Trees of Righteousness

Accept flaws, because in our world beauty is made when something broken is fixed again.

I find myself unwilling to share anything that will not reach perfection. I won’t share my words unless they will exactly articulate what I want to say. I won’t share my art unless it meets some undefined standard. And when it comes to sharing my heart — well, I don’t anticipate it becoming perfect anytime too soon.

I’m starting to think that my world will remain very small if I continue rejecting anything that is not an absolute ideal.

This is troubling because I do believe in a perfect standard of beauty and goodness. I think the world was once just right and the things in it were whole. I believe the desire for perfection serves as an indication that it exists. Desires can usually be traced back to their legitimate fulfillment.

We’re obviously not seeing much perfection around these days. What we do see, however, is goodness being formed out of imperfection. I think this is one of the most significant characteristics of the Kingdom of God, at least as long as it is in the context of a screwed up world. Let’s look at Isaiah 61, referring to the coming of Jesus:

“The Spirit of God is upon Me, because the LORD has anointed Me to preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound, to proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, to console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified” (1–3, NKJV).

Most of these things involve God taking something wrong and making it right. Fulfilling needs and desires. That is the beauty — something that was not perfect is now good. What is the purpose of the healing?

“That He may be glorified” (3).

These “trees of righteousness” are planted to bear fruit. After God heals, look at the result:

“And they shall rebuild the old ruins, they shall raise up the former desolations, and they shall repair the ruined cities, the desolations of many generations” (4).

Look how those who needed healing are made into healers. Not to their own glory, remember; to God’s. Listen to the proper response of the healed healers:

“I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for He has clothed me with the garments of salvation, He has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. For as the earth brings forth its bud, as the garden causes the things that are sown in it to spring forth, so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth before all the nations” (10–11).

The progression described here is beautiful. God takes His people from broken to healed, then to rejoicing in their own healing and healing others. God receives glory through our process of being made perfect in sanctification, even before the end is reached.

Consider. A thing does not have to be perfect in order to be good.

Related posts:

You who are beautiful than men Praise beauty And every man who goes out of his way Magical drink is yours And every man in his freedom She fell in love with the golden chain Poetry to know each…

Would making email obsolete make me obsolete? What will I do if that blinking light no longer demanded my attention? As a senior leader at a large bank, my emails come from many origins. I am…

I needed to make an inset graph inside another graph for a journal publication ASAP. I’ve never done it before so I asked “Google” and found that it seemed very complicated for me to learn. After…