What do you love about Jesus?
This is the question that changed our author's understanding of sharing one's faith. Feinberg writes, "...I thought sharing one's faith was a matter of coercion. Now I realize it's a matter of connection" (p. 55). Feinberg writes about loving Jesus for his beauty and finding beauty all around when she more readily identifies the Creator of those surroundings: "When I fix my eyes on him, then I can look at things in this world and better recognize which ones bear the fingerprints of the Creator. And I find myself worshiping the Maker of beauty rather than that which merely has been marked by beauty" (p. 53).
I get it. I started practicing yoga more than seven years ago. It's great for my health and for od for my often overwhelmed brain. Type A folks like me need something to slow us down and give us an excuse to be still and yet feel accomplished afterwards. An equally wonderful and completely unexpected gift of my yoga practice is the way it has opened my eyes to beauty. While yoga has somehow made me more attuned to physical beauty in other people, it is also undeniably connected to the beauty of the Creator. I see human bodies as works of art. Each is a differently shaped, a hand-crafted clay vessel sculpted by God. Each is the perfect work of art that God intended and bears God's own fingerprints. I receive it as an amazing blessing to see people as creations made and loved by the Creator rather than judging shapes and contours and colors the way society and media would have me to do.
One of my favorite children's sermons to give is to talk about the image of God. I ask kids what God looks like and get a variety of answers. (Or better yet, I ask kids to draw Jesus and get some of the coolest kid-art ever. I never fail to learn a lot about Jesus in the process of asking them to explain their drawings to me.) I tell them I've got a picture of God, but they'll have to look closely. I then show them a mirror. It's best when kids gasp in amazement! I wouldn't do this with children if I didn't believe that they are seeing God in that mirror, but that's precisely what I believe.
But yoga and bodies are just one way among infinite others to see beauty around you, me, and us. So where is it that you see God's breathtaking beauty?
And what do you love about Jesus?
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What do I love about Jesus? I love the way Jesus loves.
ReplyDeleteI had this incredible realization almost 10 years ago now when I was leading a youth group mission trip. We were reading Matthew 10:17-34 (sometimes called "The Parable of the Rich Young Ruler"). Verse 21 jumped off the page, grabbed me, and hasn't let go ever since. In The Message, it says, "Jesus looked him hard in the eye--and loved him!"
I love the way Jesus loves. He looks deep inside and loves. He looks at us and loves instantly. He looks in and loves no matter what he finds.
My epiphany on that youth trip was this: It's just that simple. Jesus loves wherever he looks...and so should I.
I love the fact that Jesus will always forgive our sins. It is amazing, that no matter what we do, he will still love us just the same and wipe the slate clean and not hold anything against us. I enjoyed this quote from the book: "For me, redemption is like a postcard from God himself, reminding us that he's still at work, he has not forgotten us, and he is closer than we think."
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