Bungee Cord 5-4-15

Hello,

The lane to our house is about ½ mile long.  It comes off of a well-travelled road, serpentines its way around and above an apple orchard and then levels out before making its final ascent to our house.  At the top of its meandering there is an old dogwood tree standing in front of the tree line.  It’s at least 15 feet tall, and just as wide.  This year, like every year, it has been full of blossom buds.

Winter has finally left us, and the warm temperatures have begun to do their work.  Yesterday, as I was driving by the dogwood tree, I could see the buds puffed up so full that I could tell they were about to burst.  I went to bed last night ready to be amazed at the transformation of beauty that I knew would greet me at the end of the next day.  I had some idea of the wonder ahead because I remember the sight of the aftermath of the explosion of the buds the last several years, but because we live in the “mountains” everything is a little behind the timing of the trees and plants in the valleys, which are already fully abloom.

Sometimes people ask me what awaits us after we die.  Although I can’t say that I can speak from personal experience, I am able to say something….something akin to what I see in my dogwood tree.  Much like my dogwood tree laden with hundreds…maybe thousands of buds ready to burst open, when I take a look at the Bible I see Jesus saying, “the kingdom of God is at hand” in his incarnation, and I get a clue as to what it will be like after I die.  Like a flower bud at the verge of revealing the wonder and beauty that is building inside, so the wonder and beauty of God’s timeless and spaceless reign was abud in Jesus as he walked this earth.  And on Easter morning, when the sealed tomb burst open, the bud began its bloom – a bloom of mercy and grace, a bloom of love and power, a bloom of hope and joy, a bloom of peace that surpasses all human understanding.  As the bloom of God’s reign began to open up on that first Easter day, and continues to open like a flower at a pace that human eyes cannot always detect….continues day by day in the community of faith….I can begin to imagine what God’s reign will be like when it is fully abloom.

Today all the buds on my dogwood tree are buds no more.  Standing atop the lane to my house is what looks like a just exploded firework shimmering in the sky.  At the tip of every branch a five petalled flower flutters in phenomenal beauty and grace. 

God’s kingdom is at hand, buds pregnant with bloom.  So when the day comes that I close my eyes in final sleep, I see in my dogwood tree a promise that another day will come….a day when buds will be no more, but only blooms.  And when that day comes then I am sure that I will be, as they hymn writer says, “lost in wonder, love and praise.”

Have a great day,

God’s grace and peace,

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger