Insightful Musings on the Scriptures

by

Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67

Good evening, dear ones.

It’s dark out this window now. I thought I had this ready to go when the light of day was just emerging. But other stuff keeps getting in the way. And I keep adding and subtracting and consulting with Becki. She read this probably a half dozen times…with various tweakings in between. This little issue definitely lets some of my/our own views hang out. But that’s OK. I bet you have some too.

I sure didn’t get as far as I wanted with my work objectives today. I thought sure I would be able to finish up a carved (routed) sign for a Woodburn park…on a slab of black walnut about 11 feet long…but I was never able to even touch it. Now I need to knock out some cut vinyl before bed.

I hope you sleep well. Blessings.

Love, Dad/Ray.

Can you imagine a person in the hungry crowd partaking when the disciples passed the bread basket around—but when it came to the fish basket he says, “No thank you—I’m vegetarian.” You don’t have to wonder how such a response would strike me. It occurs to me that right here in this account is a great argument to support guys like me who are meat fishermen. That which floats my boat (and I want it to stay floating) is not just fishing like some fishing fanatics are happy to do. The way I’m wired, if I don’t succeed at catching fish to take home to eat, I’m wasting my time. As demonstrated in this account by Jesus, the Son of God, fish (along with many other forms of animal life) have been created and intended by God as a resource of food for human consumption.

Another divine intention is noteworthy here. At least I think it is. And that is to discern that the primary divine purpose behind the miracles performed by Jesus is mainly intended for grabbing attention—as an advertising strategy—not so much to serve as an end in themselves, but as a means to an end—presenting opportunities for God to heal bigger and more serious eternal diseases, not just little temporal ones. I realize this is a view that hassles the opinion of some who read into this miracle account their preferred view that God just wants everybody to be healed of anything that ails them all the time, and to never be hungry. I’ve spent a good deal of time within the circle of that bias, but for the life of me, I can’t seem to get it figured out to the point that it makes consistent objective sense to me. How can I ignore the fact that many who promote such a perspective have obvious physical problems of their own—balding, eye glasses, pimples, toothaches, obesity, heart disease, diabetes, cancer—then, like everyone else, they get old, sick (or sicker), and die? Is that evidence of insufficient or erroneous faith? I can’t believe that.

Would it now sound like a contradiction to I state that I’m happy, often eager, to pray for the sick? It shouldn’t. God’s power and ability to interrupt the natural flow of the physical world is as present today as it ever was. Sometimes He grants such interruptions. But I’m constantly finding myself overwhelmed with an awareness of the presence and reality of the supernatural displayed throughout the realm of what we call the natural. The very fact that you are reading this with eyes that see, brains that think, from a body that lives—you are a profound demonstration of the supernatural power of God! Dirt can’t do that! Your being is not accounted for and explained in terms of chemicals and protoplasm in marvelous combinations with mindless chance. The bottom line, as I see it, is that we are intended to not only be “amazed,” but to continually praise “the God of Israel”—with or without miraculous interruptions in our physical world—because He is worthy of our worship from a HEART AFTER GOD in sickness or in health, young or old, here or there, dead or alive. I think I will just keep on living and eating good fish until I die. Then what? I can hardly wait to find out!