Transformed in 2011?

I have always been fascinated by the water cycle. It is appealing to imagine that the drop of water in the glass next to my computer might at one time have glistened on a spider’s web in a Saharan sunrise, or it may (just as easily) have been frozen to the whiskers of a polar bear. The terrestrial water system is a closed one, so it contains a fixed quantity of water that changes its location and form in an endless distribution of life. Evaporation and transpiration purify water, puffing it as vapour into the atmosphere where it condenses as clouds that wring themselves out for the sake of life on earth.

And just think of the life that water supports and produces in the various stages of its cycle. For example, almost 70% percent of your body is water. With a physique like mine, you would think that my body is 70% muscle. But no, respected scientists tell me otherwise. Well, so much for our bodies. Let us turn our thoughts now to plants. If you sow a single mealie seed, water and sunlight will help it to produce hundreds of seeds – enough to eat and to plant again next season. God’s gift of water is the life-blood of a creation that is irrepressibly generous and vivacious.

Perhaps it is no surprise then that God uses the water cycle to teach us something about His Word. In Isaiah 55, the Prophet writes that just as rain waters the earth producing a harvest before it returns to the sky, so God’s word produces abundant life and fruit before returning to Him (v10, 11).

However, as humans, we have a problem. We tend to think that our thoughts and ways of doing things are better than God’s (v7). Yet our thoughts and ways become wicked and evil when we ignore God (v7). Further, we “spend money on what is not bread, and [our] labour on what does not satisfy” (v2). Excluding God does not yield life, it harvests death. That is why the Prophet’s voice cries out just as piercingly today as it did 2600 years ago:

⁶ Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near. ⁷ Let the wicked forsake his way and the evil man his thoughts. Let him turn to the LORD , and he will have mercy on him, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

                God has granted you a stay of execution, a few precious years when “he may be found”. But your earthly life is suffering from an unquenchable haemorrhage. And once you have died, it will be too late! So do not squander your life on what is not bread, sweating vital seconds on what does not satisfy. Turn to The Word who became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14). Live in relationship with Jesus. Follow His commands. Ask Him what needs to change this year. With Jesus’ help, joy and peace and fruitfulness will characterise your life, declaring the praises of His infinite renown.

And then, as you face the start of a new year...

¹² You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands. ¹³ Instead of the thornbush will grow the pine tree, and instead of briers the myrtle will grow. This will be for the LORD's renown, for an everlasting sign, which will not be destroyed.