Designed By God

There is a T.V. show on the HGTV channel called “Divine Design,” and it showcases the impressive talents of Candice Olson, the star and host of the show. Every time I see or hear “Divine Design,” I don’t think of Candice Olson. I think of God.

When I was a teenage in youth choir, we sang “MASTER DESIGNER,” a song by Kurt Kaiser:

Cotton candy clouds, so fluffy and white,
Who put you there in a sky of deep blue?
Or do you just happen to float along,
Pretty and white in a sky so blue, so blue, sky so blue?

Tall mountain, deep valley, fast river, cool stream,
Show grandeur and majesty in some grand scheme
All of these wonders that we behold,
Are only a part – it cannot be told, be told, cannot be told.

Master Designer, Whoever You are,
All of this beauty both near and afar
Can’t just have happened, the odds are too great,
There must be a plan, we’re not left to fate, to fate, not left to fate.

All of this beauty is far too convincing
Master Designer, Your word must be true,
Of all Your creations man is the dearest
Help me to simply believe now in You, in you,
Believe in You.

O.K., the song is dated (after all, it was the 70’s), but I’ve long been fascinated by this notion of God as the master designer. It is a notion born out in the scriptures, as we read in our texts for today.

Psalm 19 – “The heavens tell of the glory of God – and proclaim the wonder of God’s handiwork.” I looked up handiwork – it means the heavens are handmade by God. God is the master designer and the master craftsman.

We see it in Noah’s Ark. God said to Noah, “…make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high. Make a roof for it and finish the ark to within 18 inches of the top. Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks.”

God the Architect, giving Noah the detailed blueprints for building a new kind of building; one that would float and last through the worst storm in human history.

Made me think of Joe Silva. Joe is a master carpenter. He can see the things he wants to build in his mind, and he doesn’t even need to write it down. His latest edifice is an outdoor kitchen in his backyard. We stood there, on the lawn, and he described it in detail to me. “The oven will be here, with a shelf, and there will be a place here for the grill. I’ll build a window here, for access to the pool. There will be vent here, and I’ll use clay tiles for the roof. It will slant from here up to there. And there will be stairs here for access to my workshop and the basement.”

It was easy to imagine what it would look like because he described it so well. When I returned, it was done – just the way he described. I think God is a master carpenter like Joe Silva.

Consider also the Ark of the Covenant. “Make this tabernacle and all its furnishings exactly like the pattern I will show you. Have them make a chest of acacia wood—two and a half cubits long, a cubit and a half wide, and a cubit and a half high. Overlay it with pure gold, both inside and out, and make a gold molding around it. Cast four gold rings for it and fasten them to its four feet, with two rings on one side and two rings on the other. Then make poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold. Insert the poles into the rings on the sides of the chest to carry it. The poles are to remain in the rings of this ark; they are not to be removed. Then put in the ark the Testimony, which I will give you…
See that you make them according to the pattern shown you on the mountain.”

God gave them the pattern, i.e., the blueprint, and told them to follow it exactly. And they did. That’s how the Ark of the Covenant was created.

God also designed the Temple. And so the Bible is clearly revealing to us that God is the Divine Designer.

Now listen to this verse from Ephesians, chapter 2, verse 10:

“We are God’s work of art, created in Christ Jesus to live the good life as from the beginning he had meant us to live it.”

We hear about God the Creator, and God the Father all the time, but not so much about God the Artist. I think there’s a lot of value in contemplating God as The Artist who puts an artist’s thought, care, and work into creating works of art called Me, You, and Us. The creative energy, attention to detail, and raw work that God puts into creating us is pretty amazing. This reminds me of one of my favorite poems – “The Creation,” by James Weldon Johnson. It ends with God creating humanity:

Up from the bed of the river
God scooped the clay;
And by the bank of the river
He kneeled Him down;
And there the great God Almighty,
Who lit the sun and fixed it in the sky,
Who flung the stars to the most far corner of the night,
Who rounded the earth in the middle of His hand —
This Great God,
Like a mammy bending over her baby,
Kneeled down in the dust
Toiling over a lump of clay
Till He shaped it in His own image;

Then into it He blew the breath of life,
And man became a living soul.
Amen. Amen.

We are God’s workmanship. God’s handiwork. The pinnacle of God’s creation.

My sister, “Snookie,” is a master gardener. Snookie’s office is filled with handmade drawings of people’s yards and development’s layouts, with every plant and tree carefully thought out based on the amount of sun, whether it is indigenous, how big it will get, how much water and care it needs, and so forth. And you can get in the car and take a tour of the gardens and landscapes she has designed and handcrafted. Right down to the butterfly garden, where hundreds come every year during the migration of the monarchs. It is breathtaking.

I want us to be master designers of the new lives that we are called to live because of the risen Christ. And I want us to be master designers of the church God has planned for greater Birmingham. We are co-creators with Christ in designing and building the kinds of lives and communities that accurately exemplify God’s Kingdom intentions.

God is the Architect; God is the artist. God is the playwright. Each of us has a role in God’s script, and if we do our part, the play will change the world. And at the curtain call, God deserves the standing ovation.

Goldilocks Comes to Church

Remember Goldilocks? At the three bears’ house, she tested the porridge, the chairs, and the beds until she found the ones that were “just right” for her. Not too hot or too cold, too big or too little, too hard or too soft. Just right. Goldilocks knew what she liked, and she kept looking until she found it. I wonder what would happen if Goldilocks came to church.
Some people shop for a church the Goldilocks way. They visit churches’ worship services with their list of preferences. Is the music too loud, too soft, too fast, too slow, or just right? Is the sermon too long, too short, or just right? Are the people too friendly, too cold, too wild, too calm, or just right? Is the congregation too big, too small, too old, too young, or just right? If one church is not just right, they visit the next, and the next, until they find the one that lines up with their preferences.
Church leaders have caught on to the Goldilocks method of church shopping, and so they do demographics studies to discover people’s preferences, and design their worship services accordingly. Church-growth practitioners become experts at custom-designing Sunday services that will meet the preferences of the largest number of people in a given area. They call them “seeker sensitive” worship services. A church-growth expert would find out what kind of worship Goldilocks likes and make sure she gets it.
The problem is, different people have different preferences. In any given community, there are devoted Christian people with opposing worship preferences. There are those who prefer traditional worship with hymns and choir robes, and those who prefer contemporary worship with choruses and projection screens. Some want suits, pews and stained glass; others prefer blue jeans, folding chairs and coffee-holders. People choose a local church based on worship preferences like they choose a particular model of automobile or a grocery store. Like Goldilocks at the bears’ house.
Division is an unfortunate byproduct of worship preferences. People tend to make idols of their preferences and refuse to compromise them, even if it means excluding other members of the Body of Christ. These exclusive attitudes are often justified by the explanation that “They don’t worship like we do.” It’s almost as if church people are saying, you have to worship like us, or you can go find another church. Ironically, the worship of God in Christ becomes divisive, when it should be the most unifying activity of all.
Now I know that preferences can be good, and necessary, because they help us navigate through the myriad of choices facing us at every turn. In a choice-crazed culture, my preferences act as my guide. Without much thought, I drive by Starbucks because I prefer Panera Bread. At Panera Bread I easily focus on the triple-berry, low-fat muffin, because it is my preference among all those delectable offerings (at least it was, until it was discontinued, but that’s another story).
But preferences can hurt us and the cause of Christ when we cling to them at the expense of unity and hospitality. People who are “not like me” should be welcome in my church, even if it means that I will have to learn to worship in different ways. Perhaps worship would be richer, broader, and more challenging if we gave up the notion that it must be done only in one certain way. Is it possible that we could love people more than our preferences? Could it be that diverse modes of worship might be a sign of our hospitality, and our willingness to expand our worship preferences could result in a church that more accurately represents the diverse community in which it is located?
Perhaps we need to remember the words of Jesus when He said, “Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.” Welcome to our church, Goldilocks. Let’s find out how we can worship together.

A State Park Becomes a Cathedral

October 15 was a Sunday we will all remember.  It got off to a very good start when we welcomed a new Covenant Participant during our morning worship gathering at our church, Fellowship of the Valley.  Then it just kept getting better. 

Immediately following worship, we trekked over to Tannehill State Park for a blue-ribbon pot-luck dinner followed by a moving (and chilly) midstream baptism.   The first baptism ever for Fellowship of the Valley! It was a brilliant day with crystal blue skies and a hint of autumn color in the treetops.  With great joy and lively conversation, we shared our feast on well-worn picnic tables under shed number three, which was ideally situated amidst a gurgling stream, a dusty road, and a grassy knoll.  The kids couldn’t wait to run and play in such a compelling spot on such a lovely day.    

After we had eaten our fill, a search party went upstream to find the perfect site for the baptism.  When they came back with a good report, we gathered everything up and made our way over to the chosen spot.  It was everything we could have hoped for!  A gentle bend in the clear-water stream was framed by sheltering trees and lined with gently-sloping banks.  The congregation gathered creekside to witness the much-anticipated baptism of two of our beloved “Fellowship Folks.”   

Pastor Mike waded into the water first, Bible in hand.  After reading Romans 6:4-10, he stood still in the flowing stream while Scott led in prayer.  As the church quietly sang “The Doxology,” Brian boldly invaded the stream.  Mike, resting his hand on Brian’s broad shoulders, said, “Brian, I baptize you, my brother, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; buried in likeness to Him, and raised to walk in newness of life.”  Then he dipped Brian backwards into the stream, immersing him completely under the waters, and raising him straightway up.  Murmurs of joy and approval rose up from the congregation. 

Kay was next, and her face registered shock as her bare feet rudely took her into the frigid flow.  After repeating the baptismal prelude, Mike plunged Kay beneath the flood.  She sputtered something unintelligible when she first rose up out of the water; later she told us that she tried to shout “Hallelujah,” but some water got in her throat.  As it turns out, words were unnecessary.  We all knew, and shared, what she was feeling.  

 It took a long time for everyone to leave that newly hallowed place.  It’s funny, isn’t it, how a state park can become a cathedral.  Last Sunday, at Tannehill, it did.  Hallelujah!