Learning to lean

I got home from work tonight and immediately crashed on the couch. I was tired and extremely frustrated from work, and also starting to feel sick. I really hate feeling sick.

After I woke up from a critically-needed nap and had some chicken-noodle soup (good for what ails you, they say), I laid down on the couch, petting my cats. All of the confusion and aggravation of the day seemed to swirl around me. I felt let down (by God) because of the difficulty of the job, and because of the sickness that was beginning to manifest in my body, and I could feel my sense of hope receding.

I started playing a song on my cell phone; it was a recording of a live worship set by Laura Hackett from IHOP-KC:

There is no pit too deep

that Jesus cannot reach.

There is no sorrow so strong,

that would overtake Your beloved one.

And He’s brought me to the wilderness,

where I will learn to sing.

And He lets me know my barrenness,

so I will learn to lean.

On that very last part, the revelation and comfort of God came crashing into the room. With weeping, I came to the realization of what God was up to, yet again.

In every trial, God’s goal is not to have me grovel as a subservient creature (I am that, and less), but to have me wholly lean and depend on Him, as my Father, as my saviour, as the Lover of my soul.

He is the One who desires to walk with me in the mundaneness and barrenness of everyday life. He desires me to lean on Him and walk with Him, through all of the little hurts and aggravations. He will attack my self-conceited independence with His loving zeal, until all my heart is His, until everything in my life is in His presence, until we are one.

Lord, consume until there is nothing left of me that would choose to be apart from thee!

Who is that coming up from the wilderness,
leaning on her beloved?

Alive again!

I haven’t posted anything in a while, other than some little tweets and much (mostly) pointless facebooking. I remember reading a post from David Sliker’s blog which said that his wife can tell where his heart is at based upon how recently he has posted to his blog. This is also very true of me. I haven’t posted anything in 7 months, and it has certainly been a dry spell.

I was driving home from work and I felt so “dry and crusty.” I was talking to the Lord during my drive, because I really wanted Him to interrupt and re-invigorate my ever-so “Blah” existence. I really wanted Him to direct me to a place of encounter so I could meet with Him. I was desperate because for so long I had denied Him by saying in my heart, “I’m doing ok on my own, I don’t need Your presence, God.” I remember so many instances in the last two weeks when He came to visit me (especially during work), and I just ignored Him, because I thought I was doing ok on my own.

I’m really thankful that the Lord totally blasted me with His Life, and gave me more revelation of His heart. I really had a heart cry out of Psalm 49:

Psa 49:3 My mouth shall speak wisdom, And the meditation of my heart [shall give] understanding.

It made me think… What is the meditation of my heart? Is it wisdom? Is it revelation? Is God in there hardly at all?

I’ve also been dealing with how seriously Facebook and Twitter have stolen my blogging thunder. Why spend the time to put your thought into elegant flowing prose* when you can

mash out 140 chars of TEH schweet tweets?

*Okay, nothing on my blog may pass as truly elegant prose, but at least there’s no character limit. 140 characters isn’t writing, it’s a thought packet. Makes me think of 1984 and “Newspeak”

Consistency

The Lord has been speaking to me about consistency…

So many times, my walk with God is up and down. Recently, He’s been smoothing out the curve a lot, and I’m very thankful for that. A lot of that has had to do with me coming into a sold understanding of my identity in Him.

A simple encouragement the Lord gave me today was:

Don’t fret about how soon you feel like you’ve cooled off of a high from a conference or encounter. Just press into Me.

So, I am endeavoring to pursue Him more consistently. I am so thankful for His wonderful presence which rushes to meet me every time I draw near to Him. I am carving out a place on my desk where I an just seek Him out in His word, with prayer. I feel like I’ve been well trained (by Him) in how to seek Him at church, in prayer meetings, in worship services, and out in the field when He calls on me to go somewhere to intercede. But I have been very lax in my pursuit of Him in the simplicity of my prayer closet. I’m thankful for the grace to be able to remedy that.

Awaken Love

…I am listening to Sean Feucht’s “Awaken Love” song on the Burn website here at work…

…and my heart is ready to throw off all its chains.

God, it’s time… set us all free… free from the useless distractions that catch our eyes from day to day.

Awaken love. It pleases. Please.
 
 
 
It’s all about the Relationship
 
 
 
How dare we get caught up in our petty agendas, doctrinal disputes, and the anointing we think we have… Someday soon someone with a very simple mind and a totally pure heart is going to pick up a bible and start praying… and will shake the nations… with a purity that we cannot fathom, while we are so busy justifying our incessant quests for self-gratification and entertainment. There is no shortcut to intimacy with the Bridegroom.

God, awaken love! Put an end to the charade… the show…

“You’re rising up like the morning sun
Shining down salvation
Let Your Spirit awaken
Awaken Love”

Pushing through disappointment

I had an interesting thing happen today. I was at a coffee house, sipping some green tea and reading the Word while worshipping to some music on my mp3 player. I have been dealing with disappointment a lot lately — there are a lot of things in my life that aren’t the way that I want them to be.

As I kept the reading and listening, the discontent in my heart eventually rose to the surface, and I just couldn’t continue. So, I packed up my books, etc. and went to my car. I didn’t feel like driving directly home, so I just kinda drove around aimlessly, and listened to worship music in the car. As I was driving, I could feel the Lord begin to direct me to drive towards a poorer part of town. I really didn’t want to do this — I was already nursing an aching soul, and that part of town is not a pretty sight. Nevertheless, I could hear the Lord saying, “I want you to see the reproach of your people,” so off I went. I drove through some rougher (not terribly bad) looking neighborhoods, and interceded for the people I saw there, and especially for buildings. The Lord gave me knowledge of issues and prayer needs for the people and buildings I saw. As I prayed, I could see layers of sin in peoples lives slowly being stripped away (it made me think of the ablative heat shielding on the Mercury space capsules, but that’s just me , and I could see the glory of God filling different buildings like an explosion.

Now at this point, you’d think my heart was totally revived because I was experiencing God in a very real way, and serving others in intercession.

Nah.

I still had an aching heart, frustrated with life, etc. I pressed through as long as I could, and drove to many different buildings, praying for them as I passed by. It was honestly really incredible what He led me to discover, things and places I had never been to in a city that I’ve lived in for eight years, nor even knew existed. Eventually, I had to stop and go home, because I was getting really upset (because of aforementioned issues), even though God was working through me. I felt His grace that I could stop and go home, although I know He wanted me to stay at one particular building and pray for breakthrough, but I just couldn’t handle it.

This only confirmed to me what I already knew, that our hearts are refreshed by spending time in the secret place of intimacy with Jesus, and not by our multitude of pursuits and ministry efforts.

Selah.