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Cliff McDuffie, click here
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My sermon given as a lay speaker at First Methodist Church Zephyrhills, Florida.
Every Day Is A Gift From God
When I was asked to deliver the address for this morning, some 6
months ago, I had already laid the foundation some six months prior to
that. It was during one of Craig’s sermons that a thought struck me so
hard, I reached up, pulled an envelope out of the holder in front of me
and jotted it down. As I prepared mentally for what my topic was to be,
I decided to try and bring to you and elaborate on that thought. That
thought was ..”I wonder what it was like to see the very first of
anything!” The first time of everything. What was the first drop of
water like and where did it come from? Is the grand oak of today the
same as it was from the first acorn? And just how did the acorn know to
bury in the dirt and germinate. It brought to mind the song…
“Have thine own way Lord….thou art the potter, I am but clay.”
I went home that Sunday and put that one line ”The first time of
everything”, into my computer and have in the last year expanded on it
to hopefully give you something to think about today.
In looking for an appropriate title for this message I just happened to
find it hanging in a window some 1500 miles from here, while we were
visiting Joyce’s brother in Fenton, MI in May of this year.
I was up early just staring out the kitchen window waiting for the tea
water to boil. There were several sun catchers hanging in the window.
One was a clear glass cross about four inches in height with something
written in the center of the cross. As I read it I knew I had found the
title for this morning.
Every Day is a Gift from God!
This is in no way intended to be a message for Darwinism or Intelligent
Design. Just something, hopefully, to make you stop and think when you
open your eyes every day to every God given thing around you.
Jesus is not the only gift we have received from God. Look around you
wherever you may go.
From our churches responsive reading of June 25 of this year. “Gather
in awe before God, who laid foundations of the earth. The deeds of God
are beyond our knowing. Our Creator is with us in all places at all
times”.
There are 2 books in the Bible that begin with, “In the beginning….”.
The first is of course Genesis. Genesis 1, 1 In the beginning God created
the heavens and the earth..
Then we are instructed how there was light and the firmament was in
the midst and separated the waters and made into dry land.
And in Genesis 1, 11
And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed,
and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself,
after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
The first chapter of Genesis is devoted to explaining how our maker
made this world we know and that the last thing God made was man
and he turned over to man every living thing on earth. What a
responsibility he gave to us!
Genesis 1, 31 And God saw every thing that he had made and behold, it
was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
Not even the first man was able to see the very first of all that God gave
him because it was already there. But just for the sake of beholding
wonders let us imagine that we, you and I, were there as things begin to
happen.
How many of you know someone that had a first? An invention, a stone
axe, the wheel, printing press, compass, safety pin, electric lights, steel,
or many, many thousands of things invented by man. Or ideas like
Newton’s gravity, Einstein’s theory of relativity, whatever that is, how
to get rid of polio, more ideas out there than one can even begin to list.
Our patent office in Washington is full of ideas. Some never fly,
literally, others have made fortunes for people. Did you know any of
theses people? I would have loved to have been standing around the
general store when old Ben Franklin walked in, pointed to his glasses
and said “I can look up to look far and look down to look close” as he
was the first to invent bifocals. What an exciting thing. I didn’t know
any of theses people but I did have an idea to run plastic tubing inside
the walls as a house was being built to gas insects.
However before I could even get a drawing done I saw in a magazine
where someone had already done that and now you do see it in some
construction. Have you ever gotten a copyright? I have. For a simple
hug. Or have you ever even been published? I have. One of my poems is
in the Congressional Library in a published book of poetry.
But here’s something to think about.
The First!!!
Can you even begin to imagine the excitement and the glorious
grandeur of the first ever sunrise as God said “let there be light”. Just
think about how awesome and fearful that must have been. That first
glimpse of the suns rays traveling across the surface of the land and
reflecting off the water with the majestic grandness of a glorious
painting never to be accomplished by mortal man. We see that daily
here in Florida as the sun dips into the Gulf of Mexico. Do you take that
for granted everyday? But think of what it first must have looked like if
you had never seen it. It would probably have scared you half to death
by the awesome colors and grandeur. We would probably run off and
hide in a cave to escape the supposed terror. Or being there to witness
first hand the opening of the very first ever rose bud or orange flower or
see a Tulip push it’s head out of the ground. Can you imagine the thrill
of seeing the first caterpillar emerge from it’s cocoon? Or the drop of
water fall from the sky and run downhill into a water basin?
Have you ever captured a few snowflakes to see the different designs?
Well now there’s something to think about the awesome intelligence to
design every one different. Could you do it?
Or the shear magic of a cocoon splitting open and a beautiful butterfly
emerging for the very first time.
What a thrill it would have been to be there.
And what is that inching its way out of the dirt. A blade of grass, how
weird and marvelous. Why are there so many different trees? I watched
with joy the spiraling down of maple seeds this spring in Michigan as
they found their way to the ground to become things of wonder for us.
Each one has a purpose I am sure.
I learned in Costa Rica that a Slough will only eat the leaves of one type
tree. We all know that Pandas only eat bamboo. Why?
Can you imagine seeing right before your eyes a large shell crack open
and a dinosaur baby wiggle out? Why do fireflies rear ends glow? So
many things in this world we take for granted and just overlook as they
continue to happen. But there is one thing for sure and that is that God
made all of this.
I love to watch Animal Planet on TV. Especially the programs which
explain how things in nature camouflage themselves. Some change
colors to match their environment. Some simply look like something
they are not, such as the Praying Mantis or the snake that imitates the
coral snake. The many poisonous reptiles and insects that have
coloration which warns you of their toxicity. The worm that removes its
tail which continues to wiggle as the rest of the worm goes off to hide
from it’s attacker. The fish with the tongue that looks like a wiggling
worm so an unsuspecting prey simply swims into it’s mouth. The
spotted fawn in the spring that is so hard to find. All handiwork
of our Creator. Isn’t it marvelous?
I am in a local writing group at the CARES Center and requested that
each one in the group pick something and write down for me what their
thoughts would have been if they were the very first to ever see that
item. It was interesting that the ones I received described their item
extremely well………in today’s terminology…..but certainly not as if
they were the first to observe it and had absolutely no knowledge of
what it was or the name we have given it.
Here is an example “ If I were first to see something for the first time,
that means I am Eve, the first female on earth. So I imagine that I am
her as I watch an encapsulated rose bud on a floral stem.” So my only
thought for including this is to give an example of how we are so caught
up in our every day lives, it is difficult to stop, put yourself in another
totally different time and envision what it is you are looking at as
though it were the first ever to be seen and wonder just where it came
from and what is it for.
I started writing this before the issue of intelligent design hit the press
and how, in the name of God, can you look around you and watch
nature happening and not say. “My God has done all of this in His
wisdom”.
Maybe we did crawl up out of the sea but there had to be a design to
begin with. And maybe that design changed as the earth evolved so that
humans could take it over. Maybe it took the earth that long to cool or
become livable for humans, and then when the time and the elements
were right, God brought us forth. Because to God, millions of years may
just be nano seconds. I sometimes wonder if in fact we are no more than
a grain of sand on the beach of the universe and there are others on
other grains of sand out there somewhere.
It is so very mind bending to sit in the woods or in a boat on a quite lake
and marvel at nature around you. To me, and I have done this on
numerous occasions, I am in church then.
Every single one of you sitting out there right now can go back in your
life and, probably many, many times, can say “I remember the first
time…..”
My self? I vividly remember walking into the elementary school for the
first time with my mother.
I remember the thrill of being selected to do the maypole dance on May
1st,.
I remember the first B29 I ever saw and how I was amazed that such a
huge thing could stay in the air.
I remember the first time I saw sculpture in jade and how beautiful it
was and the first snow fall as I was taking a botany test at the Un. of
Tennessee.
I remember the first time I saw the little gal who I would date all
through high school.
I am talking about believing in God as our maker.
Over the last several years I have begun reading or rereading some of
the classic books.
In “The Last of the Mohicans”, by James Feinimore Cooper, a true
classic, there is this description of belief in God. It is found in Chapter
XII when after vanquishing some enemy Indians and saving the
captured whites from eminent death. Two of the characters, Hawkeye
and David, were talking about reading books. Hawkeye has just
stated that he is not a whimpering boy at the apron of an old gal and has
never read but one book and the words are too simple and plain to need
schooling.
David responds “What call you the volume?”
Hawkeye responds to David and I quote;
“’Tis open before your eyes.” returned the scout; “and he who owns it is
not a niggard of its use. I have heard it said that there are men who read
in books to convince themselves there is a God. I know not but man may
so deform his works in the settlement, as to leave that which is so clear
in the wilderness a matter of doubt among traders and priests. If any
such there be, and he will follow me from sun to sun, through the
windings of the forest, he shall see enough to teach him that he is a fool,
and that the greatest of his folly lies in striving to rise to the level of One
he can never equal, be it in goodness, or be it in power.”
I do not want to get into the current debate over “Intelligent Design” or
even Darwinism as that is not what I am trying to convey to you. I just
want you to stop a minute in your running to and fro and think about
what you see around you and the magnificent being who provided all
this to us.
Isn’t it just the most fantastic thing that we can communicate with God,
who made all this happen? We don’t need a computer, a phone, a Fax, a
radio or any other man made object to talk to Him. We simply can close
our mind to today’s troubles and connect directly to Him wherever and
whenever we wish.
Direct dial, straight to the Man upstairs.
I am as much at church in the woods or fishing on a lake, not really
caring if a fish bites or not, and they usually don’t, or just sitting in the
park admiring Gods handy work while marveling at how he went about
making it happen. Something I may never actually know about, but my
imagination sure has fun trying.
Every single thing on this earth is, in my opinion, the love and labor of a
master painter, engineer, scientist, sculpture, mathematician, biologist,
and all the other professionals we can think of all rolled into one being
we know and call God.
How humbling when I cannot properly carve the figure I want to see in
a piece of wood and then watch a cocoon slowly open and a beautiful
butterfly emerge..WOW!.
God is with us, every single minute of every single day of our
lives……….you remember the song, His Eye is on the Sparrow but I
know he watches me”…..not just you and me, but with every single
person in this world and all the creatures on and in the land, in the air
and in the water and at the same time creates all the weather,
mountains, seasons, every thing that grows and yes even the hurricanes,
volcano eruptions, sunammis, earthquakes and every drop of water in
the oceans. Now that is one master planner if you ask me.
Can you imagine sitting in your workshop designing and manufacturing
snowflakes! Every single one is different, so they tell me and I don’t
want to stand out in the cold and check them out so I take that at face
value.
Let me conclude this by giving you the second place in the Bible that I
referred to earlier.
The Gospel according to John Chapter. 1 verse 1-5
1. In the beginning was the word and the Word was with God and the
Word was God.
2. The same was in the beginning with God
3. All things were made by Him; and without Him was not any thing
made that was made.
4. In Him was life; and the life was the light of men.
5. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it
not.
Join with me now in prayer……….
Dear God, our Father, we are so blessed to be allowed to enjoy your
labor of love here on earth. We thank you for this glorious day and all it
beholds for us. We stand in awe as we see the seasons change, the birds
in the air, animals in the fields, flowers springing to life. Your waters
and fields provide us food for life. Your skies provide us water to drink
and water our crops. You have given us so much to be thankful for. Be
with us as we now prepare to go about our daily lives and open our eyes
that we can be more appreciative of all the gifts you lay before us.
Be with those in harms way who protect our way of life and make your
way into the minds and hearts of all men to bring peace on earth. Amen
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