Limited perspective, unlimited hope for the new year

Consider the ant, you sluggard; learn from its ways and be wise!  It has no commander, no overseer or ruler, yet it stores its provisions in summer and gathers its food at harvest. --Proverbs 6:6-8

I wonder what the horizon looks like to an ant?  I can just imagine a weather-ant in front of a green screen, standing on two legs, holding a clicker in one, and pointing with three others to imaginary numbers.  "And it's going to be a gorgeous day, with visibility up to fifteen feet from high atop the ant hill.  Watch for automatic sprinklers set for 7:00 a.m., and remember the giant children coming home from school at 3:00 p.m.--don't want to see any of you squished on the sidewalk."

The point is that from their perspective, their world is relatively small.  And no matter how hard they do their jobs, most of them are subject to things outside their control--a small boy discovers the properties of light with a magnifying glass, wrecking the lives of some unsuspecting ants; a little girl drops her candy on the ground, and when she tries to pick it up and brush the ants off of the sticky sweet, some of the stinging insects could end up in her clothes, and cause her to dance uncontrollably.  They may have ant-dreams of finding a picnic, but can they really plan for that?

We are like the ants in that respect.  We go about our lives, doing the best we can.  We struggle to carry life's burdens, which appear to be up to six times our body weight.  And just about the time we carry a few crumbs home to store them up for the winter, some calamity strikes, and our homes are destroyed by a shovel larger than we can imagine, or there is wide-spread sickness and death caused by a poison introduced from outside the colony.

I, for one, could not have begun to predict the events of the past year when I was ringing in the new year in 2013.  I had no idea I would lose one job and get another.  I could not have imagined what effect joining a new church and being more faithful in tithing would have in our lives.  Neither could I have predicted that my children would both move home, that one would get a job and the other would get a dog.  These were not my plans.  I did not resolve to do any of those things.

None of the things we take for granted are in any way guaranteed.  Our homes, our health, our handiwork--all could be gone in the blink of an eye.  It is by the grace of God that we have them; it is by his mercy that we keep hold of them.  That, I think, is why the Bible teaches against prideful boasting.

Now listen, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money."  Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow.  What is your life?  You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.  Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that."  As it is, you boast and brag.  All such boasting is evil.  Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins. --James 4:13-17

If it is God's will, we will act on our plans.  But all the while, we must remember the words of Jesus in the Model Prayer: "Our Father....Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven."  We must stay attuned to the Will of the Father.  This doesn't mean that we are to quit our jobs and just wait for the Lord to come.  Remember what James said in the passage we just quoted--whoever knows to do good and doesn't do it, commits a sin just as grievous as doing something we know to be wrong.

In 2014, pray that God will make His ways clear to you.  I can guarantee that if you attuned to the will of God, then the changes He brings will be less traumatic to you.  If you put on too much pride, God's humbling will be painful, and maybe even humiliating.

We are called to be sheep.  Our job is to follow the Good Shepherd.  Sheep are not called to be load-bearing animals.  Sheep are not called to be astronauts, seeing the world from God's perspective; instead, we are called to share.  When a sheep is shorn of its wool, it is not embarrassed.  That wool accumulates dirt and stains when it stays on the sheep.  In the hands of the shepherd, that wool becomes fibers for a man to weave, giving him work to do with his hands; it becomes warm clothes and blankets for a mother to gather and provide for her children; it becomes an artistic tapestry that a child can appreciate, for it reminds her of her mother's love, her father's work, the shepherd's faithfulness, and the sheep's act of selfless giving.

Many spend their lives gazing at stars, when they should keep their heads down and their eyes closed.  For it is in the spirit of prayer that we can see the heavens more clearly.