Desperation

I'm learning not to despise the things that create a desperation in my soul for the only stability I've ever known. Learning not to hate the things that cause me to run under the umbrella of God and be close to Him as it pours chaos all around me. 

Steffany Gretzinger said, "There is a price for the closeness." I'm learning it's not just time or even sleep. The price is far reaching and it will cost you every certainty in this world. You will give it all up to know, in desperate longing, a Force you cannot see. It's not a haphazard, blind following, however. Because the benefits and rewards of following Him far outweigh anything you will ever give up.

Despair (over lack, over pain, over hardship) for endless real hope.

Mourning (over loss and over waste) for joy in new mercies and new beginnings and anything renewable--including you.

Terror (of the past, the present, the future) for unexplainable peace that doesn't come from simply thinking happy thoughts but surpasses any logic. 

Hatred (of others, of circumstances, of self) for genuine, overflowing and enduring love straight from the throne of grace--grace that is greater. Always.

God can do a lot with desperation. It creates open hands and open hearts ready to welcome Him, the Living God. When God lets the plug out we can be filled to overflowing again. We begin to speak up again. We begin again. And again. And again. 

Sovereign God

Ever been in a place where God comes and completely messes with your theology? Your neat and organized ideas of God, like shredded in a matter of minutes?  

You have two options when He does that. 

Option 1: Get frustrated. Get bitter. Throw your hands up and say "screw it, He's too hard to know." Have the attitude that this isn't worth all the hardship, trying to walk this out when you don't get it. Give in and and go back--back on everything, back to everything that's familiar and knowable. And Egypt. Get cynical and jaded and judgemental. Knit-pick and fault-find your way out of this because it's easier to say it was all one big mistake. A ruse. A hoax. A lie. 

And it would be exactly the bait the enemy wants to serve you. He loves to discredit God and all He is and has done in our lives. 

Option 2: Keep going. Get low and get humble. Admit you don't know all the answers but Your God is still good, He's still just, and still worth it all. Admit that He is God, and you are not. Admit it's hard. Admit your great need--which is still Him in all things. It's still Him you want. It's still Him you desire, even more than before because now you've found out the real truth--the great depths too deep to measure about the One true God you had tried to fit in your box. And Him, our Pearl of Great Price, is worth every little ounce of our being.

And I'm telling you, option two is His plan. It's His sovereign plan to bring about His own steadfastness in our lives. It's His idea to forge His own relentless Spirit with ours at the point of greatest strain. Who can know all that He has in store for building us--His kingdom--His way? And for those of us who don't say "when," and turn back, we have a glorious reward: Christ Himself, the hope of glory.

So if He has to empty out all our pockets of even the little ideas and opinions about Him, I say do it. Wreck us. Let us not be caught stuck in our own understandings about who we think He is. May we be teachable and moldable, open to know Him like we've never known Him before--as He is.

Spoiled Child

Kicking and thrashing against God as He holds me. This sense of feeling used and led on to a dead end has this spoiled child on a tantrum. 

God was showing me this morning that all the frustration I've been feeling, all the angst is because I have made things about myself when I have no place to do so. 

If I take myself out of the center, God remains. He's strong enough to withstand the blame, wise enough to take on all the questions, good enough to tarry on with us in patience and gentleness. He's always been at the center but I try to stand with Him and take all that on myself. There's no way I can, and He knows that. Step back, child.

And finally, the peace again in the command to be still. There's no striving in the world worth losing peace over.  A spoiled child no longer, in humility I let go of what (as Audrey Assad sings) "was never mine to hold."