A few weeks ago, I wrote about some humans that were destroying great chunks of our house. And I was rather shocked that my owner and his wife weren’t doing anything to stop them. Things recently got a lot worse when these invaders turned up with two metal dragons. One of them has a mechanical beak on the end of a long hydraulic arm and is apparently called “a digger,” while the other looks like a giant frog on wheels and is called “a dumper truck.” Well, the end of our house is now a great pile of rubble and dust which stretches across the back lawn. However, it now turns out that these human invaders are going to repair what they have done and make it all bigger and better than it was before. So perhaps they’re not quite as bad as I first thought.
And perhaps there’s another ‘parrot life-lesson’ in all of this. Because all kinds of bad things can occur to us as we live out our lives. Humans sometimes chop down my cousins’ rainforest. Or else, humans can be severely affected by natural disasters, wars, or problems with their money or relationships. There are times when Life can bring us all to our knees. And yet we so rarely give up. Both humans and our natural world share an incredible resilience, so that even in the most dire of circumstances, they will pick themselves up, dust themselves down, and start afresh all over again. And sometimes we will go on to live better lives than we did before. That’s what it will be like for our house.
And that’s also what it’s like in God’s world. None of us live in the Garden of Eden. Beautiful as this world is, it comes packed full of trouble and strife. But if we have a Christian faith, irrespective of what befalls us, we know that something better awaits. We know that thanks to Jesus, we will eventually be lifted away from our troubles and join Him in the perfection of Heaven. We’ll be remade and restored and end up better than ever. And that’s a rather wonderful thought to finish on!
“There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.”
“Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.”
(Corrie ten Boon: [1892-1983]: Dutch born Christian writer who survived a second world war Nazi concentration camp)
“God never said that the journey would be easy, but He did say that the arrival would be worthwhile.”
(Max Lucado:[1955-present]: American church minister and bestselling Christian author)
“All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.”
(Julian of Norwich: [c.1343-c.1416]: Her book ‘Revelations of Divine Love’ was the first book to be written in English by a woman and continues to be much quoted today)
“We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down but not destroyed…...Because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus…..”
