open doors

“Always maintain a habit of prayer: be both alert and thankful as you pray.  Include us in your prayers, please, that God may open for us a door for the entrance of the mystery of Christ (for which I am at present in chains), and that I may make that mystery plain to men, which I know is my duty.” (Colossians 4:2-4, JBP)

More and more, it seems, I’m finding that our main role in life and ministry is just to pray and pay attention.  To look for, and pray for, open doors, and to walk through them, however God leads.  A part of that process is to realize that we can’t open the closed doors, but we can certainly miss the open ones if we are not paying attention.  Personally, I find it amazing to consider how much time and energy I have wasted through the years trying to force open closed doors, while open ones are standing right in front of me.

Help me, Lord Jesus, to not get so consumed trying to force open the closed doors that I miss the open ones.  Help me to be prayerful, alert, and attentive to the movement of your Spirit within and around me.

"We throw open our doors to God and discover at the same moment that he has already thrown open his doors to us.  We find ourselves standing where we always hoped we might stand—out in the wide open spaces of God’s grace and glory, standing tall and shouting our praise." (Romans 5:1-2, MSG)

true confession

do not let us

o Lord

stop too near the surface

in our confession

for if we do

we never really

get to the source

of our problem

we merely chop the weeds

off at the surface

only to see them

grow right back again

instead of pulling them

up by the roots

for apart from you

we don’t really even

know what to confess

we deal only with symptoms

rather than the disease

so show us

o Lord

what we really need to see

and give us the courage

to confess it

so that we might be free

i want to see...i think

I once was blind, but now I see is not a “one and done” proposition; it is a continual process.  In fact, most of our spiritual growth involves being able to see in new ways, and that takes time.  Blind spots remain.  I might be able to see on one level, but still be completely blind in other areas of my life and heart. 

Being able to recognize these areas is a significant part of the equation.  I mean, how can I ever confess my sin, if I haven’t yet recognized it as sin in the first place?  Oftentimes, we have grown so comfortable and familiar with our own patterns of sin and dysfunction that they seem perfectly normal to us.  In fact, there are times when we can be so misguided that we actually begin to call them virtue.  Oh sure, we can easily see the sin and dysfunction in the lives of others, but we have grown blind to it in ourselves.

That’s where silence and solitude and prayer come in.  They allow God the space and time—the access, if you will—to work within us in such a way that our eyes are opened to our part of the problem.  No wonder we tend to avoid them.

That’s also where the words of this ancient prayer are so helpful: “Search me, O God, and know me; test me and know my anxious thoughts.  See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” (Psalm 139:23-24) It is a scary prayer to pray for sure, because if we are, indeed, sincere in praying it, God will be faithful to give us exactly what we have asked for.  He will show us those areas of our lives and hearts that are not congruent with all he desires us to be, and then he will bring those areas into conformity with his heart and his character and his will.

O Lord, help me to see, to really see.  Help me to see the blind spots in my life and heart.  Help me to see the ways and the places where I have grown so comfortable and familiar with my own sinful patterns that they seem normal to me.  Help me to see how and where I have even begun to call that sin virtue.  Forgive me, O Lord, for how easily I can be led astray.  Forgive me for how easy it is for me to see those things in others and yet fail to see them in myself.  Help me to see, O Lord, help me to really see, and then give me the courage to follow you in the way everlasting.  Amen.

new jerusalem

What is this new heaven and new earth you are bringing about within me, Lord Jesus? (Rev. 21:1-5) This New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven, or coming up from the depths of my soul, or coming about in my life or ministry, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.  Preparing me for her and her for me, until the time of consummation has arrived.  For you, O Lord, are always making all things new, even me.  Come, Lord Jesus.

it's not about me

When I finally begin to understand that life is not about me, then maybe, just maybe, I will begin to finally make some progress in the spiritual life.  Only then will I start being the person God made me to be—someone meant to reflect his glory and embody his love, rather than being consumed with myself.  For in the kingdom of God, we find our lives by losing them.

“Don’t get consumed spinning around in your own little story,” Jesus is telling us, “but get swept up into the grand narrative of all that God is doing in time and eternity. As long as life is about you, you’re going to live such a tiny, limited, miserable existence, and I am inviting you to so much more than that.  I am inviting you into a life so much bigger and so much more beautiful and more noble than you could imagine.  Don’t miss it.”

Forgive me, Lord Jesus, when I somehow become convinced that life is more about me, than it is about you.  Help me, this day, to learn what it means "to lose my life, in order that I may find it."  Amen.

be still

“Keep moving,”

My fears keep telling me,

“For you are only as valuable

As the last thing you’ve done.”

But from deep within

I hear your voice saying,

“No, my beloved,

Be still and know that I am God.

Your value and worth

Can never be achieved,

They can only be bestowed.”

stillness

when i am still

i meet the loneliness

that lies within

and i let it scare me away

from the beautiful invitation

that silence has to offer

for on the other side

of the darkness and fear

lies both light and life

the stillness but a doorway

into a what i most deeply desire

a life lived in you

but only if i dare

to not stop short of it