Leaning to Trust

"Behold, the eye of the LORD is on those who fear Him, on those who hope in His steadfast love, that He may deliver their souls from death and keep them alive in famine." Psalm 33:19

During the darkest of days the Lord promises to sustain us... that we will not be alone...

Oh that I would trust Him so fully that when dark days come I don't flinch but stand strong on His promises to be with me... that in the raging storms of life my soul and heart, and emotion and mind would be calm and still in the knowledge of who He is and how He loves me. I don't understand myself, how is it that I can I possibly forget His immensity in light of such feeble thing. How is it that I so quickly forget who He is... One glance at Job 38 & 39 leaves me breathless and longing for more of this God, this God who loves me so deeply and fully that He gave of Himself to make a way for us to be together again despite my constant rejection and forgetfulness.

I wish I  could say I have "arrived" at a place where I know and trust Him fully but I can't... I can say that I am thirstier for our time together than ever before and that I am growing more and more in love with Him and I long that my actions would bring Him glory thought I fail constantly. I am continually learning to trust Him in every moment, and that at ever crisis He must be my first thought...

I am thankful that His loving me is not contingent on anything I do but on the Blood of Christ that was shed for me, on a rugged cross, on top of a hill, so long ago. I am thankful that I won't ever be good enough because if I could have saved myself I would have tried to. I am thankful that even on the best of days He reminds me of who He is and calls me to my knees in reverent worship.

It's all about heart

This morning while drinking a cappuccino and reading the Word the Lord once again reminded me that my walk with Him is about the posture of my heart...

The Lord's dealing with us has always been about out heart issues... sin is in our nature. Both Cain and Abel brought sacrifices, they both gave, but Abel gave in faith and Cain did not. Though God did not accept Cain's sacrifice he didn't leave it at that, He pursued Cain after "his face fell". In Genesis 4:5-7 "The Lord said, 'Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. It's desire is for you, but you must rule over it." God didn't just leave Cain to his own destruction without warning him. The Lord loves us so much that He warns us in His Word and He gave us His Holy Spirit to guide us from evil and into righteousness but we have to choose to obey. We have free will: it is our choices that lead us closer to or further from our Heavenly Father.

This reminds me of how some close friends of mine are raising their boys. Since they were each around eighteen months old, when one of the boys begins to make a wrong choice he is asked to choose to obey. These parents are ensuring that their boys understand that punishment and praise are direct results of their own choices. That's what the Lord was saying to Cain in verse seven, "If you do well, will you not be accepted?" We have a choice to do well... to obey the Lord and His Word.. there is no middle ground... the choice is ours. Be encouraged brothers and sisters. The Lord looks at our hearts not our track records or ability to do good... we all have a sin nature... our natural hearts are corrupt and full of evil but when we call on Christ to be our Savior and Lord He becomes our strength and righteousness and He changes our nature. In Him alone we are able to give our lives as a living sacrifice to God the Father. 

It's up to you.. so choose today who you will serve:

“Now therefore fear the LORD and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the LORD. And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the LORD, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.” Joshua 24:14-15

Be in the Light

"O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord." Isaiah 2:5

How sad that throughout 3 chapters, Isaiah 1-3, there is a constant turning away from the Lord... a choice made to walk in crippling darkness rather that "Glorious light". How easy it is to choose self righteousness and self fulfillment rather than a life of humble service to the Great High King but in the end it brings ruin and misery and loneliness and nothing of eternal significance. We like to think that we are different from the Israelite but really we're not. We get caught up in having things, jobs, hobbies, and so many other stuff that we let them steal away our time with the Lord... there is nothing wrong with having nice things, or a good job, or taking time for yourself. What makes them unbeneficial is when they became detrimental to our relationship with God, that is to say, when they become the focus of our lives. Follow God doesn't mean you won't have the things your heart desires, it means you truly giving them up to follow His will without expecting God to work like a genie "For my service I wish for wealth" or a like balancing scale, "I'll give you this if you give me that"... We should follow Him and hold fast to the knowledge that, "... the LORD will give grace and glory: no good thing will He withhold from them that walk upright." Psalm 84:11. So let us "be in the light as He is in the light."

Lord, let it be our prayer that we would thirst after you in such a way that our own selfish desires diminish.

The Sound of Footsteps

It's funny... for years I didn't realize that the sound of footsteps are distinct. The way we walk incorporates our natural stride, old physical injuries, and even our current emotional state. A few years ago my Dad had a stroke and something happened... the sound of his footsteps changed... I was up late as usual and I heard footsteps I didn't know walking around my house. It was a terrifying sound. That may have been the first time I consciously realized that I knew the steps of my family and that they were safe. It didn't take me long to learn the new sound of my Father's footsteps because I heard them multiple times every day.

So much in my life has changed in the last few years and sometimes I feel lost... like it's midnight... and I'm in the woods... and its a new moon... and I can't even see my nose... but then I remember Psalm 145:18 "The Lord is near to all who call on Him, to all who call on Him in truth." so I  call out to the Lord of my salvation and He draws near to me... and I begin to hear the familiar sound of His footsteps as He walks ahead of me through the darkness, guiding me to a place of peace and refuge. 

Decoys look like ducks too...

At times, try as I may, I don't understand why my life has turned out the way it has. Most days I am thankful that God saved me from what I thought I wanted for my life, much of which would have lead to destruction and misery. But there are those days when it seems I have been wronged. I think to myself "What did I do  to deserve this life of solitude?" When this happens I should immediately remind myself that the Lord has been good and that He has called me to Himself and to a life that glorifies Him and that it sometimes means walking down a road alone. Unfortunately, this is not always my reaction. Some times I'm my own undoing and I begin to feed into the lie that my life is one of solitude. Much of the time these feelings come after I have been wounded by someone, the details of which may vary.

Sometimes you can see a thing and think that it looks like a duck but upon closer examination you find it is a decoy. A decoy is defined as, "a thing (or person) that lures or entices (a person or animal) away from an intended course, typically into a trap." The enemy of our souls is constantly using decoys to  try to distract us from what the Lord would have for our lives. Some times the distraction comes in the form of a man that looks and (on the surface) acts like a man of God, but what looks like a duck is not always a duck and what looks like a man of God upon closer examination can be found a fraud.

I have heard that rather than studying the fraud one should study the genuine because frauds are always changing in an attempt to look more genuine but the genuine is without change. So what does a genuine man of God look like. There is no better place to look than in the Word of God, 1 Tim 3 gives a description of what an overseer (or bishop) should look like and because the man is the head of the home,as women this is what we should look for. "Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money... He must not be a recent convert... he must be well thought of by outsiders... must be dignified, not double-tongued, not addicted to much wine, not greedy for dishonest gain. They must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience."

What does it all mean, it means that you should not settle for a man that does not respect you, or value you to the degree that he would protect your testimony and integrity even when you are struggling to. A man of God does not manipulate women into feeling that the only way to prove their affection is with physical intimacy. A man of God seeks to honor and glorify God with all he does not excluding his relationships. As women we need to learn that the the only way to know what a man of God looks like is by drawing closer to God Himself. His sons imitate who He is; by knowing the Lord more intimately we are able to recognize His sons.

Ref: 1 Corinthians 11:1, 1 Tim 3, 

Reclaiming what was Lost

When I was younger I knew how to dream. I dreamed without reservations and in spite of what I saw in front of me. The lack of resources, ability, and knowledge did not factor into my dreams at all. I was not yet tainted by the world or my experiences with it. I dared to dream of all the things my heart desired. As I grew up and life happened, as it always does, I learned to let go of my "impossible" dreams. I found that if I lowered my expectations for my life there were less opportunities for me to be disappointed by it. So I let go of it all, every last dream; and I stopped dreaming for years, without consciously knowing it. For many years I was just surviving, going from goal to goal and never thinking about those dreams I had dared to dream in my childhood. Let me make one thing clear, my life was good; I was studying something I enjoyed, working with people who had become family, volunteering my weekends to helping people in need. I was in no way drowning in misery nor did I hate my life. I simply was not daring to dream the dreams that were hidden in the depths of my soul. There was a yearning deep within me that was begging to be set free... Then, about a year and a half ago God began to call me to dream and to dream big. He reminded me of all those dreams I had long forgotten and after much hesitation and internal wrestling I chose to truth God not just with my life but with all my hopes and dreams. From that moment I dared to dream again, all those bold and seemingly impossible dreams slowly came back. There was no moment of clarity it has been little moments of  choosing to to truth when new dreams come to life inside me. The first of these dreams was Graduate School, Seminary to be specific... this dream came with something unexpected. For it to come true I had to move from Texas to Virginia; this meant leaving family, home, job, friends, and church with just trailer full of belongings. This was scary but it was worth it. Then deep inside me the dream of working in ministry (as a vocation) came back to life; this meant I would no longer receive the luxuries of the corporate world but it also came with the joy and peace of the Lord and in knowing that I am where He would have me. The scariest of all the dreams I have ever dared to dream has been revived inside of me. I dare not vocalize it before it's time but I know that God has placed it in my soul and that in His perfect timing, and not a moment sooner, it will come to pass in this present world. In part, I think it has come out of the other two dreams coming true but in part it comes from the child in me that has escaped and is painting my soul with dreams. I know there are other dreams ready to come out of the depths of my soul and into the light of my present thoughts but for now I will focus on enjoying those dreams that have come true and praying for God's guidance for those I am still dreaming about.  I am excited to share this journey with my friends and family and I hope that it serves to remind each of you that it is never too late to reclaim the dreams of your youth. If the Lord gave me the strength to reclaim my long lost dreams then He can do the same for you.

Truth Hoarders

This past summer one of my Aunts, that lives in Costa Rica, was diagnosed with cancer. The family was devastated by this news and of course those of her siblings that live in the U.S.A. immediately schedule trips to visit her. After much deliberation, the doctors gave her the worse case scenario (six months) then they gave her her options. My Aunt, like so many others, chose to fight but what if the doctors never gave her that choice. What if when she was feeling sick she went to the doctors, they ran test, and when the results came in they decided not to share the bad news with her or tell her how to be healed. What if they allowed the fact that the conversation was going to be difficult and uncomfortable to convince them that she did not actually need to know the truth of her situation. Most people would think that the thought of a doctor doing anything like this is ridiculous and completely unrealistic.

This is what we do every time someone allows us to see the pain they are living in and we neglect to speak the truth of God to them and into their situation. At times our hesitation come form society constantly telling us not to force our beliefs on others. Other times it's because we have become so occupied by our lives that we can not be bothered to take the time or make the effort to reach out to the hurting. When will we learn that sharing our beliefs does not mean we are forcing them on others? We should be willing to speak truth into the lives of those around us no matter the cost.

When we become people who "attend church" rather than being the church we become truth hoarders. Truth hoarders are those who search out the truth and take their fill of truth and keep it to themselves. Rather than pouring out truth into others they become stagnant like the Dead Sea. We were meant to be overflowing with truth, overflowing means that it is pouring out of us. When we fail to do so one day we will wake up and realize that we are not just allowing others around us to die but we are slowly killing ourselves. Like the Dead Sea, nothing can thrive or even live when it remains constantly stagnant.