Written ages ago and echoing in my soul now…God gifts His people not just for others’ benefit but for the “gifted” as well. HUMBLED

I am not a victim of sin but I victimized Him
on the cross they hit him with pins He was pinned
for my sake and the wounds they were great holy God
took my place for the filth that was on my plate!
I am Barrabas it was my cross
it was my execution it was my loss
but instead my Lord took the wood & the sword
the spear in His side and a crown made of thorns
He was born for this forlorn from the kiss
that betrayed His trust but led to my bliss
He was Christ on the tree Miraculously
workin salvation it was instantly
yet gradually he’s still saving me
it’s a sanctifying logic defying mystery
He had missionally condescended for me
despising the shame for joy infinitely

Crowd scoffs robe’s off look at Christ on the cross my guilt’s been tossed
Nails bang flesh hangs see my name in His pain
Christ bore my shame

it was my lust and lies and the crust of my hard heart inside my chest of pride
For which the just has died was crushed - despised; sword thrust inside
Was crucified on my behalf absorbing all the Father’s wrath
So I could take a blood bath to walk the white and righteous path
No loan but there’s forbearance for the debt that was apparent
Started in the garden in the name of my first parent
Adam had no collateral to sign the promissory note
He and Eve they first conceived not kids but death the promised blow
Blood on their hands delinquent tab in need of blood to extinguish wrath
So God the father gave deferment but the penalty He aint relinquish that
Instead He took the principal and made it the reciprocal
He who we owed would take the blows account zeroed He flipped the bill
Grace first displayed when He gave em some animal hide
Then throughout history men lived to see their sacrifices die
Then A.D. brought the mystery kenosis the big twist
The Son declared His bankruptcy for our debt forgiveness.

Crowd scoffs robe’s off look at Christ on the cross my guilt’s been tossed
Nails bang flesh hangs see my name in His pain
Christ bore my shame

2nd person of the trinity in his infinity
became finite cause He was really into me?
Who am I? I’m but dust in the Lord put my trust
If i’ma see him I must put my faith in judge just
Saw Me in the  muck and mire pulled me out the burning fire
made his word my desire now I lift his name higher
Im a servant not for hire a slave in his empire
not a jester in the court but daughter who’s admired
Made me an heir to the throne where I don’t belong
My punishment is gone I sing salvation’s song
Hosanna in the highest to the reigning king
who put His foot upon the neck of death’s remaining sting
He’s the Father who chased me when I ran and came back
Now I await the feast He said that can claim that
The stained back of the Son bought me back from the grunge
ground cracked as He hung and my wrath was expunged!

Crowd scoffs, robe’s off, look at Christ on the cross; my guilt’s been tossed
Nails bang flesh hangs see my name in His pain
Christ bore my shame

The life we live is in fact a war. No matter who you are, there has always been a struggle present in your life, something fighting against you, you fighting something and often times…you losing. Many of us have been victim to the blows of this world. All of us have been subject to the temporal blows that our sin gives. And still, many of us have been victim to the blows of the sins of others. If you know anything about war and fighting, you know that injuries get inflicted. I, like many others, was always one of those people who felt like strength meant taking a blow to the gut and as long as you’re not bleeding - suck it up. Writhing in pain and all, no one needs to know you’ve been hit. Even if you get hit in the face and your lip starts to bleed, you lick the wound, take care of it with home remedies and keep it moving - you don’t want to be pitied or even taken care of.

Problem #1: Take enough blows to the gut and a little something called internal bleeding starts to happen. Why does this matter? Other than the ugly bruises that will eventually start to show through the surface - because someone WILL see them, you are causing more harm to yourself letting the bleeding happen inside untended. In extreme cases (watch enough Grey’s Anatomy, Private Practice & House & you’ll see what I mean) the result is organ damage, seriously detrimental complications and death. When we take the hits that life deals to us even if that internal bleeding begins to occur, or a tear that could lead to it occurs, if we DEAL with it, the lasting effects will not be there. When internal bleeding is caught soon enough it can be handled.

Problem #1.Pt.B: If you have an open wound that goes untreated or poorly treated…it WILL get infected. That infection will lead to illness, loss and it will spread to infect everything around it…

Problem #2: The very “taking care of” that we claim we don’t want, is the very thing that the lack of was the blow to begin with. What am I saying? Abandonment, rejection, abuse - some one didn’t take care of us the way they should have. These things were the figurative blunt trauma all to often. It makes us afraid to let anyone even try to take care of us. It convinces us that no one could possibly take care of us but that only we can. LIE. One botched surgery does not discredit medicine. One faulty computer does not make the whole field of technology unreliable. So what does this mean?

Unfortunately, one persons’ foul ups may not dictate that the whole human race has a condition of an inability to right by each other…but…its true. We are screwed up people. As it has been said time and time again - hurt people, hurt people. As I said earlier, the hurt we experience comes from a number of sources so inevitably..we’re all hurt. The question on the floor is - what do you do with it?

Well…I’m still trying to figure that part out but I know two things…if nothing else.

#1: Jesus is NOT a fallible man. He is faithful to the faithless infidel. He is a healer and He knows how to care and fix what’s broken.

#2: He uses His people to help in the process of healing if we put our trust in HIM not them.

So what now? I’m still working on that part…

ok…so, honestly, sometimes the only reason I brush my teeth is because I don’t want my breath to stink. Sure, you think, “at your age it ought to not even be something you think about but a habit you have just gotten into. best practices kind of thing.” And I hear you, but as with most things, I over think it. I wake up in the morning and when I go grab the Arm & Hammer Complete Care, I’m not grabbing it for the complete care it gives. I don’t think, “Ya know, this is good hygiene. Brush my teeth and I will have a healthy mouth.” Most of the time it doesn’t even cross my mind that tooth brushing is a health issue. I brush my teeth in light of the scent my mouth gives off. I’m not even aiming for clean teeth sometimes, just fresh breath.

Even when I am concerned about the state of my teeth, it isn’t always because I want to maintain health or because I am thinking about my orthodontic future. I want white teeth because they look good in pictures. I want fresh breath because without it you push people away. Bad breath offends people and if its bad enough you will start to offend yourself.

I’m not super deep, but I am super analytical and this tooth principle got me to thinking. There are so many things that I do because if I do it enough just often enough, I won’t run the risk of offending someone. If I just deal with the scent or the outward appearance of things in my life, then I don’t have to worry. Too often,

THIS IS MY CHRISTIANITY!

I do just enough so that people won’t be off put by what I’m not doing. Vice versa, I don’t say or do certain things in front of people because I want to give off a white appearance and a clean exterior. Frequently, my “good behavior” and “wholesome & edifying talk” is all about what I look like and not at all about the actual condition and health of my heart. I’m aware that if I do certain behaviors, I will push people away and eventually I will in fact begin to offend myself. Even worse, the more I do them (or in some instances don’t do them) the more numb I will become. My breath won’t stink to me any more because I’m used to it. But everyone else is still offended. God is still offended by my stench.

Even when we look at the toothbrushing example and the individual who just does it out of habit…this too is my Christianity!! When I’m not motivated by my appearance and image toward others, I’m motivated by habitual repetition. Get up, shower, “pray,” brush teeth, read passage blah blah blah. Unlike brushing one’s teeth, just doing Christian things habitually does not have lasting effects - not good ones at least.

My prayer?

Lord, may I come to you out of a desperate need for health and a need to be sustained not just for an external fix up. May I see your cleansing power as that which is in fact needed daily but not to be taken for granted. May I view my soul as white before you already and work from that not for it. Even in my working from it, cleanse my motives and let it not be about what I look like to others but that I may be found pleasing in your sight. FORGIVE ME for caring more about what I look like to others than the state of my soul and my health and comprehensive shalom before you. Please awake me from my white-washed tomb and give me a heart to live clean to bring glory to you and you only.

Luke 11

“And the Lord said to him, ‘Now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. You fools! Did not he who made the outside make the inside also?’” 

          vs. 39-40

_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Lord, now indeed I find
Thy pow’r, and Thine alone,
Can change the leper’s spots
And melt the heart of stone.

Jesus paid it all,
All to Him I owe;
Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow

So I always think it’s really hard to surprise me because I over think EVERYTHING. i always think about what could be happening behind the scenes, what people’s plans could be a disguise for, how they could be working around me to get something done, being overly suspicious of people’s motive and a whole wheel barrow full of other concerns and worries that truly are not my own. How does this directly relate to my spirituality. Please excuse me while I think “outloud” I over think everything and under submit things to God in prayer. Initially my first thought was to be all deep about how the Lord is coming back quick and in a way and at a time that is unsuspecting to all…reality - yes. Truly relate-able parallel? Probably not. What is more relevant is how I have talked to several people over time about many different things and have been encouraged to believe that a lot of times when God is doing something in our lives it is when we are looking for it the least. Honestly, this convo has been about men more frequently than not. But, in regards to the ways that I believe God works, I think this is a true principle, especially in my life. As it applies generally, it’s not a rule of thumb where if you are not looking for something God will give it to you or the second you start throwing yourself into something He will give you something you’ve been waiting on and decided to no longer be preoccupied with. This is not a Biblical principle. I do believe however that the Lord is in the business of confounding the wise as well as honoring those who diligently labor for His name’s sake (which often results is not being distracted by the other stuff)

As for myself…I have noticed recently how I have been so caught up in other nonsense and over analyzing my life and how I can bring resolutions to stuff and how I can finagle my way into orchestrating things, that I have been oblivious to the things that God has been working in me. So this idea about God doing things most when we are not looking works in two ways. 1 is that often times when we put the distractions down He shows Himself to us. Secondly, the Lord often tries to show Himself all the more to us in our mess of idols and distractions and we are so consumed that we miss Him. We are ungrateful because we are oblivious. It;s not that God is not “speaking” loud enough, it’s that we’ve I’ve become deaf and desensitized with my hands over my ears and sunglasses on my eyes so as to not see Him clearly. He has openly been blessing me and answering prayers that I prayed a long time ago and it has been so easy for me forget that I even asked Him for it because He was taking “so long.” However, I am glad His Holy Spirit dwells in me and in His people around me to point out His faithful work in me.

Patience in waiting on Him. A better understanding of who I am and why I am the way I am. Commitment to relationships. Being slower to speak. Being more aware of my offenses and shortcomings quicker so as to repent and correct them with others. These are all ways the Lord has been answering prayer that my overactive brain almost missed! I was very focused on what I don’t have and what I want in the future and what I feel needs to be fixed that I was oblivious to what the Lord has BEEN faithfully doing over the past year! He’s so good!

What has been in your way of seeing Him clearly for His faithfulness to bring His sanctification to pass in your life? Are you aware of the ways that He is working within you for His good pleasure? Are you grateful for it? Are there idols in your heart that block you from seeing God’s hand at work?

My idols have been control, opinion’s of others, jealousy of others lives and how to make myself have what they have, wanting to be perfect. God is yet and still at work in me in those areas and SO many more. Now that His Holy Spirit is opening my eyes I can see that. No more spiritual Helen Keller.

I’m all for the lord surprising me with fanciful treats that I may or may not have been looking for; what I am opposed to is being so consumed with my thoughts and trying to figure out every little thing that I miss Him at work because my brain is so hard at work. Tomorrow has enough worries on its own. I want to love Jesus today! I want to see Him at work today!

squan·der

[skwon-der] –verb (used with object)

1. to spend or use (money, time, etc.) extravagantly or wastefully   

2. to scatter.

–noun

3. extravagant or wasteful expenditure.

This word came up in a conversation with a good brother of mine recently as we talked about gifts the Lord has given me. He mentioned that based upon my lack of usage concerning this (unnamed) gift, I was squandering something valuable. The idea of stewardship and squandering is usually used most when talking about money. It is easy to see when a person is squandering their funds, they may live lavishly in some respects but you find that they are broke and in need when problems come. They tend to invest in things that do not appreciate or have lasting value. It is not as easy to see when a person is wasting something else that they have been so freely given. I would argue that it’s often because of our perception of the word gift.

There are two ways that we viewthe word gift that have us in a position where we are more likely to squander. The first is that we see gifts that we have been given as given solely to us. We all learn at a young age that we’re supposed to share. We share toys, we share food - as kids - because that’s what we’re supposed to do. As we get older, however, that sneaky little word that we try to deter children from using so freely, seeps back into our vocabulary…MINE. We think that if we’ve earned something or even simply possess something, that it is ours to lord over and either determine how we share it or worse and more obviously wrong, not share it at all. After all, possession is 9/10 of the law right? Well allow me to insert a very self-explanatory and later to be expounded on Biblical principle:

“The earth is the LORD’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein, for he has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers.” Psalm 24:1-2

The other reason I have found that we tend to squander our gifts is because we do not see them as gifts at all. Something like our talents, which especially in the Christian context, even though we call them gifts openly we don’t see them as something that has been given to us. God has given us much…in fact…He has given us everything but it is easy for us to look at our daily lives, the way we are wired and our regular contexts as mundane events and circumstances rather than gifts freely given for us to use not just exist in. Not only do we not see them as gifts, we don’t see them as valuable.

I just had another conversation with another brother who was sharing his heart on the fact that the Lord has wired us with specific passions and make-ups uniquely and intentionally. On top of that, He has given us contexts within which we are called to use them for His glory.

“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” Eph. 2:10

We were created to do good works for the sake of bringing attention and glory to Christ, not to mention for calling people to the Lord Himself. I was challenged on this topic even more specifically concerning my job recently. That is a gift! Mundane and regular as it may be it is a gift and not just one of provision but work is gift which we are called to use as a tool to bring Him glory and that He has given also to produce joy within us. Rather than seeing my job as a gift, I was not even simply looking at it as mundane, but as a burden. This makes it a waste. So I am called to the carpet on a few things here:

1. Which one of God’s gracious gifts am I squandering?
2. What other gifts that God has given do I not see as a gift but as ordinary, useless or a burden? (or anything else shy of a gift to be received with gratitude)
3. How am I using the gifts that I have for the sake of others and the maximum glory to the Lord rather than just for personal pleasure?

There are a few exhortations from Scripture that look at these topics and give us insight. When we truly understand that EVERYTHING belongs to the Lord, it ought to bring things into perspective. Psalm 100 has some very practical applications for what all of this means:

Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth! Serve the LORD with gladness! Come into his presence with singing! Know that the LORD, he is God! It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! Give thanks to him; bless his name! For the LORD is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.
 (Psalm 100 ESV)

This passage tells us very distinctly that we are in fact His; He made us, we did not. How good is that?!?! He is God, He is good and He made us and is faithful. Our directives are simple - serve Him with gladness and give thanks to Him. In all that we have that we “possess” we have two very simple responses of service and gratitude. It is very easy to begrudge the things the Lord has given us because we are unsure of His intentions especially when circumstance seem bad. When people don’t like us, when we are not succeeding in the ways we would like to, when we are unhappy or when things just aren’t exciting for us we are called to remember this:

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.
(Jeremiah 29:11 ESV)

and this:

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! 
    “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?”
     “Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?”
 For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen. I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.
(Romans 11:33-12:1 ESV)

The Lord wisely constructed us and is wisely holding all things together by the power of His word and we are called and implored to safely trust in that. With that in mind the question remains simple: what are you squandering that you’ve been called to steward - are you squandering your very life?

Read Ecclesiastes for more perspective