Baa Baa

We probably ought to stop treating the Holy Spirit like the black sheep of the family.

Photography from morguefile.com by anon

Dare To Go

We are invited to go to the place of mystery, where the bigger and unexpected things can unfold.  It is a place where we don’t write the script, but we are welcomed to come and participate, to be amazed, to have important roles, to engage and be filled with wonder.

We need minds that will explore His character and make room for His ways without requiring that they make sense to us first or demand that He only does things we are comfortable with.

We need hearts that are open and swift to respond to those around us, interested in what God might be doing in this encounter, and continually being shaped by Him as we give Him room to be the God who lives and is lavishly at work in the world in infinite ways.

We need courage to go with Him because we believe more than anything that He is utterly good and is not out to demolish, shame, or abandon us--even if the current scenario stirs our nerves.  It might mean that God is asking us to consider something new and widen our parameter of Him and what He might be up to.  

We are sometimes the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion, but we can go to the place that is somewhat unpredictable, a place that doesn’t exactly have the comforts of our home, and yet brings a life that we know our home desperately needs.  We discover, when we open the doors, that He is at work continually and beautifully on our behalf there.  

As far as I can tell, the root of our response is always tied to the question “Is He good?”  It is the ancient question that has tipped the scales of human response since the beginning.  And ironically, we are unlikely to find that He is until we truly give Him a chance to show us.  We can be stunned by a major event where we know the outcome was way better than we deserved and not at all of our doing.  And we can decide to stay in those waters and explore those depths and find that the frontiers are wide and deep and His work inexhaustible.  He moves on and on.  

Most of us stop at some field of poppies and the seductive substitute of some lesser kind of wonder and miss the power of the Kingdom that is just a few steps ahead, and the King who is waiting for us and so hoping that we will come.  We can discover what was there for us all along.

Photograph by SarahBelham at morguefile.com

The Blessed Wait

At some point most of us realize that we cannot convince the people or control the situations around us, and we move into the much more significant work of being the best person we can be in the midst of it all.

The human condition has us often operating out of fear.  We clutch for what we are afraid of losing.  We manipulate and chase--with foam sliding down our chins--frantic for what we think we cannot live without.  All the while, it would have been given as a gift.  Oh that we would know that we are blessed and loved and could be patient for the dazzling gifts to arrive at their anointed time.  But we are afraid He isn’t that good and we sure don’t want to wait for what we want right now.  What would it look like if we had the capacity to pause and trust, and then dance our wild days with courage and joy as He calls and gives?

Everything is a lot better when both it and we are ready.  The adventure will be there, the discoveries and the learning will still be before us, but the preparation that the Timeless Master Creator has readied will make the outcome brilliant and good.  You can do something amazing with ingredients that are ripe.

Photograph from morguefile.com by quicksandala

And On and On and On and On it Goes

 Forty-two years today of celebrating God’s faithfulness.   That late summer evening on a grassy lawn, I was labored over by One who had been preparing me for my new birth for months.  There were those last contractions of His wooing call and my last moment wrestling and response, and I began to take my first tottering steps in a new-found adventure where I could know the God who was endlessly working yet had not lost a bit of power or resources along the way.  

Forty-two years now I’ve been experiencing His kindness, patience, direction, and provision.  Forty-two years of discovery of layer upon layer of His spectacular goodness in rest and play and wrestling through to find His presence in stormy days and dark nights.

Several things stand out this morning.  

He wants me to enjoy Him and enjoy the relationship we have.  It took me a long time to really start to get that, but the words “Come play with Me” spoken just a few yards away from the spot I’d begun my journey with Him transformed my life in mere moments.  

I have only this tiny span of life on earth to offer Him my trust.  Once I end this physical part of my existence and enter the rest of eternity, the work of belief will be past and I will never again have the opportunity to trust Him for what I cannot see, for what is not yet unfolded but promised.  I don’t know of any way I want to thank Him more for all He has done to rescue, redeem, and provide for me than to trust Him for whatever next step is before me, as complex as it may be.  No obstacle is too big for Him, it is just a matter of how He is going to work it out this time.

He is disturbingly patient!  He is way less worried about when something will unfold than I am.  (I’m sure I don’t need to describe more to you; you likely experience Him the same way.)

He IS who He says He is and will DO what He says He will do.  And every day now is a new canvas to see what He is painting on this day, what colors He will choose, what images He will make to reveal more and more and more of His faithfulness.  My opportunity is to watch, to be amazed again, to run and get a friend and say, “Look at this!  He is at it again!”  He is the smartest, kindest, and most creative One.  He is brilliant in His plans and wise in how He goes about every single thing.  He is utterly lavish with His grace and love and provision, yet persistent to let us get the best, even if it isn’t at all the way we’d hoped the provision would come.

Last night I had a delightful discovery, a perfect reminder and launch into His fun as I move into a new year.  A young man we’ve been getting to know joined us for dinner and conversation for the evening.  At one point in the sharing of his story he was telling us how he got to Mansfield and asked us if we knew another guy from our town.  The name was of a classmate/friend of one of our sons, who had spent much time with us through his growing up years and who I’ve had the privilege of talking with for hours on end.  It was one of those ironic “full-circle” evenings, brimming with the unexpected surprise in what and how God had accomplished bringing something new to us through an old and dear friend.  I had to shake my head again.  Sometimes I think of God kind of like a wild-haired Doc Brown, full of excitement over what He is working on to amaze us next.  Yeah, I’m pretty sure I don’t want to be about a whole lot less that that.  

Here we go, into another day that is just now dawning, another chance to slow down and notice and listen and watch for whatever He has for August 25, 2016 to unfurl.  Our participation can make a big difference in how beautiful the day becomes.  Whatever hardships or tragedies or heartbreaks may be part of it, I am convinced that He will give us the opportunity to see Him still at work, being true in the face of the wounds and scars of earth to have a way forward that will be more than enough, better than we could have planned, far more abundant in His best stuff than we would have guessed.  It is who He is.  I have tried to record much of what I’ve seen Him do, the things He’s let me glimpse.

“Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who have set their hearts on pilgrimage.  As they pass through the valley of Baca, they make it a place of springs.”

(Thank you to Jon Ford and Kris Davis for your part in the adventure of yesterday.)

Photograph is of my journals and some of my reminders of His faithfulness.

For the Life of Me

As I sat yesterday with communion elements in hand, I was struck again by their simplicity.  Bread and juice.  It doesn’t get more common than that.  Jesus came for everyone.

As I thanked Him again for what He has done for me, being broken and totally poured out in the process for my redemption, I proceeded in the steps typical in the tradition I experience.  Bread first, then juice, as the pattern at that first Last Supper.  

He was wise.  We chew the bread, reminding us of our own brokenness and the need of a Savior.  Then we tip our head back to get the drops of juice.  The last thing before we swallow is that our eyes have been lifted upward.  Brilliant plan.  We need never deal with our sin without being reminded that it isn’t the end of the story.  

Photograph by Anita, from Easter Vigil  

The Making of You

We can be shaved down, sharpened, fine-tuned per se, and then be more useful for lovely (loving) works.  The hard layers removed do not lessen us, they set us free.  The willingness to be transformed by Him always leads to a greater good, a more potent message, a more beautiful outcome, though, like the alpine flowers and distant galaxies, He may be the only one who sees.  It is enough.  It is that precious place of being in direct contact with the hand of God who never abuses the vulnerability of our willingness to become what He envisions.  He is the master Artist and we couldn’t imagine what He will do if given time and space in our lives.

Photograph by Anita

Two Parts: The Vessel and The Filling

Perhaps each morning God views His people like the vessels that Elisha told the widow to gather.  He will fill up anyone who shows up to be filled with what He wants to provide for the real life needs of the day ahead, for the people who need a word of hope and encouragement, for some kind of practical provision, for the situations that can be responded to with outbursts or with wisdom, for our own provision and well-being.

He has much for us.  Be available and attentive.  Get what He wants to give you.  We can go into our day prepared by getting filled before we set out.  Then we will have something of greater worth to give.

Jesus has gathered us.  We start by being quiet and obedient, like the widow, behind the closed doors where no one sees; that’s where He does the filling.  We are the vessels in our communities for our time.  We are filled with oil, the anointing of His Spirit for the dryness that is so rampant.  He will not be stingy in the provision.

Don’t be discouraged if we are coming to Him totally empty.  That just means there is more room to be filled with Him, a better position than if we are so full of ourselves that there is little room for the things with what He would want to equip us.  So many times we miss the treasures of the better things we could be available to give.

Will the vessel of “you” be useful to His dreams today?

“We carry this precious message around in the unadorned clay pots of our ordinary lives.”  A stunning opportunity.

Photograph from morguefile.com by Melodi2

The Colors of Trust

My reading this morning took me to Matthew 4.  Jesus was in His last moments of preparation before His ministry began, but it was a situation that fully counted on its own also.

He was spot on, even in these temptations where He could have easily fed His appetite, taken an uncalled step as a test of God’s care and abilities, and started His own kingdom at a hefty price (at a cost determined by someone who didn’t even own it).  He did none of it.  He knew that each moment stands on its own merit.

Each day is full of little vignettes that let us paint with the colors of faith and trust.  No Plan B option gains us enough that we should be careless with the moment we hold.  He is more than enough for us to trust right in the thick of this one.

I am not sure that His call to the first disciples would have held such power if Jesus had spent the week before distracted by secondary things.  Of course He was hungry and had come to build a kingdom.  But He didn’t get confused about how it would be built and what He was most hungry for.

In all things, keep your vision set, ears open, heart responsive.  He adores you. He will be faithful.  Trust Him and enjoy the adventure of what His faithfulness to YOU will look like--a unique and beautiful story, as you are formed into the beautiful image of God’s Son.  His vision for you is dazzling, no less passionate than when He breathed galaxies into existence or spoke rainforests’ fascinating details into being.  Trust Him for His timing and provision.  He is more than enough to bring the exact right hues at the perfect time.

Photograph from morguefile.com by lauramusikanski

Yes and No

“Let your ‘yes’ be ‘yes’ and your ‘no’ be ‘no’.”  It takes an equal amount of heart and courage and determination for both, and rare is the person who has the wisdom to speak the right one at the right time.  

Get wisdom.  It comes from both hearing and trusting.  If you have ears you are a good candidate. Go for it!

Matthew 5:37

Photograph from morguefile.com by GaborfromHungary

Woman at the Well

I stand at the edge of mystery.  I feel the fibers that wisp into vague.  I take one in hand, following its path to substance.  The mystery increases in the knowing.  There is always more, so much more.

He is not a God to pin down like a science specimen, to capture and analyze.  He is vast.  He is endlessly good.  He is living still and breathing His work forward like a waterfall of power and beauty that then runs into all the unexpected tributaries to feed and refresh every weary soul.  Start the adventure.   Explore Him.  You will never exhaust all the love and knowing that can be found.  A lifelong treasure hunt.  Wisdom, provision, delight to be discovered in what looked for all the world like a desert.  He is a deep well in every place of need.

Photograph from morguefile.com by lauramusikanski

Be Filled

There is so much more than we knew.  How full of Him can we become?  How much of His love can we discover?  How much can we share?  There are empty vessels all around us waiting for a cup of good news.

photograph from morguefile.com by pippalou

The Planting, The Harvest

The soil may look like just dirt, simply something to walk on to get to a better place, but it is the thing, when well tended and available, that can produce food for many, can support mighty roots of an oak tree in the years to come.  

Your heart is precious and powerful.  

Your life is a magnificent field.

Don’t let it be offered for just anything to be planted there.

Photograph from morguefile.com by miteshtake