Trust

Inadequate gratitude.  Yup.  Gotta be.

I find myself not trusting the goodness I see in my circumstances at the moment.  It is easy to manufacture a story that contradicts what I see.

My mind is too available to lies.  I am not busy enough recognizing grace and mercy, and expressing gratitude.  Ingrate!

I am not an ingrate.  I just do not have gratitude habits.  No.  I do not have adequate gratitude habits.

Enough analysis.

Daddy, thank you for loving me with the Blood of Jesus.  Thank you, Father for redeeming me from the mire.  Thank you finding me when I was not even looking for you.  Thank you for holding me while I struggle to prove you are faithless.  Thank  you for refusing to let me go back to my idols.

Thank you for flooding my life with things to be grateful for, so I can develop better and better habits of gratitude.

Thanks, Daddy.

What is it about the Blood of Jesus?

One of the strangest things I encountered.

I grew up in an old denominational setting, where there was liturgy that included the reading of scripture, and where there was a training for the youth that I went through, to be confirmed in membership.  There was no interest in scripture otherwise.  No one read the bible every day.  No one got any significance from it that they were not given by a speaker.

A lot      a real lot    of things were very       very      different when I came back to church during the 90s, in a nondenominational, charismatic setting.  Certainly at first the biggest difference was the relationship with scripture.  It is important, true, dictated to men by God, not a metaphor, descriptive of the past, predictive of the future.  It also contains a whole bunch of ideas that I had never, ever even heard of.  Even whole sections of the story were there that must have been considered irrelevant.  The best example I can think of is the Babylonian exile.  I totally missed that part as a Methodist.

The strangest thing, though, was the Blood of Jesus.

The first time that it really came up was strange, too, which made the whole thing more interesting.  There I was on a set of choir risers, getting ready for a Friday night singles meeting, and learning a new song.  Just One Drop.  Over the months, I had never heard any teaching on the supernatural power of the shed blood of Jesus to redeem mankind, and I was being taught lyrics to sing that night about the central idea of the power of blood sacrifice and the replacement of OT animal sacrifice with the Last Lamb, the last sacrifice ever needed to put man right with God.  No time to study.

But there was time later.  Nothing but the blood.  The blood will never lose its power.  Oh, the Blood of Jesus.  It washes white as snow.

Thanks for the Blood of the Lamb, Father.  I plead the Blood of Jesus over myself.  I plead the Blood of Jesus over my family.  I plead the Blood of Jesus over my community.  Thanks for the Blood, Father.

Gifts and Talents

There are things you are good at, things you are really good at, and then there are things that very clearly you are better at than you can be. When you are doing those things, you come alive with more than the enjoyment of doing something well. You come alive with the power of God coursing through you and doing well for his glory.

And all of this can happen without you having any regard for God.

The gifts and calling of God are irrevocable, and also are not dependent upon having received the good news of the Messiah.

There is a fair chance that the talent you have been given by your heavenly father will not be used for his glory if you have no regard for him. But the talent is still from him, inspires awe and reflects glory upon him.

Father, nothing you do is wasted. Perhaps what we do with what you do comes to ruin. But you will receive all of the glory. That has no variance. Now, what happens when we find the talent you have given, and we turn it all for the purpose you intended? Does it reflect your glory more? I hope so, but I am not sure. Or can we ever know the fullness of what you intended?

Maybe it is time to rest in the knowledge that, with the good heart you have put in me, that I will purpose and fail, and purpose and succeed, and purpose again, to do my best to love you with what I have and am. You have given me a good heart, and I will love you with it. It is you to have mercy on me. It is you to pass over my foolishness when you see me covered with the blood of Jesus.

O God, thank you for the Blood.

Holy

Resting under the Blood, Holy Blood of Jesus. There is so much religion. And then there is the Blood. The simple fact of finding cleansing and perfection under the shed Blood of a Holy God.

It calls for faith. But that is all. I plead the blood. I proclaim that the entire body of Christ Jesus is under the Blood. There is only one thing for it. Rest. In the rest, in stopping every struggle and moment of striving, the supernatural power resident on earth by the unexplainable Blood of God who made Himself man, is transformation from death to life. Transformation from darkness to light. Transformation from the religious struggle for redemption and perfection by human ritual to the simplicity of trusting God when He said, "It is finished."

Father, thank you for freedom from religion. Thank you for your gift of spiritual life instead.

Kio Stark

Don't have clue how I found and started reading Kio. Two blogs and a website. But I know why. She talks to strangers. and better, she listens to them. Then later she writes about it.

Kio talks to strangers, and strange people. She talks to scared people and she talks to scary people. My best take is that she values what they bring. They are never fodder for a writer.

Evidently she teaches college kids to do the same. And so this thing is perpetuated. Something happens when there is a connection. Without the daring to connect, there is no hope of the power of connecting.

The daring is love. The listening without interrupting is love. The permission to get past "news, sports, weather" is love.

Yup. I wrote about this last night. And now I understand my love for Kio. She is a lover. And the King of Love keeps her supplied with the desire and ability to pull back the curtain and help us see people.

Having read her and browsed her "life-on-display" I am pretty sure she does not go through the curtain that was rent from the top down, and sit on Daddy's lap. I am pretty sure she does not do this daring under the Blood. Yet she is clearly supplied. The life produced is clearly extra-ordinary.

Daddy, please help me to find more lovers and to understand more of how you touch the world through them. Please continue to bless Kio.

Time to Write

Time to right. Time to make man righteous. Time to stand him back up, to stand walk live the way man was made to. That was the point of the sacrificial death and supernatural resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. Father said, "It is time."

So the Messianic prophecies are fulfilled in the life of Jesus. In the process, everything needed to reconcile man and Maker is accomplished. So reconciliation is complete...where there is faith. Father does not make anyone turn up the lane off of the main road and come get a hug. But the lane is there and so is the hug.

Thank you for the Blood, Father.

Doctrine is Hard To See

The Heart is beating, beating, beating. Right here. I approached and I got swept up in those arms. I got pulled in close. It is a closeness that is never found in human society. There are close approximations. But there is only one Holy Embrace. And it is the very best distraction.

I was trying to think about doctrine, but I got too close. I fell into the gravity well of Love. I was not trying to stay away from my Beloved. I just was not trying to get near. But there I go thinking about doctrine and the divine, and before you know it my head is lifted and there is no resistance. My face is plastered against Him, and he is soaked with my tears. This is the one place that was made for me, so I can rest. This is the safe stable place where nothing is missing. It takes so little effort to enter the presence of the Most High, now that the veil is rent. Now that the blood is spilled.

The really, really cool thing is that He can hold me, and He can hold you. He can hold us both right in the center of His attention, and neither of us is short anything. And neither of us notices the other. Father, you draw me and you catch me. You let me listen to you breathing. Thank you.

Room

You have to lean. That is the only price.

You have to admit that you can not do what has to be done, and lean on the One, the only One who can and did.

The words are, "The Blood of Jesus was, is and ever shall be enough and all."

I am smart, but not smart enough. I am strong, but not strong enough. I am not a bad looking human, but I can never be handsome enough. I am rich, but I can never have enough money to defeat the Wild. The only way I am coming out of this place is leaning on the arm of my Beloved.

Leaning everything.

God forgive my pride. God forgive the pride of your Church. Have mercy on her today.