praise

I am becoming increasingly convinced that it is impossible to love God with all of your heart, mind soul and strength without spending a significantly greater amount of time in praise than in asking requests of him. If we focus on the character, the majesty, the might, power and infinance of God, how can any trial stand up to him? Perhaps this is where we are to be joyful when we experience trials. How else could we?

My life has been a spiritual and emotional roller-coaster for the last few weeks. I have had incredible answers to prayers as well as rather deep disappointments. But yesterday, I chose to praise God despite those disappointments. Not to focus on his blessing, but to focus on him, to thank him for his great enduring love and mercy. Tonight, through tears, I praised him for giving me so much more than I deserve.

I do not deserve my relationship with him, my roommates, my church, my job, my friends or family. I do not deserve love or appreciation, grace or mercy. Fortunately, grace, being unmerited favor, is by definition not what I deserve, yet according to Ephesians 1, he lavishes it on us. I thanked him for these things and then went on to thank him for the lessons that he has taught me through trial. I thanked him for those disappointments and then went on to ask him to make me content in whatever circumstances I am in, just please give me more of himself.

Everyone loves Jeremiah 29:11 - For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Perhaps they love this verse because it is true. I always had a problem claiming this verse because it was written to the entire nation of Israel, but seeing as how I'm grafted into that tree, I think it's still applicable. God, plant me where you want me, use me as you see fit. Make me a man who is after your heart and not my own. You've broken me, shattered me, and destroyed me. I leave it to you to choose how to put my pieces back together, as you are the only one who should. Make me the man you want to carry out your will and make your will the core of my desires.

Caution: I am weird

I fast because I'm hungry I run because I am thirsty I die every day because I want to live I lead because I follow I give everything away to become rich I am weak and broken so that I will be strong I see more when my eyes are closed I'm in love with someone I haven't seen I love the unlovely I am honored when people mock me I embrace these foolish things to become wise I will walk whole heartedly out on any limb He requires, because even if He lets it break, He can teach me to fly.
-Lygon Stevens

Recently, I was introduced to the journals of a young woman named Lygon Stevens. She was a daughter of God, madly in love with Christ. She died in an avalanche in January of 2008 and her opened journals revealed a woman who loved God deeper than anything else, and whose words challenge me now in how I choose to live.

It is so easy to go with the flow of this world. It is so easy to choose to be comfortable, to try to be accepted, to try to not be weird. Yet that is not what we are called to. We are called to a life that is different, that stands out and that is spent in utter denial of self for the sake of honoring Christ. As Paul says in Philippians 3:8, "What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ"

Do I let myself be weird in the eyes of the world? Do I let myself be so madly in love with Christ that I would obey him in a heart beat? Do I let my life speak dramatically of his goodness? I think it's time to step up my game here. Much of the time I'm focused on what I don't have, the sacrifices that I must make or I try to find life in the desires of my heart rather than the love of Christ. I want to be so madly in love with God that I honestly would consider all things rubbish in comparison to knowing Christ.

Recently, God has been revealing the extent of my sin and it is very ugly. It is selfishness and hypocrisy at its worst. I am tired of being a hypocrite, saying I love Christ and then turning to the world for hope. I am done with it. I am reminded of the lyrics of one of my favorite worship songs:

Lord you have my heart
And I will search for yours
Jesus take my life and lead me on.

Trust in the LORD with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;

in all your ways acknowledge him,
and he will make your paths straight.
-Proverbs 3:5,6

A friend recently shared this verse with me on a previous post (via facebook, not actually on this blog). I have been thinking on this verse for a few days now, and I've come to the conclusion that I constantly make decisions based on my own understanding of the universe, yet I am to obey one who created it. I get stressed out and try to do things based solely on my own perspective, yet I have a book full of letters from him who is in control of the whole thing.

Lord give me the proper perspective on reality.