As this year turned the corner, I began this venture and all that I knew was that I was journaling and that I was going to be slightly secluded from everyone else. At first I thought that I was secluded just because of the physical time limitations. I work full time, I am taking classes, I need to spend more time with my family. Now I am also doing this, I don't really have time for anything else.
It might sound crazy to say that I am secluded, if I am making the choice to stay home, but I know that I am supposed to be doing that. When I quit smoking, I had to change other things too, at least temporarily. I had to give up coffee and beer. Colin smoked too and we would end our days by sitting out on the porch, talking and smoking. I even had to stop going on the porch with him for a while. So, this change is no different, other things must also be given up.
This time next year I need to be somewhere different spiritually. Not because I'm not good enough where I am but because I have developed (or he has developed) a furious desire within me to be somewhere different. I want more and not a little more- I am on board now. I want the transformation.
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I heard somewhere that our relationship with God is exactly where we want it to be. He is always there, it's us that stay away or move toward him. I am finding that to be true.
I've written journals before, not quite like this or even with this regularity. I've heard God speak to me and felt him move. It's been here and there. However, starting this blog has dramatically changed our "hit or miss" relationship.
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. (Ezekiel 36:26, 27 NIV)
He is literally chiseling away pieces of my heart. I feel gutted sometimes after writing these. You read that God is talking to me about cussing and yelling and parenting and being guided by him. I can't give up or make all of these changes on my own but as I draw closer to him, he chisels all of those things away from me. Some of them I wrestle with and hold onto so much longer than necessary. But he keeps chiseling.
John 15:5 says "I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing." When we remain in him, it's when we bear fruit. When I become a place that his spirit can dwell, or that his spirit can live; changing and following his commands will become more natural, because as works within me, the desires in my heart change. I want to see more of him, to become more like him.
We don't have to journal to be close to God but our relationship with him, is one of a daily communion. As I am a wife, a mother, a coworker or any other of my roles, I have a physical role to play in my relationship with him as well. My relationship in the past was only hit or miss because that's the only way that I would spend time with him. If I only go to him once a week or once in a blue moon, I am not remaining in him. And all of his work stops until next time...
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Obviously anything that we give to God is better than nothing. I inched my way to this spot. A daily message or study. A 15 minute prayer journal (cringing because if I wasn't complaining to him about a huge problem, I had no idea what to write.) CD's in the car, an occasional retreat. These things happened gradually, together and separately, I'd draw close and then drift away.
I'd hear people talk about a personal relationship with God. While we've had many moments together, this is so much different. Instead of a 15 minute prayer journal, I find myself running out of time after an hour or two a day. I find myself squirreling away 5 more minutes of time and carrying a recorder in the car. -Waking in the middle of the night to scribble notes.
I might get it wrong sometimes, even as I post it so publicly, but I keep coming back. I want to know his voice better than my own. I am finally taking that time to ask questions and make sure that I get the answer. I know that there are some things in my foundation that are a little off. I am using this time to make decisions about my faith and let him purge those things from me that are still a hindrance.
We may not understand all that God is asking us to do but he is showing me that in order for him to answer the prayers that I have prayed, I am going to have to make those changes that he has been asking me to make. Even if I don't understand their connection.
I need to move forward, I need to let go. I need to let him transform me. That cliff that I feel like I am on, it's a simple yes or no. Will I stay or will I go ...wherever he leads.
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A couple weeks ago, I started writing about "Take up your cross and follow me" from Matthew 16:24. I think that I wrote a good bit about taking up our cross but I never really got back to the follow me part.
Luke 9:23 says to pick that cross up daily. He may not ever ask us to do anything specific but daily you and I should go to him and seek his face and not be satisfied until we see it. We have to be willing to bare that cross and daily we have to report for duty.
Not just a simple check in but a "Here I am God. Here I am!" like little Samuel in (1 Samuel 3). He got up and he ran every time God called his name, even though he wasn't sure who, what or why- He went, physically running, mentally listening, eagerly seeking and when he got it wrong he went back and listened some more, EXPECTING God to talk again.
Anticipation and participation. Follow me.
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I know what some of my crosses are. And I am finally taking the time to decide, what his cross means to me. When he says follow me am I willing to pick up any or all of those crosses and use them for his good? Am I willing to follow him and let him change me from who I've been to who he promised that I could become? When I get to the edge of that cliff, am I willing to let go, even if I don't know what's on the other side?
In my mind, I only expect that when I jump from the edge of that cliff, I'm going to land in something at the bottom or plummet to the ground to be destroyed. But Gods word says that he will mount you with eagle's wings. There might actually be a life in that unseen realm after all and he just might show me a whole new view of the world when I let go...
Faith is just faith until we know why we have it. When we get that answer- that is when it transforms! -And that's what all of this writing is to me. I am getting my answers.
But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. (Isaiah 40:31 NIV)
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