Train Up Tuesday: Lessons from the Sun

....and The Son.

Recently, my family started a new journey...homeschooling. After much prayer and research, we decided upon an approach appropriate for our family and a curriculum that we have already enthusiastically embraced (“My Father’s World”).

After 2 weeks learning about Creation week, we have been specifically studying the sun. This curriculum not only encourages learning about the obvious lessons of a topic, but also their spiritual implication and how all of creation relates to it’s Maker. So, for the “sun”, we talked about how “Jesus is the Light of the world.”

We’ve had lots of fun exploring the sun...paintings, drying grapes into raisins, reading, hearing songs about the sun. We’ve also talked about the difference between walking in a dark room and walking in a room that has the sun shining through it. It was quite easy to make the parallel to having Christ in our lives to be that “sun”, and showing us how to avoid stumbling.

One day, however, even momma (myself) was reminded of something beautiful...and something we all may have to be reminded of time to time. As we were outside talking about shadows, we attempted to trace our shadows while standing in the sun. Well, being so close to noon, there wasn’t much to see or trace. We did the best we could and considered tracing shadows later.

Over lunch, though, the Holy Spirit reminded me of something. It wasn’t that we didn’t see our shadows well because the sun was hiding or gone. In fact, it was more “on top of us” than it could be at any other time of the day. If we were looking for evidence of the sun simply by looking for shadows, we would have been a little disappointed. But, indeed, all we had to do was look up...straight up...to see the sun shining in all it’s brilliance.

Sometimes, I think we get caught up in “looking for evidence” of Jesus in our lives (or the lives of others) based on what we think we should be seeing and especially when we are going through something tough (consider Job’s predicament and his feelings...Job 23:8-9). In reality, Christ...the Son...is right on us, closer than we may realize. The best way to see the Son is to look right His way rather than just around us to see “evidence” (how we are directly impacted). The best way to really see Jesus when we don’t see what we are expecting is to look at His Word, because He IS the Word.

I’ll try relaying this to my 4 1/2 year old. He may “get” some of it. But I encourage you to take moments like these to make the most of “teachable” moments with your children, especially when considering His creation. It’s a reflection of Him and there is so much to learn if we have our eyes open and ready!

Keep your eyes on the Son,

Ashlie