Thank You!

Thank You God
Father, Son, Holy Spirit
For looking down on us
Looking on
   our wandering
   our brokenness
   our hopelessness
With compassion
   and love
For staying so committed to us
That though we didn't really want You
Though we rejected again and again
You decided to come
For those who might receive
   and believe
   and find life

Thank Jesus
For being willing to come
Come as a baby
Be so completely curtailed
Did you know, all along
That the cross was coming
Or did that hang over You all Your life
Even if You didn't know
Living sinless
In the midst of our
   hate
   selfishness
   jealousy
   petty rage
   foolishness

Thank You
For always looking with compassion
And love
On our miserable state
On me
   wherever I am
   no matter how foolish
   no matter how I should know by now
Thank You
For always
   reaching
   seeking
   loving
   knowing
   receiving

And You didn't balk
   when it got hard
You didn't give up
You didn't walk away
You stayed
You followed through
You let Yourself go through
All of the same things
   I face
   And so much more

Jesus, Son of God
Then and now
Thank You for Your constant
Presence
In my life
In the past
Now
And into my future
Your love will never change
Your constant reaching
You as a constant refuge
And shelter
And rock
And strength
Your love as my source of life
Your love and life flowing into me
Transforming me
Living out through me

Thank You

A Sabbath Heart

Thoughts from Mark Buchanan's Spiritual Renewal workshop at Break Forth 2013.

The fundamental thing...if you don't have a sabbath heart, you will never have a sabbath day.

"The problem with the culture we're living in is we're trying to solve the dilemma of our extreme busyness and stressfulness and all of that, by simply creating more leisure, and leisure isn't the cure for what ails us, sabbath is."

How do we gain this ability to enter the rest of God...to get to the place where we can really recline with Jesus, without constant agitation, checking email or the iPhone, etc. to just enjoy Jesus, know He likes you and you like Him?

It takes a Sabbath heart, and a Sabbath heart is rooted in one thing in particular: a deep and deepening conviction of the sovereign goodness of God.

If I don't cultivate this sense of God's sovereign overruling transcendent imminent goodness and presence and ability to deal with life in all of it's tumultuousness and make it all work together for good, then I can't rest.

All I've ever been

I've wondered
Should we take them on again
The same as we've been doing for the past 6-7 years...
Get recommendations for 20-30 new students
And help them through high school

Are we too tired
Will we burn out
Can we do it when we are so short-staffed

When I think of just saying "no" this year
I suddenly think
They would be out there still
Students...
Who have lost mom's and dad's
Who are hurting, needing comfort
May go off to work at 15 or 16 without high school
How can I hold back
In the face of this need
When we could help

Then I think
But what's the point of "helping"
When the helping is so limited
If all we can do is give some money and a meal a week
And send them off to school
Who am I kidding
There is so much they need that we don't give
Don't even come close to supplying

And I remember You
Sometimes in the face of great need
You simply turned and walked away
Need, apparently, wasn't Your highest call

And what I have to offer
I know it's never been enough
It's always been ludicrous
I've always been
Just a kid
With a few loaves and fish
Offering what I have
And in Your hands
It can become plenty
More than enough

And so here I am
Offering again
It's all I can do
Woe to me if I do not offer
All I have

How to offer
What it means
I'm still listening

How? Through circumcision?

How is it going to happen Lord? You spoke to me so powerfully through Isa. 58. And I know it's for more than just this past month or two, but something I need to keep listening for. A friend this week ended her email with:  "May your light truly break forth like the dawn. May your bones be strong and you be well, well-watered. And may you know the glory of the Lord as your guard and defender." Yes, from this same chapter.

And I find myself wondering, how are you going to strengthen my bones? I feel like I'm getting weaker and weaker. The plans, the methods that seem good for going forward...are just lacking about 5-10 more people helping put them into practise at this point. Okay, well 3 or 4 would even be good.

Yesterday morning I listened to Mark Buchanan's all day workshop on "Spiritual Renewal" from Breakforth 2013. He talked about Joshua and the army heading to Jericho, they have just crossed the Jordan River, and the angel of the LORD comes... And the strategy is not rally the troops and charge. First, it is circumcision. Why then? Why not weeks or months earlier on the other side of the Jordan? They are effectively incapacitated, and vulnerable for weeks. If word of this leaks out to the enemy, they could be slaughtered so easily (remember Dinah, Shechem...Dinah's brothers). Then Buchanan asks: What is your Jericho? What is before you that needs a strategy from God?

Buchanan talked more about the 'incapacitated' part of circumcision, and I wondered if we are in that place now--our forces have certainly been weakened.So I have been wondering and asking You what this is supposed to mean for us. I have sensed these two months need to be a time of rest and recovery, but...I don't know that we are getting there. At least I'm not. Should we just lay down and recover?  What would that mean?

But if I think back on that passage, I think there was  purify yourselves, consecrate yourselves part to it. That is more the point of circumcision--being God's holy people, set apart. Maybe it was a time to check their hearts and their commitment. And...being weakened, also put them in a place of having to trust in God.

Today I purpose, at least for these two days before getting into the next work of planning, to rest, and to wait.

You are here

Jesus,  I've run hard
and now I'm tired
and alone
and don't quite know where I am

But You are here
You are always here
with me
wherever I am
so I stop
and cry
here before You
with You

I've looked to You
entrusted all
looked with hope
but disappointments
still hurt

You Sovereign One
Son of God
hold me
here with me
I'm Yours

This chair

today
once again
I'm asked to sit

this chair
this uncomfortable place
not knowing
uncertain
wondering
wishing I could know
how it will end
what will happen

I squirm
wiggle
jump off
lurch
left
right


stop!
grab on
both hands
rigid sit
deep breath
relax

Father
I'm still learning to trust
still learning to sit
calm
in this place
of unknowing
I choose
once again
to trust
Your promises
Your presence


Perhaps someday
this hard chair
this uncomfortable place
will be
the place of
   peace
   joy
   freedom
   like I've never known

The LORD says, 

"I will guide you along the best pathway for your life.

I will advise you and watch over you."

Ps. 32:8 NLT

Simple 'chair' picture, from December 2012, depicting...the place I need to stay--an end to the running, the place of trust, eventual peace.

Binding me

You are
Slowly
Binding my heart
to You

It's what I want
I'm tired
of the wandering
of this bent to wander

You are
Revealing
the ways
the reasons
I leave
I bend away
and the foolishness
of it all

"Binding"
And yet it is free
I am free
free to choose
You are
changing the bent
of my choosing
the lean
is more toward You

Thank You
I'm no longer running

Alive!

Hallelujah, Risen Lord, The only One I fall before...