Sunday, November 04, 2018
Sunday Reflection: Grasslands
This morning I am giving a sermon on 1 Peter 1-2:10. It's really an uplifting, wonderful text (though things go downhill fast after that-- the remainder of 1 Peter has a lot of "Slaves obey your masters" and "Wives subject yourselves," etc.).
I was particularly fascinated by this little poem at 1 Peter 1:24-25:
“All people are like grass,
and all their glory is like the flowers of the field;
the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord endures forever.”
and all their glory is like the flowers of the field;
the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord endures forever.”
For years, I drove between Minnesota and Texas, and stopped in a little town called Cottonwood Falls, in Kansas. Cottonwood Falls is in the heart of the Flint Hills, an area of broad, treeless grasslands that regenerate through fire every year. It fascinated me; an ocean of grass as far as the eye can see.
What if that is all we are? One of those blades of grass?
If that is true, it seems glorious to me-- to be a part of such a glorious creation, a tiny bit of something grand. And even though we are each temporary, like that stalk of grass that burns off, the grassland is preserved by what we leave behind.
I love being a part of this whole.
