Creation's Sermon

“Now learn a lesson from the fig tree. When its branches bud and its leaves begin to sprout, you know that summer is near. 33 In the same way, when you see all these things, you can know his return is very near, right at the door. Two men will be working together in the field; one will be taken, the other left. Two women will be grinding flour at the mill; one will be taken, the other left. So you, too, must keep watch! [Be prepared]. For you don’t know what day your Lord is coming."
-Matthew 24

Spring is my all time favorite season of the year. Though my allergies suffer terribly, and my asthma will probably kick back into high gear, there is a special kind of promise I see in Spring. All seasons hold promise, and point to highest and greatest Creator of all time. Martin Luther said it best, "Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in spring-time." The seasons are all about life and death. I walked around my house and took pictures of the new life coming to bloom. So many illustrations to be used in creation, it preaches a sermon in itself, we just have to listen, we have to observe.

Jesus teaches us in Matthew 24 that we are too be ever ready for Him to come back for us, always watching, and prepared. He told His disciples that just like a budding fig tree tells us summer is almost here, we know the same is true for spring, and every season. There are indicators. So it is when Jesus returns, there will be signs, and we know that when these things happen, His return is close. My dear sister in the Lord and I talk about this often. There isn't a day that goes by typically that we don't remind each other to look up, and to be ready for Him.
Chris Tomlin writes in his devotional this about creation:

Could it be we are looking for God in the wrong place?
As humans, we want God to be contained in a single entity like our own bodies. We want to be able to see what he looks like, what color his eyes are, the texture of his hair. But our understanding of God is confined to our understanding of the objects on earth. We must remember, God is much bigger than this earth and he has left us his image in a much bigger way: his creation.
Paul says “His invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made” (Rom. 1:20). So what if instead of wishing we could see God in a particular form, we started to see him in our immediate surroundings? The way we view the earth would radically change.
Consider your commute to work with God all around you. He is in the trees you pass by, in the sky you can see through your sunroof, in the sun that you shield your eyes from. The person in the car next to you is His creation as well as the rain or the snow that’s making the roads busy. And when you get to work, you step out of the car into the cold, or warm, air that God created to fill your lungs.
You see, when we put God into the details of our lives, life fills with beauty.
It does take a direction shift. We will not see God in nature and our surroundings if our focus is on ourselves and our circumstances. It requires a looking out and a looking up, but once we do, we don’t want to look back.

The most important lesson here to apply this resurrection is not only sharing in the death of Christ our Savior, but allowing Him to live through us. Are we producing God? A seed must die before it comes to life underground where the pressure, and darkness, and hotness is. Are we being watered with the Word? May we allow the creation which surrounds us to remind us of our constant need to die to self so that new life can continuously be produced in and through us.
As we celebrate Palm Sunday, are we preparing the way for Jesus? Are we looking for Him? Yahweh, Jesus is coming!
Allow God to point, and show you yourself. Don't freak out, it will scare you. Simply repent, and ask God to help you not be that way anymore. This comes by dying to self. Don't fight when God aims for that which is alive in you, let Him cut away the parts that are ugly.