Like people running
a race,
we must take off every
heavy thing.
We must leave behind
things
that get in our way
and entangle us…
We must keep our
eyes on Jesus.
~Hebrews 12:1-2
During this season, God is calling
His sons and
daughters together
for the sake of
clarifying the course and
adjusting some of
our thinking.
He is helping us to
think bigger,
which always means thinking more like Him.
First we have to
leave behind the
thoughts that get in
our way of doing so.
Thinking
bigger requires us to think less
about
the things that used to define us.
These thoughts involved assessing,
mostly
subconsciously,
whether
we were valued and significant.
We often
determined success by things like
money, friends, position, achievement, power
education,
promotion, recognition, status—
even in, maybe especially in, the church.
Our
judgments about significance often were
made in
light of world system values.
Maybe in strange ways, these values
helped direct us to our callings.
There was good that came out of those times.
But at some point, we must recognize
the trappings of living in the world.
When the
trappings are embedded so deeply that
we
cannot strip off those "things that entangle us,"
God
comes in to help us get them off.
Often,
God will use something that feels like
a wrecking ball to get
our attention.
He
doesn’t want to wreck us, however;
He wants
to wreck those things that aren’t Him.
The narrow road has
been taking on new meaning.
It hasn’t changed
any of the old meaning,
but it is meaning more
now.
I have been on the
narrow road for many years
and yet every day I begin the journey again.
Every day, I am on
both sides of the gateway,
on the inside
knowing I am His and
that He is ever with me
and
on the outside
wanting to begin again
that I might know
Him more.
There are days I am
afraid that
I won’t find Him in
the depths I desire.
My mind wanders, my
heart fears,
my emotions hold me
back.
This stripped down
version of myself
wonders if I can do
this.
He whispers once
again that He is with me.
Whatever my thoughts
of God are today,
He is infinitely
more than I can imagine.
So my desire today
is to move closer,
to hear more
intentionally,
to see more vividly
and know more
practically.
Jesus, be the absolute center of my life.
That I may be one
with you.
Infinite
love made our hearts in such a way
that
only an infinite union with infinite love will do
~St John
of the Cross
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