VOYAGE of the STARSHIP GENESIS Two-Seven

DEPTHS

If I go to the depths of the sea, behold you are there…. The psalmist was declaring the omnipresence of God. In other verses of the 139th Psalm the writer explains how no matter where he is or how he might try to hide, God is there. He explained his own understanding that even in the womb God saw his unfinished form and knew him.

It seems the author took comfort in God’s knowledge of him and also felt disquieted by the revelation. “Such knowledge is too great for me…” (139:6) he declares. And such Is God’s greatness, His omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence, and Hid holiness.

I wrote, in a short monograph titled,The Essence of Non-existence, that I am not afraid of death because I know heaven will be my home. I declared that I and God both know I do not deserve it; but, He has given it to me at the cost of His own Son’s life. The last place I deserve to be is in the presence of the Holy God and yet I know that when I enter heaven’s gates made of pearl and amazing gems, Christ Himself will take me within His arms and welcome me home.

Right now, though, as awesome as God’s heaven will be, He has not yet removed from me my will to live. I have had the honor of being around many as they pass from this realm to the next. Most, at least those I knew that knew God, went with a peace that shows their will to live had been removed from them. Maybe it comes by getting a view of what is about to happen. My own father, immediately after being revived from a cardiac arrest, described how peaceful it was and how he had to gather the will to ‘return’. Another, who had seen a glimpse of the angels who were his escorts to glory, was amply ready to pass on. Some see what lies ahead. Others simply lose awareness of their state and slip away.

My will to live is now stronger than ever. There are more than a few reasons, most of them have names. One name stands out above all the rest which is an amazing feat. Of all those who come alongside, this one inspires me to not accept this diagnosis as a death sentence but as a challenge. The lab tests and the CAT scans are the gauntlet thrown down in front of me to hold on to the promises of God’s Word for healing and restoration.

Not often enough do we stop our crazy rat-race world to see God through His nature. The picture included here inspires me to consider God through the vastness of His oceans. They go on for endless miles and they never stop moving. No matter how still an ocean may seem, closer examination proves that the motion is unending. Taking its cue from the pull of the moon, tides come near go as regular as clockwork. In fact, for millennia men have set the times of day by the tides.

Underneath the ever moving surface, thousands of interdependent eco-systems thrive. Since before the beginning of time, the seas have held an abundance of God’s creation that even now remains barely understood. After the same passage of time, explorers, scientists and men of highest acumen capable of taking exploration to Venus and beyond have not been able to unlock all of the secrets of the seas’ depths.

Laying like a gentle blanket against the nighttime sea is the dark sky illuminated by billions of stars. Many stars are already ‘dead’ before their light reaches earth. It is yet another place where the depths of God’s creation are not yet even remotely known. We cannot know our own galaxy and there are billions of a galaxies in an endless universe and we cannot know our oceans limited by the physical nature of the earth. How can we possibly know God?

God’s Word tells us that He uses nature to reveal Himself to us. His greatness.and His intricate creative drive is everywhere evident in nature.His Word also makes it clear that God can be known through His Son Christ, the second person of the trinity. God in the flesh. Jesus’s own words, “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father… for we are One.” (John 14:9-10)

OK so God is great and God is good… the children’s prayer… let us thank Him for our food… but that’s not where I’m headed.

God is great and God is good and yet bad things happen every day and many really bad things happen to people much more innocent and, in out thinking, much more undeserving of bad things than me. I can never argue that I don’t deserve to have bad things happen; but, I do know that because Christ promised to save me and eradicate my sin, when God looks at me He sees Christ and not this sinful person that I am. That, in fact, is how we do get to heaven because God sees the work of His Son in us and not us, although He loves us deeply.

So what does it mean to me, right now… tonight… not happy with my current situation, not thrilled by things that are happening in my life that I have no control over. Yet, I am told to count it all joy when we fall into various trials and tribulations because it will work together for our own good to build us and make us stronger and create a greater witness to God.

Right now I don’t particularly treasure the idea of getting stronger. I just don’t want to hurt anymore… not just physically, emotionally. One person in particular tells me that I have to just get past it in my thinking to not look at it in a negative… not think of it as a negative but to just act right.

Advice comes in all colors and forms and shapes and sizes and sometimes you don’t need advice. Maybe you do need it but you are not in the right frame of mind for receiving it. Thus, it will be more of an irritant then it will be a help. And even by writing that sentence, I will offend many people who have tried to help by coming alongside. That’s not my intention. I’m just trying to help you and me both understand what this is like. To find some comfort in the depths of God.

If I find that comfort, then perhaps, I can share that comfort with others who are seeking the same. Sometimes it’s just sharing with someone you just met about the joys of life with or without disease, Sometimes, meeting an individual for the first time who takes on your concern for the difficulty of disease and agrees to pray is such an encouragement. One such is DeAsia who is willing to pray and to care though our paths will likely never cross again. Such caring people are a gift from God.

So where do I go from here? Still, as I contemplate God’s depth of love, of power, His presence, all things that are His…how do I move on? How do I pick up that glove that’s been slapped across my face to meet the challenge to fight …to keep from allowing the specter of death to haunt my every waking moment and most of my non-waking moments… the unconscious moments… whatever?

To be very honest, dear fellow travelers and crew members, I have no idea. All I can do is, with weariness of form, I bend over slowly and pick up my challenger’s glove. With what strength is in me, I rise back up and summoning all of the anger, hate, frustration and just down-right pissed-off’ness I have within me and I look around into the eyes of the faces of every name I have known who are hurting for and with me and I look directly into those most beautiful eyes of my muse, my champion, my most incredible inspiration for life and I hit back at my would-be challenger, Satan. disguised as Death. He who would try to rob me of every good moment, of every ounce of love, of life and I declare in a voice which is strong and will ring out across the future to declare:

“KMA You worthless, evil demon! By the Word of God I declare Christ the Victor, the Lord of my Life and you will never be able to separate me from His love nor His strong and mighty arm! I will fight you! I will fight this disease! I will come alongside others who are under the grip of IPF or any other malady pushed upon us by a sin ridden world. Yes, Satan, you can Kiss My Ass because I have a mountain of people who love me and who are praying for me and I WILL NOT let you rob me of another second of joy! My one and me will move on and we will not look back at you, not for an instant!”