Follow the Son ~

This is my view from afar, when I look up over the roof to see the bamboo in the labyrinth. Do you see how it looks this afternoon? All of the new shoots are leaning toward the west! They were not like that earlier in the day. Leaning, bending, bowing, stretching…call it what you want, but isn’t that cool? In the space of a day they have changed direction!!!

This tall, rigid, strong Giant Timber Bamboo follows the sun. It yields itself to the follow the sun and as a result receives its own nourishment and growth. Think about that for a second! Can you imagine what the earth would look like if all the plants didn’t yield to The Creator for sustenance? What if all the bamboo wanted was water? It just didn’t feel like stretching over the roof to reach out after the sun?

 

Actually too much water is exactly what happened to this little stalk during all that rain we had a month ago. It couldn’t get to the sun, so it didn’t make it.

My sheep respond as they hear My voice; I know them intimately, and they follow Me.

John 10:27

(The Voice Version)

The Voice translation of the Bible is new to me. If you haven’t read much in it, you should try it out! One of the focuses (short version) is to help in getting the nuisances from Scripture that we may otherwise miss.

One of the words that jump out to me here is ‘respond’. It doesn’t just say we hear His voice, there is an element of action as we hear. It makes perfect sense, as I think about it. As kids we ‘hear’ our parent’s voice, but don’t necessarily listen. (ok, so perhaps that wasn’t you, but definitely me, unfortunately!) This Scripture says that at the ‘hearing’ of His voice there is a response. Perhaps, the first response is one of listening?  (insert big 'duh' here!!!) We cannot fully follow The Son, all day, changing our direction, unless we’re actually listening. And ya know what? That’s not easy and it certainly isn’t automatic for me! Strong, rigid, set-in-my-ways kind of thinking doesn’t usually set me up to follow places that are not already on my “list of things to do today”, ya know!

^{Anyone who serves Me must follow My path; anyone who serves Me will want to be where I am,}

^{and he will be honored by the Father.}

^{John 12:26} 

…Will want to be where I am. Stretching, leaning, bowing in order to Follow the Son!