(In My Backyard)
Hi God. I am sitting here in the backyard as the sun is beginning to sink behind the rooftops of my neighborhood. Buster is diligently sniffing around the yard in search of some small animal he can terrorize in some way. It’s good to spend some time with You as this day winds down.
I’ve been thinking about an idea that Brennan Manning discusses in his book, Ruthless Trust. At the end of my last journal entry, I was marveling at Your perfect balance of the infinite and the intimate. When I read chapter 6 of Manning’s book, I see that he has entitled it “Infinite and Intimate”. (How timely… God, You do stuff like that all the time.) In this chapter, he shows that the perfect example of this concept is found in Your incarnation here on earth – Your son, Jesus Christ. Manning ends the chapter with a caveat advising us to broaden our concepts of God and Christ:
"The towering importance of the above caveat – that transcendence must be conjoined with immanence, that divinity must be coupled with humanity, that heaven must be balanced with earth, and that God’s distance must be complimented by his nearness – is essential if we are to grasp the true meaning of the glory of Jesus." (1)
After reading this, I came to the realization that Jesus Christ is the very embodiment of the whole concept of Your infinity and intimacy (about which I have been journaling a lot recently).
Christ demonstrated His infinity with His miracles – changing water to wine, healing paralytics and lepers, quieting the storm, and ultimately overcoming death itself. He also demonstrated His infinity with His wisdom – His teachings to the multitudes, His brilliant responses to the snide questions from the Pharisees, His words of comfort and words of challenge to those who sought out His counsel.
Christ demonstrated His intimacy through His compassion – His forgiveness toward the adultress, His acts of healing to countless hurting ones, His acts of acceptance to Zaccheus, Mary Magdalene, and many others with “questionable occupations”. Christ also demonstrated His intimacy through His conversations – insightful and frank one-on-ones with Pharisees and prostitutes, rulers and lepers, women and children, priests and tax collectors.
Several chapters later, Manning adds these words from Christ himself, recorded in the gospel of John:
9b Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father!
Then Manning makes this observation:
"Jesus is the human face of God with all the same attitudes, attributes, and characteristics of his Abba… In order to have any understanding of Abba – not of his essence, which remains unknowable, but of his character – we must look to Jesus." (2)
Through tracing the life and ministry of Christ, we see a personification of Your nature, God… of Your character… of Your heart. Since He was God in the flesh, walking among us, He is the ultimate example of Your infinity and intimacy – God of the Universe stooping down to brush away the tears of the broken, to hold the hand of the child, to embrace the lonely and the forgotten. Christ is a beautiful portrait of who You are, O God.
Thank You for Your power and Your gentleness… for Your omniscience and Your compassion… for Your holiness and Your grace… for Your infinity and Your intimacy.
ENDNOTES:
1. Brennan Manning, Ruthless Trust: The Ragamuffin’s Path to God (New York: HarperCollins, 2002 [2000]), 85.
2. Manning, Ruthless Trust: The Ragamuffin’s Path to God, 109.
