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Last weekend I put the dying dogwood in our front yard out of its misery. As I placed the chainsaw at the base of the tree and began to cut, I quickly realized that my efforts to spare this poor tree any more suffering were without mercy.
I had sharpened the saw, or so I thought. Perhaps I had done so incorrectly, or maybe I had sharpened it one too many times. Whatever the case might have been, I knew that the saw was inflicting needless pain on the tree because it was not doing me much good either. The words of farmer and poet, Wendell Berry, came to mind, “To live we must daily break the body and shed the blood of creation. When we do it knowingly, livingly, skillfully, frequently, it is a sacrament. When we do it ignorantly, greedily, destructively, it is desecration.”
A thought occurred to me. They sell replacement chains at home improvement stores. Immediately, I turned off the saw and hopped into the truck. The man at the store was helpful. He showed me the chain that I needed to buy for my saw. Anticipating the need to one day sharpen this new chain, I asked the man if he had any advice. He looked at me kind of funny and said, “I don’t usually worry about that.”
I said, “You don’t sharpen your chain?”
He said, “If I need a chainsaw, I borrow one from a friend. I let him worry about sharpening it.”
I said, “Oh, that makes sense. Why didn’t I think of that?”
I took my new chain home, put it on the saw and cranked it up. Mercifully, the dogwood was on the ground in a matter of seconds. The new chain went through it like a hot knife through warm butter.
The new chain made all the difference. Without the new chain, that small dogwood might not be cut down today. I am pretty sure that an axe would have been quicker than the old chain. What a difference the new chain made!
One of the themes of the Christian life that we read about in the New Testament is that we are being made new by our experience with Jesus Christ. In Him, we are new creatures and a part of His new creation.
I don’t know about you, but being in Christ does not always feel new. To be certain, one of the chief comforts of the Christian faith is that God is constant. God’s love for us does not change. The forgiveness offered to us by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ does not change. The same thing can be said for God’s mercy and grace. There is a sameness about God that gives us strength, courage, and hope.
Therefore, when we talk about being new creatures in Christ, we are not talking about God being new. We are talking about us being made new by our encounter with God. God’s love is constant and we are made new by our experience of it.
Spiritually speaking, if we find ourselves feeling old and not new, dull and not sharp, then why is that? Perhaps we are living under the assumption that one encounter with God is all that is necessary for us to experience all the newness that God intends for us. This is simply not the case. Paul, writing to the Church at Rome, says, “...be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Our relationship with God is an ongoing, every day process of transformation and renewal.
What if that just does not sound like our experience with God? What if we see dullness and maybe even some rust creeping into our souls? If that is the case, how did it happen, and what can we do? The cause may be revealed by the solution. Francis DeSales said, “We cannot help conforming ourselves to what we love.” As Paul warned the Church at Rome, if our spirits are dull and rusting, then perhaps we are too much, “...conform[ed] to the pattern of this world.” If our love for this world has a greater focus in our lives than the impact of God’s love on our lives, then we cannot help but find ourselves conforming to the world rather than being transformed and renewed by God.
Whether we are talking about a chain for a saw or the human spirit, new matters. The chain can be purchased at the store. The spirit obviously cannot. The price of a renewed spirit is time, place and heart. Each day that we take the time to find a place where we can be alone with God and give our hearts to Him, we are made new.
Joy and peace,
Ed
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