I was standing on my back porch the other morning looking at the beautiful sunrise. It had turned the sky behind my house into a pink and orange color that is difficult to describe. I was struck by the wonderfulness of it all and was thanking God for the beauty He put into this world when I heard the sirens.
It was probably and ambulance heading up Annandale Road but it broke the peacefulness of the morning. It reminded me that no matter how beautiful or wonderful or special something in this world is it is broken. I don’t mean that this world is cracked or that it is in pieces. Instead I mean this world is broken by sin.
The shadow of sin is everywhere. Open the newspaper, turn on the radio or surf the web and you will find brokenness. In the newspaper we read about a world full of injustice where those with power and money have it easy but those who are poor and powerless struggle everyday to survive. We read about people who are desperately trying to make sense of the world by relying on their own wisdom and not God’s folly. () On the radio we hear songs about people seeking love, looking for direction, destroying their lives with sex, drugs and alcohol. Seeking to fill the void in their heart with the stuff of this world they ultimately fail. Finally as you surf the web you discover how dark the world can be. One can easily find websites that promote hate, pornography and exploit anything and everything to make money.
Now in each of these mediums you can find beauty. In the newspapers there are stories about people triumphing over the injustice of our world. On the radio you can find music about hope and discovering how to fill the God shaped hole in all of us. On the net you can find light, love and purity.
The beauty of the world shows us the brokenness. I think back to Jesus’ statement that we are to be in the world but not of it. We are to be beauty and light in this dark and broken world. It is not our light or our beauty but it is the LORD’s light and beauty we reflect.
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