Raisins and Flakes

Matthew 17:5–8 (ESV)

He was still speaking when, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”  When the disciples heard this, they fell on their faces and were terrified. But Jesus came and touched them, saying, “Rise, and have no fear.”  And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only.

Good morning Zebras,

I was going to name this z-mail “Balancing God” but I didn’t want to give the impression that God is something that needs to be balanced in your life.  The Bible is pretty clear on that point.  God is to come first and then everything else “balances” under Him.  It is arrogant to think that the God who created the universe should be allotted a time slot like a TV program.

So instead God told me to name it “Raisins and Flakes”, because He used my cereal to teach me a lesson.

A couple of weeks ago I had a bowl of Raisin Bran that had too many raisins in it.  What was intended to spice up the boring flakes had, in my humble opinion, overtaken the bowl.  So the next day after I poured my cereal, I picked out a lot of the raisins and threw them away.

And I started ranting. Not about the raisins, but about the lack of solid Biblical teaching on the nature of God, especially His holiness.

Thursday I opened a new bag of cereal and this time when I poured it into my bowl I saw there were too few raisins.  It was basically a bowl of flakes.  And although I prefer a bowl of flakes to a bowl of raisins, neither one is Raisin Bran. Good Raisin Bran is the perfect balance between raisins and flakes.

And that’s when God taught me a couple of lessons.

First, strong Biblical teaching is a necessity, but a few fun stories lighten the mood and make it easier to digest.  And second, as difficult as it may seem, we need to strive to understand the “balance of God.”

God is holy, but He is also love.  He has grace but He is also the righteous judge.  He forgives sins, but punishes those who reject Him.  And the list goes on. 

It’s so easy to get out of balance with God, to focus on one attribute more than the others, but when we do that we end up getting ourselves confused and misunderstand God.  For me, too much holiness and I am like the Israelites hiding in fear of the Lord totally crushed because I can never live up to the “law.”  Too much grace and I can get lazy about my walk forgetting what it cost God to extend it to me.

Finding just the right balance of holy fear and overwhelming love is not easy but I believe it is what allows us to victorious walk out our faith.  (1Peter 1:13-21)

Love,

Jill