God carries on to completion

A couple nights ago I picked up a book to re-read, called Jesus: The Stranger to Self-Hatred by Brennan Manning. If you haven't read it, and you struggle w/ that kind of thing, then I can't recommend it enough. It's on point.

So I started to read it again, and realized that I didn't need to. I had a moment of, Yes, thank God that that is not as much of a struggle as it was a year or two ago. And that's zero percent anything that I did, but 100% God bringing me through that, by his grace and his grace alone.

The following verse honestly never meant much to me, because I get impatient with the whole restoration process, but it's very real to me now: "being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus" - Philippians 1:6.

Thank God that he cares about us to continue working on us, like a potter molds clay, even through the storms of life.

Clarity vs. Trust

Just after reading a few preview pages from Ruthless Trust by Brennan Manning, one thing stuck out to me. This guy he talks about goes to Calcutta to serve and figure out what he is to do w/ the rest of his life, and he asks Mother Teresa to pray for him. What for?, she asks. For clarity. She responds: No, I will not do that. That's the last thing you're holding on to that you need to let go of. I have never had clarity, what I have always had is trust. So I will pray that you trust God.

This is intriguing, because I can't count the number of times I pray for clarity, and have prayed over friends for the same thing. But, what if trusting God means accepting a certain lack of clarity. I think we all want clarity, but, I wonder if part of trusting God is accepting that he wants us to give up some clarity so that we can rely on him more, so that we can trust him more.

And if you think about it, why do we want clarity? I know I want it because I want to know what the mess is going on in my life, or in the lives of those around me. I want to have the knowledge of how something is going to turn out. I kinda feel like Adam in that way, I guess.

But that leaves no room for God. I don't need God if I have full clarity; he's of no use to me then.

So, instead of praying for clarity, I'm going to pray for the ability and courage to trust God.

Paul doesn't have it together

"I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do, I do not do, but what I hate I do" - Romans 7:15.

and...

"So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law" - Romans 5:16-18.

Reading Paul's letters is a breath of fresh air sometimes (now) for me. "I do not understand what I do" and "they are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want."

I feel like Paul gets it.

There's this tension. These constant forces that directly oppose each other, and sometimes you end up not understanding what you're doing. I read that as, Paul doesn't have his stuff together and he's honest about it. I'm glad he's honest about it.

So, what then? What if we don't have our stuff together, and we're left with our hands out, palms facing upwards, saying, "I don't freaking get this." What then?

I guess we remember the truths about God. The promises.

"Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus."

There is now, no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). Am I "in" Christ Jesus? He is my redeemer, he is my Wonderful Counselor, my Prince of Peace, my Almighty God, my Everlasting Father, and I can call him Abba.

So I guess it's about perspective, right? When you do stuff you don't want to do, or not do stuff that you want to do, then at least there's an unstoppable Mighty Love that doesn't shift. And when we F up, to some degree it doesn't even phase God, because he doesn't love us based on how well we have our stuff together.

ect ect.

Or maybe I'm trying to find external stuff to explain things, when it's more a matter of self-control and self-discipline. That wears me out, because I begin to forget God's love and get upset about not having enough self-discipline and brute force strength to get my stuff together. And. it's. exhausting.

Hellen

I don't know why I do this, but when I'm in an airport for 3 hours I need to find ways to entertain myself, even if at the expense of others. You be the judge.

The following dialog took place when I was ordering lunch today from an airport. In order to protect the anonymity of all parties, I won't say which airport it was, nor reveal the name of the sandwich place. I will say however that it was one of the major airports in Charlotte, NC, and for story's sake, I'll make up a name of the place: Quiznos Subz.

me, "Hi. I'd like a small sub, the smallest size available please."

Hellen (I didn't catch her name but she looked like a Hellen), "We only have one size."

me, "Ok. I'll have a one-size sub then."

I wish this was the only time I pulled something like this, but it's certainly not. Far. From. It. The first time was back in 2007, on a Tuesday (not sure what day it was): Size Smoothie, Please. All in all, only 2 times I guess. And I wonder if I'm the only person I know who thinks it's funny. Her facial expression translated into words would have been, "you're an idiot." Ha.

Florida - Gorgeous! (Old School reference nbd, sort of)

"Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ" - Galatians 1:10.

This verse came to mind several times in the days leading to my visit to see my grandparents in FL. And just last night at dinner, I feel like God had to nudge me with, "remember that verse I brought to your mind. Yes that applies. Right. Now."

Words from family members tend to have much more of an effect on someone. Words from people who have known you from day 1 cut much deeper from those of a stranger, or even a friend.

God has been gracious. Since last night there are approx 5 comebacks with which I could have returned the cutting jab, but God keeps bringing that verse to mind, which helps me combat my flesh. The Enemy is ready to provide me with equally cutting words, but I reject them.

I like the end part of the verse, "If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ." I read that, "if you're worried about making men happy, then I can't use you Ian" and I think God wants to use each and every one of us to advance the Kingdom. Do I want to be used by God, do I want to be a servant of Christ? A thousand times yes, so that adds some extra motivation to turn the other cheek and to love said family member who is loose with his or her tongue.

If that motivation of wanting to be a servant of Christ is not enough, there's the "love your neighbor" verse. "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another" - John 13:34-35.

I remember one time I gave a certain family member a big hug when a handshake was expected, and it sort of paralyzed him (um...or her. ok it's a him :). So when we can return a jab with an act or word filled with love, then that's powerful.

That's the Kingdom.

** I hesitate to write this entry and I wanna backspace the heck out of it for fear of giving the impression that my time in FL with my grandparents is not enjoyable. Beneath it all, I am forever thankful to be with my grandparents. Another reality that hits me is that my grandparents are just people. My grandpa's just a guy, and my grandma's just a girl. A guy and a girl who decided to marry each other, and later to have kids who then had kids, ect ect. They, just like me, just like you, have a past full of successes, and some failures. Not all of it is rosy, and on this level I can relate to them. We're all broken, but we're still all created by God who relentlessly pursues us in order to make us whole again, to complete His work in us.

*** why the picture of Bush? I'll blog about it later. Let's just say that W and I are now bbf's now tho nbd.

Lean

"Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight." Prov 3:5-6

I felt like I needed to sit in silence for a minute, so I put my chillin' mix on. But even my chillin' mix doesn't allow God the space to meet with me. If you know me well it takes a miracle for me to chill w/OUT my chillin' mix on :) Maybe I need to create a Silent Mix with zero tracks on it. I digress...

"Can you turn that off, too" says God. Ok fine.

Sometimes I get to this place where I have 80,000 thoughts running thru my mind, mostly jumbled up, and they consume me. I push God out of the picture the more I dwell on them, which leads me to where I end up now.

The silence.

And that verse pops into my head. And I feel like I can finally STOP leaning (slash dwelling) on my human, ugly, feet-running-in-place thoughts and it finally forces me to throw my hands up and say "ok I can't do anything more at this point. I'm just running in place now. I guess I have to trust you. I need to acknowledge you now, b/c I'm done with trying to figure out this stuff on my own. Because I'm tired, fresh out of energy, and I don't get it"

Not going to say it's rock bottom, but, it's certainly not a spacious place, where God ultimately wants to bring us into.

"He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me." - Ps 18:19

That verse has been coming to mind today. After David has the "chords of death entangling him," God rescues him b/c He delights in him, and He brings him into a spacious place.

A spacious place, where he looks all around, and there's nothing, nothing but the Father who just took him to that place. No enemies. No worries. No jumbling thoughts. Nothing. Peace.

But I don't think we can live in that space forever. Perhaps it's an "ok child, O child whom I created with my bare hands in your mother's womb, let me draw you out of these deep waters and take you to this place so we can spend time together, just you and me. Let me show you Truth. Let me show you my everlasting, ever-faithful promises I have for you."

And we get refreshed. And then maybe God nudges us back to real life, and gives us that free will to make choices, to make decisions, but at least we can feel better about stepping forward after we've met with Him. I need to meet with Him, I need him to come and meet with me.

Paul's (my) Contradictory Life

"I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do." - Romans 7:15.

This verse has been coming to mind a lot over the past several weeks, and I'm not sure why. Sometimes God can bring stuff to mind w/out saying why and we just need to be OK with that, I suppose.

I wonder tho if this verse applies only to the sinful nature we have, or if it can apply to simply us humans behaving in a way that's contrary to what we want. Fear can be a part of that; it can be this driving force in our lives, compelling us to do things that we don't want to do, or NOT do things that we want to do. There's the fear of the unknown, the fear of failure, the fear of rejection.

I suppose when we let fear drive us, then that is sin, so maybe it circles back around to the sinful nature I was talking about.

I say all of this because I am afraid to sit down one day and make a chart of "What I'm currently doing" and "What I want to do." I'm afraid that they will be vastly different, and I'll wonder what I'm doing with my life.

So what, then? Do I go after the things in the right-hand column, the things I want to do, and deal with consequences if it gets ugly? I should at least do a self-eval to see if any fears or anxieties are keeping me from moving in any given direction that God is calling me too, a direction on a path that I am currently not on.

Not sure what to make of all of that, and there's still more "abrewin'" in my heart and mind about this. But it's hard to explain, hard to put in words.

Final thought - I love how Paul's real honest in how he's living this contradictory life, because my life too often feels like a giant contradiction between the things that I believe in, the things I want to do, and the things I'm actually doing.

Thankful tho for God's grace, a grace that I should receive like a child, a child who can do nothing of merit to deserve that grace.