present

The only reality is today...now and here. And to be anywhere else is not trusting You.

With my mind preoccupied with yesterday and tomorrow, I am entirely neglecting the present...neglecting Your Presence. When I turn in circles with scenarios about my future, my spinning makes me so dizzy that I am unaware of the loving present...I am missing the only reality: You. Now. Here. Today.

Fears of the unknown future are birthed in and nurtured solely by my mind. A friend shared this with me recently, "It is impossible to have a fear of the unknown. You cannot fear what is not known."

In the absence of my self-analysis, dissecting every thought and circumstance that comes, of my self-observation, what I "should" be doing, guilt and shame mysteriously yet miraculously disappear. Because being fully present, in Your Presence, relinquishes my false sense of control and gives it to You. Even more, I can hear You when I am all in today. So while it may appear "irresponsible" not to have my plans all mapped out, the only Planner I need to know and hear from is You. And unless I live in today alone...unless I remain in the now and here...I will never stay in nowhere with You. I will not hear and know Your Voice. And ultimately, I will not, cannot, just sit with, rest in, and know You. I want to be responsibly irresponsible...or maybe irresponsibly responsible...to Your passion, gifts and call in my life.

In Matthew 6, Jesus commands us not to worry about our life. Basically, He was telling us to chill out and live in the present...in today, with Him, in His Presence. This act of trust is not only entirely contrary to the planned culture we live in, (especially that of the Western world), where its focus is always tomorrow, the "next", but it is like that of a child.

And to be fully present demands child-like faith.

boldness

Interestingly enough, I found myself in Exodus 33…maybe it wasn’t an accident, maybe it wasn’t. But Moses boldness resonated in a new way as I read this time.

God is speaking to Moses as a friend, and this is how the conversation ensues…

Moses wants to know whom God was going to send with him…he knows that God is sending him, but he wants details…and then Moses also reminds God of what He has spoken to him in the past, “Yet You said, ‘I know you by name and you have also found favor in My sight.’” So Moses boldly asks, in light of what God has said, that God would then show him His ways…that He would make known to Moses what He was doing…so that he would know God more deeply, understanding who He is more clearly…and then, in spite of already proclaiming this truth, Moses again asks for favor in God’s sight (which God has already told him multiple times that he has). Moses asks, whether it was because he doubted or was just neurotic I am not sure…but I could imagine the wrestling with lies and fears and doubts was very intense.

God’s response (v.14): “My Presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest.”

It was not a revelation of all God’s plans…it was better. It was His very Presence and the rest of His Presence.

Moses in essence admits his fear, of God sending him without He Himself going. Moses wanted to be where God was…and God’s promise to him was that He would go with him. So now Moses knows that God is sending Himself, yet he wants more. He wants evidence of this, essentially saying in v.16, “Ok God, You say You are coming with me, but how will I know?”

God’s favor Moses, to us, is His very Self…but Moses still wants more. And in His graciousness, God again reminds Moses of his favor in His sight, that God knows him personally and by name, and basically will allow Moses to tangibly know that He is with him.

This part got me. Again, Moses boldly states, “Show me Your glory.”

God’s reply, “I will make all My goodness pass before you and proclaim My name.” God revealed His glory upon Moses courageously but simply asking!

Why can’t I ask this? God wants our childlike faith and the bold simplicity of that…to come before Him and ask...seek…persistently knock…to show me Your glory!

I think Moses believed God’s promises to him to be true yet they were still intertwined with shreds of doubt and fear…yet ultimately he wanted more of God…so he asked to know God more, to know what God was doing, and to see His glory manifested. I also think Moses knew that to see God’s glory was to deeply know His promises. So God, in His grace, did this. He allowed Moses to see the extent of His glory that was humanly possible. And even in this, God’s glory is so great it could have killed Moses…but God’s grace was more, and protected him while still granting his “asking, seeking, knocking.”

So I too ask…show me Your glory Father! Show me Your glory in Your working out Your plan and promises…and in doing so, show others Your glory, whether they know it or not. Show me Your glory God…not because I am testing You or for my purposes but because I believe You and I know what You have spoken and that You will glorify Yourself.

Show me Your glory.

all in

Isaiah 31:1, "Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, who rely on horses and trust in chariots because they are many and in horsemen because they are very strong, but they look not to the Holy One of Israel, nor seek and consult the Lord."

You said "woe" meaning don't do it...to go back to Egypt, where my flesh wants to turn, where the world often runs to, yet the very place where You have plucked me out of...Egypt not only represents slavery but also the safe way...certainty and comfort, at least to my mind...yet are they really? Maybe they are illusions instead, a false sense of control. To run to Egypt says, "I don't trust You God."

And the tangible masses, "horses...chariots," they seem certain in their numbers...and I can see them, "very strong."

All in to You means free from slavery to any earthly security and worldly comfort...and it also means using the resources You have given me to provide, both skill and the Gospel, to a people who need them both.

I would rather look to You my God, in the unseen, and hope in that, rather than in man and what appears the comfortable and safe route...because You are not safe but You are good. And there is no comfortable alternative...risking it all is the only option.

just today

It is the first day of being unemployed...but today is also my first day of the next step of my journey after more of Jesus and the vision He has planted deep within me...and one that continues to come alive, day by day. My heart and prayer is that in my foolish steps of faith, after the Voice that I hear calling me, that He would glorify Himself in a way that blows all of my - and others - categories. I have deliberately put my life in His hands in such a way that He has to show up...He has me in a place that demands all of my trust and I am desperate to see Him move, because this is beyond my ability...but not beyond His ability to make much of Himself.

"The way of trust is a movement into obscurity, undefined, ambiguity, not into some predetermined, clearly delineated plan for the future. The next step discloses itself only out of a discernment of God acting in the desert of the present moment"...just today..."the reality of naked trust is the life of a pilgrim who leaves what is nailed down, obvious, secure, and walks into the unknown without any rational explanation to justify the decision or guarantee the future...because God has signaled the movement and offered it His Presence"...none other than Brennan Manning.

And so I walk...one step at a time, waiting to hear His Voice and follow His lead...and in the meantime, to enjoy Him, the moments He gives me, all the while trusting and believing Him...trusting Him to bring to fruition what He has already started...trusting Him to glorify Himself in each step...

One day at at time...

certainty in uncertainty

Being okay in uncertainty is evidence of the Spirit...

The nature of my life resting in Jesus is that I am certain even in the uncertainty. To be certain of You is to be uncertain in all my ways...especially not knowing what tomorrow may bring. Father, let that be my breathless expectation, and abandon myself to the fact that I have no control.

But You have me.

I am free to live life full of spontaneous, joyful uncertainty yet expectancy. Leave everything to You and it will be gloriously and graciously uncertain how You will come in.

But completely certain that You will in fact come. Remain faithful.

waiting

Waiting before the Lord could be the most painful yet glorious thing He asks us to do...

Especially in a world that taught us to be impatient...

When waiting means keeping silent when everything within you wants to speak...or containing passion deep within for a later time...God's time...because He is not inactive.

When He asks us to wait, it is because He is doing something in the unseen world. And like His Word says in Isaiah 40:31, "But those who wait for the Lord, who expect, look for, and hope in Him, shall change and renew their strength and power"...waiting upon Him will grow our strength...re-energize us, as we press on, all while He is orchestrating something great!

Somehow, God keeps bringing it back around to this...Habakkuk 2:3, "For the vision is yet for an appointed time and it hastens to the end fulfillment; it will not deceive or disappoint. Though it tarry, wait earnestly for it, because it will surely come; it will not be behindhand on its appointed day."

Enough said.

Finally, James 5:7, "So be patient as you wait...see how the farmer waits expectantly for the precious harvest from the land. See how he keeps up his patient vigil over it until it receives the early and late rains"...a farmer waits expecting fruition, not knowing when it will come exactly, but still expecting...and knowing that fruition is hinged solely on the Lord's grace to bring rains and grow the crop...again, when that rain comes is unknown...and at the end of the day, it all depends upon God...the farmer acts, in both faith and expectancy, being obedient in what has been entrusted to him, but the harvest is God's..."so be patient" (v8)...

And expect rains of grace in the waiting...

it is not for me to decide

“It is not for you to decide what happens here.” These were words spoken by an Iraqi citizen in the film Green Zone.

Do “we” America have the right to decide what happens?

How deeply this penetrated my heart, because like in this movie, as America I am not sure it is our job or our “right” to decide how to direct people’s lives…and so it is in my relationships…their choices, their decisions, their salvation…it is not for me to decide for them, as much as I want to, especially where sin is involved…

Why do I often feel the need to tell or say anything at all…maybe it is just simply “being” the work God has sent me to do…

In John 6:29 Jesus says, “This is the work, service, that God asks of you: that you believe in the One Whom He has sent, that you cleave to, trust, rely on, and have faith in His Messenger.”

Love, grace, mercy…

Even as much as it pains my heart and grieves my spirit, it is still not for me to decide. That decision is up to and by the Lord…and Him alone.

And in this place of waiting, I have learned to restfully wait before Him…experiencing more of His grace through not being able to “decide” for them…I see Jesus’ grace , mercy, patience extended to me…I recognize the way those around me resonated His heart rather than judge and decide for me when my spirit was not ready.

So in the waiting, I have been able to freely let others “be,” and in doing so, being overwhelmed by yet more abundant grace in my life…because eventually, in God’s time, I too made the decision for myself, because it was for me to decide…and so I will pray for my friends, those that I care so deeply for it hurts, that they too would decide.

In Berlin, everything is keep an open mind…and so I must keep an open mind about how God’s Spirit works…wants to work, probably creatively…maybe it is in speaking truth, maybe it is in extending grace, maybe it is interceding silently…

God knows what He is doing.