Patterns by Ryan in Oregon
After picking up Todd and Suzie Clark, our two guests for the day, we loaded our vans and headed to the Oregon coast. Todd, a youth minister with the Presbyterian church in Salem, is just back from his own Wonder Voyage in the Tetons. Suzie, Todds wife, is a marine biologist and loves bringing our teams out to play in the tide pools. Today these two will be our guides and reveal a new part of Oregon to the group.
Once we arrived at the coast, and before we began our new discoveries, Suzie posed the question to the team to find how the patterns we witness in ocean life reveal Christ. It was a lingering thought, but after our lunch on the beach we had some free time to swim and then we were off again. This time it was Todd who lead our adventure and he took us deep into Silver Falls Forrest. A completely different terrain from the ocean life we just discovered, but just as powerful. After exploring two of the seven waterfalls this park has to offer Todd flipped the question of patterns on us from finding Christ in the patterns to finding patterns in our own lives that limit us from allowing Christ to reign.
It was a sober question, one that we pondered in silence on our return home that evening. It is a scary thought that the very God that brought patterns into this world also allows us to build some patterns in life that limit us from seeing Him. It is only through our knowledge and relationship with Him that we will grow to see those patterns that are actually destroying us.