It is the same with my word.
I send it out, and it always produces fruit.
It will accomplish all I want it to,
and it will prosper everywhere I send it. (Isaiah 55:11, NIV)
I took my lunch break in front of the TV last Thursday, tuned into the AT&T event from Pebble Beach. My wife checked in for a minute and I said to her, “Wow, I miss that place.”
This tells you much of what you need to know about my last 11 months: I’ve been working a lot from home. And one of my favorite places in the world, the Monterey Peninsula, is no longer a day trip from my house but the proverbial million miles away.
Are you with me? Literally, that question makes no sense, as we’ve all been with so few people over this shutdown stretch. Figuratively, though, you understand it all too well. Our routines aren’t what they always been. In a word, we’re stuck.
I’m no botanist, but foliage makes me smile at the variety and beauty of God’s creative handiwork.What I find to be most helpful in times like these is a big, full gulp of the great outdoors. Most golfers are that way, I suppose. I grew up walking five miles a round with a carry bag on my shoulder and the grass beneath my feet. If I walk the course these days, there are wheels under my bag, but I still love the green below me and the blue above. It’s not heaven, but for me it’s the best of earth. Now are you with me? I should hope so!
Last week, I also got an email from my brother-in-law. He’s not a golfer, but he is a walker. He was working on a podcast project and was asking a few of his friends this question: How do you discover the glory of God in walking?
I’m no botanist, but when I think about answering that question, I know that foliage makes me smile at the variety and beauty of God’s creative handiwork. Of course, here in California, we have giant sequoias in the mountains above us, cypress trees on the coast, yucca in our deserts, and I would be wrong not to be partial to the Jeffrey pines of the chaparrals.
Isaiah 55 features several well-known words of God. Read its 13 verses today and you’ll find yourself saying, “Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.” There, verses 10 and 12 wrap verse 11 with lively context to our verse today about the fruitfulness of God’s word. First, we read of rain and snow watering the earth and causing growth. Then we read of a life of joy and peace, where the mountains themselves burst into song and the trees clap their hands. We can picture all of this because of the time we spend outdoors, walking over the land God has formed and among the growth he has seeded and sustained.
What happens outside points us to the glory of God. So does what happens inside of us. Often, the two go together.
—
Jeff Hopper
February 15, 2021
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The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.