Hour of
Power
I
recently had lunch with a friend named Brent who has worked with the family
dairy his whole life. After years of trying to maneuver through the mine field
of constantly increasing feed costs, and the prevalent drought conditions that
affected hay crops yields each year, they had no other choice but to sell off
their herd of milking cows and stop the financial bleeding. He shared with me
that for decades the acreage around the place had been so barren and bleak
looking due to the constant trampling by the cows . . . not to mention the
incessant barrage of manure and urine. Now that the herd was gone, he was
beginning to do some much needed dirt work and seeding to reclaim the usefulness
of the soil.
Much to his surprise, after just a few weeks, things were already looking quite
promising as the fuzz of new grass was popping up all over the place. No doubt
the years of animal by-products have enriched the soil making it incredibly
fertile. A month ago he was on the verge of caving in emotionally due to the
pressure of the unknown, and sounded as if they had been stripped of all
options. The only career and livelihood he ever knew had become a dead end
street. The lunch time and conversation we shared was a real “power lunch” for
me and my interest was incited as he talked about new ideas that were beginning
to emerge in his mind. His heart was coming back to life and a new day was
dawning as his ideas were developing into viable plans to repurpose that
hallowed ground and foster new ways of producing income for the
family.
By
the end of our lunch visit, I had an epiphany about the dynamic relationship
between God’s role as our Sovereign Provider, and our responsibility to partner
with His creative enterprises on this planet. I immediately thought of Adam
working with God in the development of this newly created world. The earth
needed a caretaker to channel its resources for the greatest good. Although
Creator God spoke everything into existence including Adam himself, and provided
everything he would need to live and propagate, He did not want to DO
everything.
Adam was given the responsibility develop what God had provided. His job was to
plow the soil, cultivate the food sources, and to name every living thing:
plant life, insects, fish, birds, and every kind of animal life. Now I
understand why it’s called “animal husbandry,” because it’s a relationship that
requires oversight and stewardship, lest it meander and mutate off course. The
created earth with its inhabitants was an expansive “wildlife preserve” that
needed to be subdued and given direction to maximize its potential. That was
Adam’s part of the partnership, and not an easy one at
all.
Even though the animals would line up in pairs to board Noah’s ark much later in
the biblical record, it doesn’t say that they did the same for Adam. Therefore,
I assume he had to seek and find them; invest lots of time and effort; and
utilize his intuition and imagination in order to accomplish this task. Yes,
God’s part to produce the created things was super-natural as only He could do,
but Adam was charged with the responsibility to appropriate them with his God
given abilities.
Lemons
to Lemonade
Sometimes everything we need is at hand but fails show up on our radar until we
engage, invest, and imagine. The barren landscape around us appears hopeless
until a caretaker’s plow turns the dirt over and new seed is sown into its
crevices. If you ask me, too many conversations these days among Christians
seem to echo the same gloom of a world gone out of control, as if there are no
more options available to us to make any good from all this bad. To hear them
wrangling gives one the impression that they think the only thing left for us to
do is anesthetize ourselves and play out the clock. No credible or successful
coach ever asks his team to take a defensive posture and “play not to lose.” I
believe the earnest expectation of rapture has more to do with being catapulted
into the Lord’s presence, and little to do with being snatched away from all
these troubles. Followers of Christ need to beware of what I call “Christian
fatalism,” which basically calls for us all to throw in the towel in our efforts
to make wrong things right in our world. This undercurrent quenches our thirst
for abundant living and leads to the abdication of our responsibility to partner
with God using His assets through our efforts.
Life is challenging and often bitter. I certainly recognize how threatened we
feel with the kinds of terrorism taking place at home and abroad. My heart has
been restless for some time now as I look about and wonder if I’m really in it
to win it, or just running out the clock. Who’s going to step up and step out?
What’s happened to our lemonade stands? Isn’t it high time we get busy and join
those who are involved in doing something redemptive? Empty buildings and
neighborhoods need to be seen as opportunities to invest and reclaim for the
common good. So do people.
What about repurposing our use of the internet and social media for the sake of
encouraging people to choose life? What if all those scattershot worries,
rumors and fear mongering were turned into positive seed sowing? I’d rather
keep my self busy as a purveyor of beauty and honorable things rather than
breeding the latest scandals and controversies. While this kind of tabloid doom
and gloom has spread like gangrene in recent years, hundreds of thousands of
children in underdeveloped countries have perished due to poverty conditions,
malnutrition, and preventable diseases like malaria.
Plenty
to Choose From
We
don’t have to look far to find something that begs for redemption or a better
purpose. The great humanitarian needs of the world we are supposed to be
addressing begin at your doorstep and extend to the far corners of the globe.
It doesn’t really matter if you choose to engage, invest, and imagine
possibilities to reclaim your neighborhood, or serve as a volunteer in a soup
kitchen for the homeless. You might even take the time to travel to Eastern
Europe to serve an orphanage for six weeks. What matters is not so much about
what you do, but that you are taking responsibility.
An Old
House to Restore: An Old Neighborhood to Uplift
So
there you have it. This is our new gig . . .
taking something old and rundown and pumping new life into it . . . a
re-creation of sorts, which is why I named our new enterprise as Maxwell
Creations. It’s not about the house per se, but more about where do we go from
here and how are we going to make a difference.
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