Converging Streams

God does amazing things when we are attentive to the variety of ways in which He teaches us. I have discovered that, whether in preparing a sermon or lesson, or in just trying to get a handle on a certain issue in my life, that God takes seemingly random pieces of wisdom and knits them together to provide me an understandable image of His purpose or plan.

The other day I was thinking about how cool it was that this Sunday's message began to come together so easily. I was amazed because:

• I often struggle to create an adequately comprehensible message
  
• The text I chose is not at all a familiar one
  
• The elements that created a cohesive unit were quite random at first glance

It is that last bullet that amazes me. I read through the texts surrounding my focus text (Isaiah 2:1-5). I had spent time studying the background of Isaiah's life, call and ministry. I read through some commentaries on the text.

Then I took some time for a lunch-study. At times I like to go and do lunch alone in the corner of a restaurant and read, study, ponder and write. I almost always find it very productive, though my sons think I'm a loser for sitting alone in a restaurant. They'll probably become just like me and I'll have the last laugh.

The message came together fairly rapidly, but it wasn't just because of the focused study. I found thoughts flooding my mind from previous studies, times of personal reading, past experiences, and a recent discussion in a Sunday School class. In the span of thirty minutes I had a fairly comprehensive plan for my message.

It was as though I was able to look back over my life and remember times in which I played in this little stream, waded in that one, threw rocks into another, and dabbled in a handful of others. At the time, they appeared as completely isolated streams, each existing exclusively within the horizon of my vision. But later I discovered a river, flowing strong and clean, and it was only then that it became apparent that those previously isolated and insignificant streams were tributaries to this mighty channel before me.

And so it happens with so much that God teaches. What seems to be a collection of random moments beside streams in different places and times are ultimately converging brooks of wisdom and refreshment for my soul. This means that I must not only pay attention to the grand rivers I discover during my trek. I must consider vital the myriad streams I encounter throughout my day trips.

Living in the moment, therefore, is more than just sucking the marrow from the bone of life. It is being a student of every encounter. It is being truly present when someone speaks, when someone cries, when someone laughs, when someone rages and when someone encourages. It is truly seeing the autumn leaves, hearing the north wind, feeling the sun's rays, smelling the lilac blossoms, and tasting the chocolate. It means not burying the pain, not ignoring the rebuke, not avoiding the work, and not running from the confusion. We face life in all its beauty and ugliness, because beside those many creeks God is waiting to teach us something that will, downstream, finger its way into other streams and provide a mighty flow of strength and wisdom in days when we least expect it.

God never wastes a moment.