelpful, but it goes in direct contradiction to what God has instructed us to do in times of trouble;

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Philippians 4: 6,7

We are specifically told not to be anxious about anything. Similarly, in Joshua 1 verse 9 God tells Joshua to “be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.” Why should Joshua not be afraid or discouraged? He’s just lost his mentor, he is now the leader of a people who have been wandering the desert for 40 years, and any day now God’s going to have him lead them all into Canaan. So again, why is Joshua not allowed to be afraid or discouraged?

“For the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”

Bearing His Fruit

“Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.

Matthew 7:15 – 20

Jesus spoke these words to the crowds in what is now known as the Sermon on the Mount. It is one of many lessons that Jesus explored, and one that has special significance to our purpose. Because it is by our fruit, our actions, that those around us will see what we are.

Throughout all the gospels Jesus speaks much of pruning and fruit; of our need to be obvious in our faith and to act in a Christlike way. Just as Jesus cursed the fig tree that bore no fruit, so too will we be “cut down and thrown into the fire” if we do not bear good fruit.

But bearing good fruit is no guarantee that we will be excused pain. In fact, it’s a guarantee that we will be pruned again. As I quoted at the beginning, “He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.”

Again though, when we look at the whole of the passage, we see encouragement, rather than just more promise of pain.

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

John 15: 1 – 4

We can be expected to be pruned, but Jesus assures us that we are not alone. As we remain in Him – which is the only way we can bear fruit – so He will remain in us.

Pain will come, most likely time and time again. It may come one after another, or all at once. You may suffer like Job, or you may suffer like Paul and Silas in the dungeons. But if you remain in Jesus Christ, then He will remain in you and the fruit you will bear as a result will be good fruit indeed.

Stewardship Is Our Work

Originally published in Witness, 2011

It has quickly become apparent that I have a passion for the environment, after writing two articles in Witness that set forth, what I hope is, a strong case for Christians being biblically, morally and spiritually responsible stewards of the environment.

As a result, I am now in the process of developing an approach for my church to fulfil that charge; an approach that, I again hope, does justice to the following:

“The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.”

– Genesis 2:15

This verse seems a self-evident call to all believers that I want to expand upon under this month’s theme of Work, Rest, and Play.

When we hear the phrase “work, rest, and play” I think we have a tendency to focus on those last two words; they sound so nice that ‘work’ sort of takes a back seat: this, despite the fact that it is the first on the list. Similarly, it was God who worked six days of the week, and rested on the seventh.

I think there’s a plausible case to be made for the idea that humans were set on this earth to work, to tend God’s creation, to “work it and take care of it.” Wendell Berry says it best:

“The ecological teaching of the Bible is simply inescapable: God made the world because He wanted it made. He thinks the world is good, and He loves it. It is His world; He has never relinquished title to it. And He has never revoked the conditions, bearing on His gift to us of the use of it, that oblige us to take excellent care of it.” – God and Country

And so, in light of this, we at Mitcham Baptist are going to be focusing heavily on recycling over the rest of 2011.

We all know how to recycle, don’t we?

Sure you do, but in all likelihood you’ve gotten lazy at some point and thrown the apple into the garbage, or the empty can of drink, or the church bulletin, when each of those items belongs in an entirely separate bin.

Mitcham is going to be focusing on four areas; 1) recycling the church bulletins, 2) general recycling, 3) sorting the waste for any items that belong elsewhere, and 4) composting with an aim to creating a garden.

Beneath these four points are a lot of sub-points, indented and using Roman numerals, which cover a lot of ideas that will hopefully be played out across the year, and into the future. If they succeed, maybe a time will come when I can take more time to elaborate on them. But for now, it is honestly very exciting to be a part of change like this; bringing an idea into a place which, as Wendell Berry again notes, has “lately shown little inclination to honour the earth or to protect it from those who would dishonour it.”

I don’t speak of my church directly or singularly, but of the Christian church as a whole. Berry precedes the above statement by reminding the reader that the church claims “to honour God as the ‘maker of heaven and earth.’” How can we claim to honour a God who proclaims himself as the “maker of heaven and earth” and then partake, directly or passively, in a culture which misinterprets Genesis 1:28 for its own good?

Take a few moments to read verse 28, but also the verse which immediately precedes it:

So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

Only in reflecting God’s image are we to “subdue” the earth, and under the implicit instruction that comes soon after to “work it and take care of it.”

The Christian church as a whole ignores the first instruction God ever gave to us. In fact, the church goes further than that and actively participates in a lifestyle which runs contradictory to that first command.

A change in lifestyle is hard, no matter the circumstance. It has to be done with little steps, and just one at a time. So Mitcham is taking a small step, which will lead to more steps, which, I hope, will lead to a change in the lifestyle of our church, which might lead to a change in the lifestyle in more than one church.

One small step is all it takes.

Environmentalism isn’t its own Religion: it’s ours!

Originally published in Witness, 2011

Given the opportunity to voice the prayer of my heart during a recent morning service I stood up and prayed for a change in how humanity treats our planet. I was approached afterwards by a member of the congregation and our conversation led to the belief that environmentalism has actually become its own religion, of sorts, and that some Christian’s are actually taking a stand against it because of that. I was dismayed, but not surprised, given the almost Pavlovian response that some Christians have to any passion that isn’t Christianity itself.

For environmentalism is not some contender for a Christian’s religious belief but rather an extension of our own faith.

Or it should be.
I don’t think that God put all that effort into creating a place for us to live just so that we could come along and destroy it. He was meticulous in what He created: He made streams come up from the ground and rain to fall on the dusty ground; He gave us trees that bore fruit and seed and “trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food.”

And then what did He do?

“The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it,”

Genesis 2:15.

Is it too much to think that God wanted Adam and Eve to take care of the lands outside of Eden as well? God told them “to work the ground from which he had been taken.” God gave us the earth to “subdue it,” not destroy it. We are here as God’s creations, made in His image and if God put so much effort and care into the earth that He gave to us don’t you think He expects us to mimic His attitude?

God made us stewards of his creation and His son came along many years later and explained what good stewardship entailed in Luke 16:

“Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.”

It’s important to remember that God doesn’t simply address the environment in the abstract. “The land must not be sold permanently, because the land is mine and you are but aliens and my tenants,” He says to Moses on Mount Sinai in Leviticus 25, and then again at the end of God’s word to us in Revelation He reminds us of the punishment for neglecting his creation:

“The nations were angry; and your wrath has come.
The time has come for judging the dead,
and for rewarding your servants the prophets
and your saints and those who reverence your name,
both small and great—
and for destroying those who destroy the earth.”

I spend every work day informing people of the tragedies our planet is suffering because of us, what is being done and what can be done. So it hurts me when I see or hear of Christians responding to the environmentalism movement as if it is some religious competition, when in reality caring for the environment should be a natural extension of what we as Christians already believe in.

Climate Change is our Failure

Originally published in Witness, 2011

The polar bear swims despairingly for miles hoping that he can find food to eat; all the while the water around him continues to rise, creeping up our coasts. Heatwaves sweep across Europe at the same time that monsoonal rains buffet the Asian continent, and Australia is either in drought or flood. All the while the atmosphere is growing hotter and scientists are honestly asking whether earth will continue to be habitable.

And its stewards are to blame.

“The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.”

– Genesis 2:15

There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that God did not just intend for us to care for Eden, but all of his creation. Consider the work and artistry He put in to our planet, and imagine Him being uncaring whether we were good stewards of that gift.

“The nations were angry; and your wrath has come.
The time has come for judging the dead …
and for destroying those who destroy the earth.”

– Revelation 11:18

That doesn’t sound like the actions of a God who wants us to treat the Earth as if it were our own little sandpit? The “wrath” of our “Lord God Almighty … has come” to “those who destroy the earth.”

It’s not as if God is springing this on us at the last minute either. The first thing God does with the man is to put him into the Garden of Eden to “work it and take care of it.” He made Adam a gardener. What does a gardener do? He cultivates the garden. He coaxes plants to grow, trims away the bad growth, and waters and feeds. A gardener doesn’t exploit the same garden he creates. He treats it with care, picks that which is ready, and tends that which needs tending.

That’s the second chapter of the His Word to us. Relatively clear directions. God made the world, knew it was good, and set us in his world to “work it and take care of it.”

Why then have we so neglected our planet? Why have we set ourselves against the will of God in this?

In Genesis 9, verse 13, God says to Noah that he will place his “rainbow in the clouds and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth.”

God’s covenant is not just with man, but with “every living creature” and “the earth.”

And look at what we have done to the living creatures and the earth. There is no need to run through a list of the disasters we have allowed and actively caused. We know them. But we think it isn’t our problem. We think Christianity doesn’t direct us or help us to care for the environment.

Timothy Keller says that “there are no better intellectual and spiritual and moral resources for a passion for care of creation and the environment then you can find in Christianity,” and I have to agree. The Bible is very clear about how we should treat his creation, but we’ve ignored it and hidden it under the pillows, hoping never to remember it’s there.

Past, Future, or Present– Part 2

Originally published in Witness, 2011

Last month Witness dedicated itself to looking into our memories. This month, we turn our eyes outward and into the future, and you know me, I do love a dictionary explanation;

the future: a period of time following the moment of speaking or writing; time regarded as still to come

But how can we discuss the future when it’s … you know, in the future. Thankfully, there are people who have already experienced their future, as well as their past and present. They’re dead now, sadly, but one thing I know is that they are often the wiser for having lived their lives.

We, on the other hand, are still living. We sometimes don’t know how to live, either being focused on our past or on what may or may not be to come.

J.R.R. Tolkien is, to me, a source of inspiration, wisdom, joy and intelligence. He is that ‘thing’ that I hope to one day become well versed in. For the moment though, I’m only partially versed in his life, but it’s enough for me to understand a little about what I want to talk about.

Tolkien was born in 1892 and died in 1973. Over that time he lived and saw some of the greatest leaps in human thinking and science and life that our race as ever experienced. Sadly he also saw those massive leaps used for the utter destruction of human life. Serving in World War I and witnessing World War II has shone through in his writing, his life, and his academics.

Throughout all of Tolkien’s written work and those few glimpses of his personal life, we can see a beautiful blending of the past, mixed with the future, that make his present.

No one could have come out of WWI without being affected, and Tolkien didn’t seem to shirk that influence. Spend any time reading the Lord of the Rings, or any his wider work, and you will see sweeping stories of good versus evil. The atrocities and horrors of The Great War impacted young Tolkien, and that irrefutable sense of right and wrong stayed with him.

But he didn’t wallow in what he saw either.

The world of the Lord of the Rings was born in the trenches of WWI. Afterwards, Tolkien continued that work, made a family, told them stories, and became one of the 20^th centuries greatest authors and linguists, an academic achievement many would not be aware of.

He lived.

At the same time as all of this happened, however, Tolkien was witness to that unstoppable force called technological advancement. It destroyed the natural world he had grown up amongst and cherished, swapping it for dirty brick factories which belched smoke into the world, initiating one of the greatest crises this human-filled world has ever encountered.

This distaste of wanton destruction for technological advancements sake is exemplified in Tolkien’s the Lord of the Rings, when The Shire suffers similar degradations. The settled life of the hobbits is disrupted, uprooted, and much of the surrounding environment is destroyed. Prior to that there is much to be seen about Tolkien’s view on technological advancement from the way that he writes the Ents of Fangorn and their attitude towards Saruman and his machines, which is to say, not very nicely.

Upon retaking their home, however, the hobbits do not do away with all the technological advancements. The future is upon them, and they do not hide away from it entirely. Their lives return to a settled routine, but houses are rebuilt using bricks and they begin to welcome the outside world in.

Because you can’t simply hide away from the future.

But nor must we adhere to everything that the future has for us. The old phrase says ‘we are to be in the world, but not of the world.’ Technological advancement for its own sake should not have a place in our lives, or in our churches. But to hide away from the future, what it holds, and where it is going, will do nothing but leave a church stagnant and devoid of members.

As last month I portrayed a need for using our past to make our present – to combine the two without ignoring one or the other – so I’ll do the same this month. We cannot expect to convey the Gospel to the unreached if we do not reach out to them, and we cannot reach out to them without being in the world. Only by being in the world can we shine His light.

In the end, I believe that our attitudes towards the past and the future must reach a happy medium so that we can live today. God told us to ask for our daily bread, not tomorrows. Both the past and the future must play a part.

Past, Future, or Present– Part 1

Originally published in Witness, 2011

‘Memory,’ as described by the Oxford English Dictionary, reads like this;

something remembered from the past

‘Remember,’ as described by the OED, reads like this;

have in or be able to bring to one’s mind an awareness of (someone or something from the past)

From the outset, in this month of remembering the year that has passed, I would like to remind everyone that, while memory and the past are both necessary and, naturally, inescapable, they are not the future, nor are they the present, where those we are trying to minister to are living.

Without extemporising on the nature of the present passing into history, I will quote from one of the wisest men I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading, J.R.R. Tolkien. The quote comes from the fifth chapter of the second portion of The Return of the King, Tolkien’s third and final book in his Lord of the Rings Trilogy;

“The Third Age of the world is ended, and the new age is begun; and it is your task to order its beginning and to preserve what may be preserved. For though much has been saved, much must now pass away”

As the book continues, there are many lessons to be learned about living in the past, and living for the future.

Frodo, the story’s primary hero, has worn himself out and has trouble leaving his past behind him which, in the end, forces him to leave the world behind for literally greener pastures. Samwise Gamgee, however, who stuck with Frodo every step of the way, spends much of the end portion of the book preparing a future that involves gardens, a wife, and many children, and then doing the most important thing of all; living in it.

Too often, I think, we find ourselves living in a world made up of our yesterdays. We forget that time is moving on and we try to hang on to that which was once safe to us in an effort to remain safe. But I don’t think our lives as Christians were ever meant to be lived as ‘safe.’ God has called us on to lives that will glorify him, even if it means sacrificing aspects of our own lives; time, money, relationships, and even our lives, in some cases.

But having said all of that, we cannot simply ignore the past either. Our histories are what make us what we are today.

Frodo, for example, had few friends, and the entire weight of carrying the One Ring to Mordor was his alone to bear. Samwise, on the other hand, was always someone who had friends and, upon his return, set about making a life for himself. He did not let the horrors he had experienced dissuade him from living, but rather, used them as impetus to live.

Maybe more than most, Sam had the justification to hermit himself away and forget what he had to sacrifice. But he didn’t. He came right home and set about using Galadriel’s gift to restore his world; bringing back beauty and life to a town that had been destroyed by the unnecessary headlong plunge into technological advancement (which will be the subject of next month’s “Part 2”).

Sam’s home had been all but destroyed. Nothing looked the same. Advancement had come along out of nowhere and pushed his people into a place they weren’t willing to go. Instead of simply resorting to default though, stepping back into the past because the past had been nice and comfortable, Sam and his friends took some of the future and placed it comfortably alongside their past, to make their present, and their future.

I think that is something we should be doing more of. People like to shun anything of the future because ‘that’s not how it was in my day’ or, worse in my opinion, ‘that’s not how it was in the Bible.’

For people’s information, the organ’s use in church – often the symbol taken up by those upset with technological progress in general, but specifically as the progress is implemented in a church – was once as hated and misconstrued as the drum kits use is today. Church regulars saw it as a musical instrument of the pubs, and definitely not fit for church. But here it is, now the token for indignant outrage whenever the drum kit or electric guitar appears more than it does.

It’s hanging on to the past because it is safe, rather than accepting the fact that the world outside is moving on, and so are the people you are trying to minister to.