Christianity
Overwhelmed
Overwhelmed with desperation
All my longing is for Thee
Jesus look upon this heart
And make Your presence real to me
I have no other I can go to
But there’s no other that I need
So when my heart feels so alone
Teach me to only look to Thee
Brothers, sisters You have given
Your blessed body on this earth
But more so than the church of Jesus
I need the Jesus of the church
If I can’t find You in the Word
When prayer and worship seem so dry
And my hearts breaks with longing for You
Will You come and dry my eyes
The ground is watered with my tears
Each one proclaims my love for You
But though I weep my life away
It shall not hinder my pursuit
A raging fire has been ignited
A passion somewhere deep within
I have begun a quest to find You
And reclaim first love again
And so this burning drives me onward
To know You in a deeper way
To have my life transformed into
A place Your glory is displayed
Remember my chains
Tragedy has a way of bringing hidden things to light. I am thinking primarily of inner things, like attitudes and motives. It would surely be an exaggeration to categorize hurricane Gustav as a tragedy for me personally, but it was most certainly a terrible inconvenience. Over the course of the days that followed there was a wide range of emotions that I have dealt with: sorrow over all the damage that had been done to our city; irritation with all the inconvenience associated with daily life; and sadness because I felt that little concern was shown by people I know in other parts of the country for how I might have been affected by the storm. This last one has been most troubling to me.
As I have pondered this issue (for it has affected me deeply), I have taken it to the Lord in prayer. Although it may be a factual issue, I was concerned that my heart was not right in this matter and that offense was beginning to creep in. So I cried my sorrow out to the Lord and asked Him to adjust my perspective and to help me see this situation as He did.
That night as I was finishing up the book of Colossians, I read these words written by the apostle Paul in the final verse – Remember my chains. I felt the Lord drawing my attention to that verse, so I stopped and read it again. Yes, this is what I want. I want someone to remember my chains. I have felt forgotten. Neglected. Somebody should remember me.
Feeling quite self satisfied, as though this Scripture justified the ugliness that was growing in my heart, I breathed a sigh of relief, certain that God was on my side and that my hurt feelings were warranted. But so softly and more gently than I deserved at that moment, He spoke to me through that verse – “Whose chains have you remembered?”
I had no defense. I had no excuse. Utterly ashamed, I could only cry out “No one’s Lord!”
So, before the world (whoever may be reading this) I confess that there was a plank in my own eye while I was angry about the speck in yours. And I pray that the Lord will help me to remember the chains of others and forget my own.
After Gustav – photos
I am so very grateful for the Lord’s mercy. My house was spared. The tree will be removed tomorrow, but all indications are that there was no significant damage.
As happy as this makes me, it is still tinged with sadness. There are many who were not so fortunate. Please continue to pray for my city.
This is a view of the tree taken from inside my back door.
These are taken from my back yard.
A firm faith
“For though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the firmness of your faith in Christ.” Colossians 2:5
What adjectives would you use to describe your faith? Strong? Weak? Bold? Easily shaken? The apostle Paul used the word firm. Strong’s defines firm as “that which furnishes a foundation on which a thing rests firmly.” Webster’s gives the following definitions: securely or solidly fixed in place; not weak or uncertain; having a solid or compact structure that resists stress or pressure; not easily moved or disturbed.
What the apostle Paul rejoiced in was the firmness of the Colossians’ faith. It was a solid faith, not easily moved or disturbed. It was a faith that was foundational to the entirety of life; substantial and able to provide strength and support. If this type of faith is desirable, how can such a faith be obtained? Many times in my own life I have felt faith-deficient. My faith has seemed small as I have battled various fears and dealt with unanswered prayers. My faith has seemed weak when compared to others who appeared to have no difficulty believing God for impossible things. Oh how I have desired to have a firm faith, but it was seemingly beyond my grasp. I had not been able to comprehend the secret to obtaining such a faith.
But the secret to firm faith is revealed in the rest of the verse and it is the same secret that energizes the whole of the Christian experience. It is these two words – in Christ.
As is so often the case, my struggles are due to a misplaced base of operations. I have a tendency to look in myself for the strength, determination, faith, commitment, etc., that are necessary to live victoriously as a Christian. All too often my level of faith corresponds to my perception of my performance at that moment. For instance, have I prayed long enough? Have I read an adequate number of chapters of the Bible? Have I behaved appropriately today? The foolishness of this is not always so readily apparent, but a few moments of careful reflection would reveal the absurdity of such a thing. The apostle Paul said “in my flesh dwells no good thing.” And “in Him we live and move and have our being.” Consequently, looking to my own efforts to produce a firm faith will always be futile, for I am only capable of producing a flawed and weak product.
But when I look to Christ, I find in Him I have a faith that is strong because it is placed in an infinitely strong object. In Him I find a faith that endures because day by day He renews my strength. So often, after my frenzied efforts to work myself up into faith, I find that all I can do is collapse at His feet, spent and weary. It is at those moments that I hear Him say “Come unto me and I will give you rest.”
And He will give strength, and He will give faith. A firm, enduring faith.
In Christ – He is the source of my faith, He is the object of my faith. The beginning and the end. The alpha and omega. The yes and amen.
This is the foundation I want my life to rest upon.
Gustav approaches but the Lord is at hand
This morning I am waiting for Gustav to make landfall. I live about 80 miles from New Orleans and we are expecting hurricane force winds here within the next few hours. Last night there was a tornado sighting alarmingly close to where I am.
I have been battling fear.
This morning the Lord comforted me with this verse: “The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything” Philippians 4:5b-6a
The Lord is at hand. All is well.
Pray for us on the Gulf Coast.
Destiny Shaping Question #7 – Does my “Yes God” have conditions?
From my very earliest days as a Christian I understood the value of obedience to God. Over the years I have come to understand it to an even greater degree.
I have been guilty of playing that oh so familiar Christian game – I can’t hear you God, lalalalala. You know the one? That when you are asking God for guidance on a particular issue and He’s showing you what to do, but then you pretend that you’re not sure if it’s Him or not, so you go ahead and do what you wanted to in the first place. Of course, feeling very spiritual about the whole thing because you did ask God.
And how about the almost laughable number of times we have sung “I surrender all” or “Where He leads me I will follow” only to go about our lives as though we are perfectly entitled to make decisions based solely on our own desires, with no thought of asking God because surely He wants us to be happy, right?
I would never dream of telling God that my Yes had conditions. But my actions tell Him. Loudly. It is not the servant who says yes who is obedient, but the one who lives yes.
Several years ago I was at a retreat and in an intense moment in the worship service the worship leader said, “God wants you to sign on the dotted line.” That phrase impacted me so powerfully that I’ve not forgotten it. No conditions, no limitations. Just obedience. What a radical idea. I’m thinking that’s probably what the Lord has intended from His people all along.
For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s. 1 Corinthians 6:20
CONCLUSION: It is time to find the joy of unconditional obedience
Destiny Shaping Question #6 – Am I flirting with adultery?
At first I felt sure this wouldn’t apply to me. But this was actually the most painful question for me to face. The issue at hand goes beyong the physical act. It includes how I present myself before a world of men who are in covenant with other women.
Our society is beauty conscious. Actually beauty obsessed might be a better word. For women, the message we receive from all varieties of media is that to be happy we must be beautiful. This is not good news to those of us who aren’t beautiful. So we spend hundreds and thousands of dollars on hair care, makeup, clothing and whatever else we can find to improve our appearance.
We learn how to use our appearance to our advantage and how to feel better about ourselves by attracting the attention of men. The right kind of look from a man can boost an insecure woman’s self esteem for days. But it’s all innocent, of course. And if I have dressed in a way to provoke a look, even possibly a lustful look – well, there’s no harm in a man looking, right?
I would have never thought of it as flirting with adultery until I considered this behavior in light of these words of Jesus:
He is my Delight 