A few years ago, I got a vision of what I wanted my relationship with Jesus to be. In my vision I was a little girl, sitting on the floor, legs straight out in front of me, stuff all around, just looking up at the backside of a tapestry being woven by the Father. I felt the wonder that bubbles up when we look up to the mountains, the humility and meekness that comes from sitting in our rightful heart-stance before the God of the universe, the peace that comes from knowing that I wasn’t in control, and that incredible burst of creativity and curiosity that grows out of wanting to do what we see someone we look up to doing. And in that moment, I wanted to stay there. I found myself praying that God would teach me how to be that child again, filled with wonder and a light, meek heart.
Every part of adulting is complicated. I feel like now that I’m turning 30 and seem to be exiting what has been the most DRAMATIC season of my life, I can say that. It’s not that I make it complicated, it somehow just is, no matter what season you’re in. We have the most obvious complications: bills to pay, jobs to do, interpersonal relationships, families, etc. Then we have the filler responsibilities, the things that need to be done for ourselves and our families: dishes, laundry, cleaning. Being an adult, it seems that every season is a busy season, even if the things we’re busy with are not constant. In fact, it gets to the point where faith and spending time with the Lord feels like a filler activity. Sure, we say we’re ‘carving’ out time to spend with him, putting him first, but is that actually true? I find a lot of times that’s just something I say, that I’m setting aside that time for him before I go to bed, or the ten minutes before I leave for work. It starts out that way, intentionally at least. But it so easily becomes an extra thing, that thing that I have to do so I don’t feel guilty for falling behind, leaving someone out.
I haven’t written anything in a long time. The last time I did, I had come back from my big Peruvian prayer trip, I was settling into a new life that was completely given to me by God (miracles, and perfect timing, I can’t even argue it). It was a time of chaos and learning how to be reliant on him – and it was awesome. But once we’re in the promise, once it’s accomplished, how often do we forget that everything we have is a gift? For me, both of my dream jobs from when I was a little kid, the house that had everything on the list I made of things I would ideally like, the car that I needed to get to those dream jobs…He gave me everything. And this is NOT to say that He gives us everything we ask for, or that these ‘things’ are necessary for the Kingdom. None of us end up with the same gifts, and I don’t think He gave them to me simply because I asked the genie in the bottle for it. Ironically, I didn’t ask for or expect any of those things. I learned being abroad, a job is just a job we do to contribute to our community. A house is just a place we get to sleep and care for our families. A car is just a vessel to get us from A to B. There are people all over the world who are over-the-moon just to have ONE of those things – and yet, it’s so easy to forget that all the blessings I’ve been given aren’t mine. A weird thing happens when we live like that! We don’t just stop being grateful, we actually start to despise the things we were once grateful for. We start to detest the gifts we’ve been given because we want more. It’s so funny (in a sad, ironic way), because I think of the Israelites in the desert after they’d seen all the miracles, been brought out of slavery, and after complaining were given manna. They had just been brought out of 400 years of slavery by signs and wonders, and they’re complaining because they think the God who did all that won’t feed them. For the cool story, read Exodus 16 (or the whole book, because it’s pretty great). The problem is, once we begin to live like something is ours, we start to live out of greed and entitlement. We think that if we have this, then we should be able to have that. Let’s be honest, we’re ladder climbers, and we always want more.
The picture in the Exodus story that I find most interesting is the image of God that is established. We think of Old Testament God as angry, wrathful, vengeful – but the only image I see of God in the old testament is radical PATIENCE. Take this story: God unleashes supernatural signs and wonders to redeem his people. They complain, so he feeds them. They complain, so he gives them water. He gives them laws, they worship a chunk of metal. He leads them to the land they’ve been promised for centuries and tells them to go in and He will fight for them – but they say no, because they’re scared. So he says fine, wander in the wilderness. They say ‘ok no, we’ll do it’. He tells them not to because He’s not going to fight for them anymore. They go anyways. They die. Then he makes them wander in the wilderness for 40 years until that generation dies out.
That doesn’t look like a vengeful God to me. Imagine you have a kid that rebels against you like that every time you do ANYTHING. It would be frustrating! But we live like this, alllllll the time. He gives us what we pray for or what He’s promised us, and we receive it with thankfulness, but we so quickly adopt it as our own and forget whose hand it came from and we tire of it like a kid at Christmas. They are so excited when they get what they asked for for Christmas, because it’s a gift – but when they’ve had it for a while, in their head it becomes theirs and they lose interest, wanting more.
Why on earth do we do this?!
I’ll let you ponder that. Back to my point: a year into my ‘new life’ of being settled, I found that it’s easy to stop dreaming. It’s easy to lose that wonder, the drive that makes us excited to do things, even the things we know we enjoy.
So how do we get it back?
I had a conversation with God about this the last few weeks of isolation (or solitude, as I’m calling it). I’m a big dreamer, literally and metaphorically, but even in my literal dreams I’ve been finding I don’t have much going on, and it bothers me. It’s kind of like that movie script fear that people have about accomplishing something they’ve dreamed about for ages: when you get there, what next? We get restless, we want to quit our jobs, travel to new places, go back to school, move, get new things, etc. trying to chase our next dream, because this one didn’t satisfy us like we always dreamed it would.
Here’s what He told me (or asked me, in typical Jesus-fashion):
What if, instead of trying to do all the things, impress all the people, participate in all the ministries…what if you just sat and watched me work?
I thought it was a weird question. Here I was, two weeks into being alone, starting to get restless, feeling guilty about not doing all the things, and he was asking me to just sit. So I did. It was morning, I sat by my window, and realized just by sitting on the floor I found that peace. And then I realized that when I sit on the floor, I almost ALWAYS find that peace. I remembered that vision I had of sitting on the floor in front of Him. At a time in the world when everyone is freaking about not being able to do anything, He gave me this gift of just being able to sit with him. That time, it’s the best part of my day – but when I think back, those times are actually the best highlights of my life! I spent three months in Peru. But most of it, even the coolest places, I barely even remember going there. Then there are the two minutes I spent sitting with a man on the street my first day, or the half hour I spent praying with my missionary sisters, the afternoon I spent in prayer on a beach…Those moments I remember like it was yesterday; They stay with me, they impact my life on a daily basis. Living our lives is so much more than being in constant revival, witnessing the supernatural signs and wonders. The Israelites saw the mother-load of signs and wonders and they still forgot! You can see the craziest things and not live in the peace that surpasses all understanding. You can know everything about God, and still live in darkness- the devil proves that. We live in peace when we choose to dwell in the moments he gives us; when we choose to worship wherever we are. That doesn’t mean always singing, or filling your home with constant music, or constantly evangelizing, or being involved in every ministry, at every service. I find the most often I worship best in silence, when everything around me is still and my heart just rests. When we work, we do our best with what we’re given. If I’m in conflict, the Word tells me how I can respond, how I can make the most of that moment. If I’m filled with sorrow, the Word tells me how I can press into that moment to live in it. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that we can’t be angry, or filled with sorrow. This time of solitude has been characterized by many as a challenge to remain connected, but I think the bigger challenge is being alone with ourselves and living in our moments. Our ability to be alone with ourselves is directly proportional to how much we like ourselves, not how introverted/extroverted we are. It works the same way as it does being with anyone else, we spend as little time as possible with people we don’t like very much. I’m not suggesting we should all be narcissists, ‘we shouldn’t think more highly of ourselves than we ought’. But we use that verse against ourselves by being convinced that we are selfish and narcissistic in nature. In some of us, that’s true. But for a vast majority of us, the issue behind our inability to be alone is our belief that we aren’t worthy, we aren’t deserving, we are imperfect. We rightfully claim that we are sons and daughters of God, but we still don't see ourselves as He does.
So let me challenge you here with this: Sit down, look up, be still, and listen. You are worthy; not because of what you’ve done, but because He already fixed it for you. He knows your faults, he knows you’re still going to forget and mess up, and He’s not afraid of that. Everything you are, is everything He’s given you. There are always more dreams, and if you need one, think about the things you dreamed of when you were a small child. Back then, our dreams were pure, uninfluenced by the complicatedness of adult life and our perceptions of what is possible. Something that has totally changed the way I think about God is the fact that He hasn’t forgotten the dreams I dreamed back then. Back then, I dreamed them and He said ‘Yes, and Amen’ before I even knew what that meant. It doesn’t mean they will happen now, or soon. It just means He knows them, He remembers them, and He values them. That’s why I can call Him Papa now. He brings to life the dreamer in us, if we’ll only stop and let him show us who we are to Him, so He can unleash the sign and wonder that is us on the earth.
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