Simplicity is Beautifully Deep

It was on the drive back from the creek where I was baptised that I reflected on the simplicity of that act of immersion. You simply go under the water and you come back up.

When I wrote to my friends and family to tell about my baptism my sister wrote back, "Looks like all those years of practicing at Sugar Shack paid off."

"Sugar Shack" was what we called my grandparents' cabin in rural Missouri. It had a creek nearby where we would swim and play. How many times have I went under the water at a creek playing baptism?

Baptism - so simple a child could emulate it.

It is the same with the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. The elements are common table items, bread and wine. The breaking of the bread, the passing of the cup - these were something that Jesus' disciples had done numerous times before. Yet this is what Jesus gives them to remember his sacrifice and his coming. Something old. Something new.

But these simple acts unfold to have a depth of meaning.

How deep?

So deep that 2,000 year later I still don't think we have the complete picture. It seems we can meditate on the symbolism and the meaning endlessly. And maybe that is why religious denominations have felt the need to dress these simple acts up with a bunch of pomp and ceremony. But really that is not necessary.

Regarding the Lord's Supper, Paul says, "For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; ... and in the same way took a cup" - 1 Cor 11:23

The apostle gives just as he received and felt no need to add decoration and tinsel. It is already beautifully simple and simply deep.

One of things I have recently begun to appreciate about the Old Testament scriptures is even in the everyday accounts and stories of people there is so much symbolism. People back then were just living their life but fast forward thousands of years and we see all these little things point to bigger realities (or perhaps the bigger reality, Jesus). In the OT Jesus' is found in the most normal of places. He is in people watering sheep and feeding flocks and growing grain and making tents and kneading bread and fighting battles and getting married and ...

A friend once jokingly asked, "Why do we need to know that Esau was a hairy man and Jacob was a smooth man?"

Because it means something.

And here is a secret -- your life means something too. If we could teleport thousands of years into the future and look back at your life . Yet if our eyes are open today,I know that God can give us peeks. In looking back at my own life I have seen the greater realities of things that seemed insignificant at the time.

What happens when we keep our eyes open to find God in the simple things of everyday life? We make interesting discoveries. Such as --

The Kingdom of Heaven is like scrambled eggs.

My friend had that revelation in a cabin as we were making breakfast. As she explains it:

"First he break us out of our shells. Then whips us together. The yolk of spirit overwhelms the egg white flesh, and colors our live. He applies heat, and we become a mixture of cooked and partially cooked. The longer the heat is applied, the more even and of substance we become. All the seperate eggs, are now of one body, one existence, a new creation."

It may sound crazy but Jesus was constantly using little things like dough, scattered seeds, and fishing nets to explain big concepts like the Kingdom.

Once Jesus told this parable:

"Or what woman, if she has ten silver coins and loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search thoroughly until she finds it? Then when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ In the same way, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of God’s angels over one sinner who repents.” - Luke 15:38

Think about a woman that actually had this happen to her. When she was busy sweeping the floor searching for her coin she didn't know that secretly she was acting out a divine truth about God's nature. How often in your life are you simply going about your simple business unaware there is a grand mystery in what you are simply doing?

Your life is a parable.

Paul is aware of this fact. To the Ephesians he begins by giving what seems to be advice for marital relationships between a husband and wife but then concludes by saying, "It is a great mystery ... I speak concerning Christ and the church." - Ephesians 5:22-32

Imagine that. Humans had been getting married for ages completely unaware that the everyday concept of marriage concealed a great mystery about Jesus and his congregation. This is just a small bit of a larger whole because as Christians everything in our lives has spiritual meaning. Our whole life becomes a sacrifice and an act of worship and even in simple everday things like eating and drinking we can glorify God.

"Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship." - Romans 12:1

"Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." - 1 Corinthians 10:31