Most people have at least one game that they like to play when they are on a long road trip with kids. My Dad and I used to count how many hawks we could see in the trees.
Winter was always the best time for counting hawks because, without the leaves on the trees, they would “stick out like a sore thumb.”
My son, Simon, is finally big enough for car games, and he likes to look for hawks, but not as much as he likes to look for squirrels when we are driving home through our neighborhood. They are easy for him to see from his car seat, and the area around our home is simply full of them.
We once counted 33 squirrels, and a crazy one that made a daring dart in front of a car that sped past. He was one lucky little fur ball!
One morning an unusual squirrel crossed my path. This one was unlike any that I had ever seen. It was gray with a fluffy, light red tail. I was curious about it, so I did a little research to see if anyone had seen one like it before, and sure enough, it is called a Melanistic Squirrel.
It’s what happens sometimes when you combine a grey squirrel with a red squirrel. Most of the time they are born solid black and on the rare occasion, they are like the one I saw that day.
It’s just another example of what happens when you combine two beautiful things. I began thinking about some of the things that combine in our Christian life to produce something beautiful, and immediately I thought of Faith and Love as found in Galatians 6:6.
The Apostle Paul is reminding the Galatian church that in Christ Jesus, the legalistic things don’t make a difference, and that “The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.” Neither can stand alone. For, “faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” (James 14:16)
Having love without faith in Jesus is ordinary love. It lacks everything that only faith in Jesus can teach, like sacrifice, selflessness, and commitment. It’s a real and unconditional love.
But, when you combine faith in Jesus with love, something amazingly beautiful, completely astounding, and truly magnificent happens. It can reach the unreachable, change the unchangeable, give hope to the hopeless, and do the impossible.
For Christians, it should not be a rare thing. Love and Faith in Jesus should be the standard. People should be able to look at us and say that we are truly people who are the perfect combination of “faith expressing itself through love.”
If it's possible, let the example of a little squirrel inspire you today. Don't be a “rare example” of a faith and love Christian. Raise the bar high so that when others see you and the life you live, they will want to be just like you.
