France- a story

 Well, this will be a little different from my norm, but I can’t get this out of my head, and it seems a little long for a Facebook post. A random storyline playing through my head the last couple of days.

She walked with the slow, shuffling gait of the aged, slightly stooped from years of simple living, working with the hands, back bent diligently over work. Slowly, steadily she makes her way home on cobblestone sidewalks, the evening bustle of tourists and tradesmen closing up shop, the world rushing around her, not noticing the daily evening journey she takes. Ducking in a tiny doorway tucked into the long stone building that all runs together, separated only by shop signs and a random, inset colorful door, her wrinkled hand and worn finger punches in the code, opening the door to a dark, enclosed hallway. 

Narrow winding steps lead up and up to more doors, a small apartment with one window overlooking the sites and sounds of the city streets, letting a cool breeze into the stuffy 8x10 room that doubles as a bedroom and living space. A wire basket of herbs and flowers hangs over the wrought iron railing just outside the window. She sets down her bag of fresh foods and bread and lets out a gentle sigh as she turns from the window to begin preparations for a simple evening meal, pinching off a bit of basil from her window garden. She’s alone now. She thinks back to younger years, quieter streets, children laughing, neighbors calling to each other. She doesn’t know her neighbors now, and her children are all grown and gone to other parts of the country with lives of their own. Sigh. But it’s still a good life. There are still a few shopkeepers selling their wares whom she’s known for ages and sometimes they get together and reminisce over a good bottle of wine, recalling bygone days. 

Next door there’s a young girl, working in the business world. Full of energy and youth, riding her bike to work each day, sometimes grabbing a metro in the evenings with friends, she sometimes says “Bonjour” as she passes by and laughs, chatting with a friend on the phone, fumbling for her keys to manage the three locks on the door. Across the hall is the shared toilet.  It’s not fancy, but it’s affordable , and it’s Paris, after all. A boy whistles from the street below, sitting on his motorcycle, urging her to come down and race through the streets of the city until they come to their favorite park and throw themselves on the grass, gazing up a a blue cloudless sky as the day fades.  Some fruit, a baguette and some local, fresh cheese makes a feast as they marvel at the height of the Eiffel Tower and the glory and rush of being alive and being young. 

A GOD with NO LIMITS!!!

 

Suddenly I'm wide awake, my heart pounds hard. I look at the clock.  11:22.  I've only been asleep for about an hour. I covet and crave a good, solid, restful night's sleep.  So, I lay there, heart pounding, nearly exploding with the wonder and power of the dream I just had.  I don't dream often or remember my dreams but I've had a few that I've written down or were strongly prophetic and that's another story.  This dream, I knew, I would not soon forget.  Therefore, I lay there willing myself to enter back into the dream, hungry for more, or to go back  to sleep, confident I would remember it in the morning and record it later, but with pounding heart, sleep was now far from me.  So, I got up, picked up my journal and began writing as quickly as I could, all the details that I will now give to you.

I was in a church I didn't recognize with people whom, in my dream I knew, but none of them I recognize or know now.  Worship was ending and a couple came up for prayer who were heading to a mission field.  Somehow, we had been in communication the week before and the Lord had given me a word for them, so I went up to pray with them and share the word.  On the stage near them was a chux pad, a rectangular absorbent pad like a pet pee pad.  One of the women sitting on a stool, guitar in hand, on the stage asked me, using the pad as an example of something with clear limits: "What is the extent or the limits to which God had called this couple?" I looked at her, and the Spirit of God came upon me, and I first quietly said: "As far as they are willing to go."  She got a quizzical look on her face and then, I turned to the congregation (Sorry for those who feel that women should not speak in church - it was a dream, and I'm just telling it as it was) and said: 

"No, really!!!  There is no boundary with GOD!!!  We put on limits, but HE HAS NO LIMITS!"  I threw up my hands and declared: "There are no limits with GOD! There are NO LIMITS WITH GOD!!!  HE HAS NO LIMITS!!!" And I fell to my knees and the foundations of that place were shaken...

 And I woke, heart pounding. 

As I finished writing the dream, heart still pounding, I was reminded of multiple passages in which people were asked some version of  "What do you have in your hand?"  I think of the boy with five loaves and two fish. John 6:9 "There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?" And it multiplied to feed 5,000, but it may has well or could have been 25,000 or 25 million -His works are LIMITLESS! 

Elisha in 2 Kings 4:2 asks the widow whose children are about to get sold into slavery because she has debts she can't pay, "Tell me; what do you have in the house?"  All she had left was one jar of oil and he told her to go get vessels from all the neighbors, shut the door to her house, and pour her oil into the jars.  As I read this now, that has so much in it that maybe it will be its own post soon, but just think!  There were no limits to how many jars she could get.  I bet - like the wine of Cana - that was the best oil around! I wonder if she limited God by how many jars she picked up.  Would she have gotten many more, had she known that as long as she kept pouring in, God would keep multiplying? 

A similar story took place with Elijah years before when a widow was making her last meal and preparing to die of starvation - can you imagine? And in the midst of the almost nothing she had left, God- through Elijah- asked for that, and because she was willing to give the literal last of what she had, her jar of flour and jar of oil never ran out. Abraham had no sons, no land of his own when God called him to move far from what was familiar, promising him great land, many generations - a nation.  

Not only is God infinite in what He can do, He loves to show up in ways and at times when the only possible outcome is devastation or everyone knowing that He is the LORD.  I Kings 20:13 - a vast army had come against Israel and God said : "Have you seen this great army? I will give them into your hand this day, and you shall know that I am the Lord." 32 kings and their vast armies were defeated that day by one small nation and a limitless GOD.  Solomon blessed God's heart for asking for a big but out of the box thing: Wisdom to lead His people, understanding and discernment.  And God not only did that but gave him wealth such as has never been, long life and a legacy.  

Moses didn't seem to have lofty goals other than saving his life and was now herding sheep in a dessert when God's big dreams broke in on him.  Exodus 4:2 "The Lord said to Moses, "What is in your hand?"  Moses said, "A staff."  That's all he had. A staff and yet, that staff, yielded to the limitless power of God became a snake, turned water to blood, parted the Red Sea, brought water from a rock - blow your mind limitless kind of stuff!! What's holding us back from believing in the impossible?  Believing for breakthrough beyond our wildest imagination? Walking in the big dreams God has for us?  Moses' response to God's mighty acts:" O Lord God, you have only begun to show your servant your greatness and your mighty hand.  For what god is there in heaven or on earth who can do such works and mighty acts as yours?" Deut 3:13 

What about you?  Are you limiting God? Is it because of what others have spoken over you or done to you that you feel limited, defined by labels, past mistakes?  Do you feel that God could do those things through someone else but not through you?  What if you broke through that limited thinking and came to see that what God has done for and through others - He can do for you.  He has no LIMITS.  So, stop putting limits on what He can do!  In Malachi God says: "Test Me in this, if I will not open up the storehouses/windows of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you can't take it all in" when you walk in obedience and surrender of everything to Him, you take your limits and lay them at the feet of a Limitless God.  Peter and John had no money to give to the beggar, nothing in their hands, but they new the LIMITLESSNESS of God.  "Silver and Gold, we don't have, but such as I have, I give to you - in the name of Jesus, rise up and walk!" And a man paralyzed from birth, got up and walked.  These aren't fairytales or acts relegated to a distant past - they are for you - and me.  Can I shout it on the rooftops??? THERE ARE NO LIMITS WITH GOD!!!

In John 8:38 Jesus says: "I tell you what I have seen in the Father's presence..."  No
wonder he walked in the authority and power of Heaven - He knew the limitlessness of GOD - and so can you!

A People of the VOICE

This summer I heard a sermon that stays with me strongly even now, and I find myself needing to come back to it again and again.  We are called to be a people of the VOICE, who live by the sound of it; for, there are no limits to what Holy Spirit can do through a yielded heart – a heart that gives God a "yes" and walks by the sound of His Voice.  We often want to hear about what to do, and He wants to talk about relationship.  

So, what does that look like? How do we hear and know His Voice? But in today’s world, what does that look like?  Some people say that it looks like God giving you a peace about something and that is His way of giving direction.  I think sometimes that can be true, but the devil also can give us a false sense of peace.  I’ve known both sides.  I’ve walked in a “peace” that ended up leading me in a path that quickly became unhealthy and shattered some things that God had called me to walk in.  I’ve known the pain of walking in a false peace, and if this is our only litmus test, we are at high risk of being led down a path toward destruction and away from the things of GOD, as the enemy disguises himself as an angel of light. 

Often God will use His Word and highlight something that we are reading or have read and give us an impression – and often God speaks to us about relationship more than about direction.  Not that He doesn’t give direction, but He is so faithful to orchestrate times, places and move us in a million different ways that we don’t even realize, and He wants most to talk to us about relationship, growing deep in Him and learning how to love others.  He speaks through other people to whom He gives a word that brings life or correction or direction or draws us deeper into the things of GOD. Sometimes I will be in the middle of something altogether different from what I've been praying for/about and suddenly God will speak to me about the prayer on my heart, and it's so clear and beautiful, and sometimes hard, and I just know it's Him.   

I love Brother Lawrence and his writings-  a monk who learned to experience God and hear His voice in the every day - when he was scrubbing floors or potatoes, cooking, serving, washing dishes or in contemplative prayer.  God revealed Himself to him in such a beautiful way and taught him that every waking moment is worship and an opportunity to commune with God. He wants to connect with us as much washing dishes as worshipping in church. 

He speaks, like He did to Elijah, in a still, small Voice, the gentle whisperings of GOD.  Most of the time, GOD speaks to me when I get quiet enough to listen.  My journals are letters to GOD and in the past few years, and more so this past year, I have written to Him and then asked a question and just started writing the response. Everything that comes to mind right after I ask the question, I start writing, then I read it and "test" it by God's Word, and I've always found this true.   This is how I most often hear from GOD.  I find he consistently speaks to me in the quiet place.  Here’s an excerpt of that kind of conversation: “I love you.  Things are going to accelerate but in a peaceful way.  You will have help.  The time is now and this vision must come to pass – be prepared to marvel.  I have quenched the schemes of the enemy and am giving Heaven’s strategies for things to run smoothly.  Even…will hear my voice.  Be ready to follow my voice. Don’t fear.  Hope in the Lord!”  

 Another entry in July last year- Me: “Oh Abba, So many things, a heaviness of heart, feeling overwhelmed, alone…Go before me to have a productive conversation with my husband.”  HIM: “My daughter, I love you. My peace I give to you, not as the world gives.  Let not your heart be troubled – trust me.  I know the path forward.  Be honest and vulnerable and let go of the outcome.  Also, build up your husband today.  Find ways to speak life over him.”

GOD is practical, intentional, and He can speak the hard truths in just the right way.  I want to be like that! 

Isaiah 50:4,5. The Voice of God is our inheritance…it’s about communion with Him.  I need to…we need to cherish/pursue the WORD from the mouth of the Father. Matthew 4:4 

How to grow in this? 

1.       Record His words

2.       Speak His words

3.       Pray His words – wage warfare with/for the prophecies given to you

4.       Be grounded in His Word – rooted in God’s Word, not striving but rooted in sonship

5.       Obey His words – like Abraham rising early to walk in obedience and not delaying

6.       Enjoy His words – Psalm 1:2 and 40:8

 

God isn’t seeking to hide Himself from us but does hide Himself for us – a treasure worth seeking after and searching out. You were BORN FOR THE VOICE- there’s a stewardship of it.  And stewardship of the things of GOD always carries with it delays and mistreatment, misunderstandings and accusations, even related to our own failures or a sense of being unqualified to hear Him or walk in His calling.  I have faced this time and again and wrestled over it and have come to be so thankful that I am not called to live out the WORD OF THE LORD based on my own qualifications but because GOD SAYS I AM QUALIFIED. 

 

SO…I am going to be one of the ones who speaks/prays in to the dreams of GOD until it happens and see with my own eyes that ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE..  Romans 12:12

And in the midst of this I find security not in what He is doing but in WHO HE IS and what HE SAYS TO ME!

Opening a Door

 

You've heard it said: "When God closes one door, he opens another one (or a window)." 

A door gives a sense of mystery, of the unknown, of opportunity, of stepping into something new and sometimes that holds some fear.  What will be on the other side? Hope? Excitement? Sunshine? or rain? Disaster? The Valley of the Shadow?  Take a deep breath, exhale slowly and open the door.

There's so much literature that talks about doors.  This one reminds me of The Secret Garden, a hidden door with lock and key, a garden dead and waiting for cultivation, love and new life, a place of rebirth, renewal, intrigue that also once held great sorrow.

  My son and I just finished reading the classic The Door in the Wall.  I get choked up at the end when the boy, having overcome much hardship and adversity, demonstrates extreme courage and gets honored for it and all his fears of failure, not being good enough because he's crippled, not being accepted as a worthy son get overwhelmingly met with such love, grace, appreciation and acknowledgement, that he begins seeing himself not as "that crippled boy who will never amount to much" but as someone who has a gift to contribute to the world and many talents.  And the faithful monk who has cared for him and taught him the importance of recognizing that there is always the door in the wall.  How many times do we just see the wall looming large and formidable, insurmountable in the face of our incapability, weakness or sense of unworthiness and then live there rather than finding our door in the wall, our opportunity to break through the barriers and walls around us and enter into a whole new dimension, a new understanding, a new path.  Robin had many doors in the walls of his loss and crippling disease - learning to read and write opened doors, learning to whittle, play instruments, walk with crutches, swim and gain upper body strength, shoot a bow and arrow, and learning to seek God and go to him all day, every day, in the coming and going - taking time to adore, pray and encounter God.  Each of these were doors that opened whole new worlds, possibilities and opportunities, pulling him out of being a victim of circumstance, learning to use or overcome his weaknesses as strengths: "when I am weak, then I am strong..." "That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships and persecutions, in difficulties.  For when I am weak, then I am strong."  2 Cor. 12:10  

Without opportunities, difficulties, challenges and weaknesses, we might never discover or even think to look for that door in the wall.  When we encounter complacency, we trap ourselves within 4 walls of stagnancy, and when we go victim, the walls start closing in, our self-pity locking us in fear of what is, the unknown and the future, which keeps us from seeing the door in the wall.  And perhaps the very thing we fear, the pain that lead to the fear, the hardship breaking us, is God's invitation to walk through a door into something new.  He is so much about growing us and building our character deep and wide and loves us so much that He may gift us with a pain unbearable, a major health issue, a financial struggle or loss, a broken friendship, a weight that seems too heavy to carry, so that we might not be encumbered any longer by the limitations that once held us, that we might learn to be fear-overcomers, good stewards of our lives and finances, prayer warriors who don't give up, great men/women of faith who believe in a God capable of the impossible and willing to step into the impossible with Him.  

What if...we could see the waiting, the struggle and trial, the pain, the setbacks as opportunities, as hard but good gifts from a loving God who knows us better then we know ourselves and knows how to produce good in us, shift us, grow us in depth of character so we can bear the weight of the calling on our lives.

What if...He could give us beauty for ashes and the oil of joy for mourning - turning our mourning into dancing and causing ALL THINGS to work together for good.

What if...we really could be anxious for nothing, thankful for all things and devoted to prayer because of RADICAL TRUST that He will always have a door in the wall for us to walk thru.

History Repeats Itself

 I love that history not only repeats itself, teaches us and tells a story we can identify with, it also reveals a truth allegorically about our walk with God.  Israel, especially and her history, is a prophetic history that keeps unfolding the plan of God for the journey of the heart.

I think of Israel's journey to Egypt.  They went in a time of need, and it was a place of provision for them, and they stayed in that place of provision, but it was far from the place of promise that God had given them.  Then, the place of provision became their place of bondage.  That which began good enslaved them because good things make bad gods.  Good things can keep us or sidetrack us from holding fast to the promise of God and then we live in a land - a facade of the promise that begins to enslave us.  And sometimes we can even come to love our bondage or cling to what's familiar even when it's crushing us. Then, God in His mercy reminds us that he has a promise for us, a place of authority, ownership and freedom. 

Sometimes, even then, even when longing for freedom and desiring deliverance from bondage, we resist the process of being set free because sometimes in the midst of that, things become harder, darker, more painful and bondage is released in the breaking and breaking free of our attachments to good things that have become bad gods.  God separates us from the things, the comfort and familiarity that we have come to trust in, put faith in.  God has to remind us that He has better things for us and when we give him our yes- to get called back to freedom, the enemy will rise up and resist our exodus into freedom, and it may get scary and messy, but He has made a way - through blood and sacrifice and passing through the waters so that we can set our feet on new ground in freedom, letting our old desires, bondage and enemy be drowned in the waters that allow us to rise up into newness of life, fixing our eyes on the promise and walking out and imperfect journey into freedom. 

I love baptisms and the beautiful picture of dying to what was, letting it wash away, burying sin and self-absorption and all other lesser things and being raised to newness of life.  It's like a seal on the decision: I have decided to follow Jesus.  I have decided to walk out of Egypt and into the Promise Land, to follow Him out of bondage and into freedom, come what may.  Freedom is worth living for, fighting for and walking out.

HOPE

 There's hope for me yet, I'm sure, though consistency hasn't been my strong suit, I keep trying and one day, perhaps that will be a word that defines an aspect of who I am.  My hope is to post a weekly blog this year looking back at lessons God has taught me and pressing into the depths of what He's teaching me now. I invite you to come along for the ride - it might be rocky, some uneven ground, but I hear the Spirit calling me deeper, into a place of quietness, intimacy, a conversation with the TRIUNE GOD! 

 And so, I come.  Will you come with me? To gaze upon Him, get caught up and captivated in His presence, wrecked by His love.  This morning during worship at church, the beauty, glory and worth of Jesus caused me to weep in wonder, awe, love and humility.  I, so small and insignificant, have captured the heart of the Almighty - because He made me to captivate Him, commune with Him, live in and bask under the radiant beauty and merciful goodness of His love and nature in the midst of a life often fraught with uncertainty, pain, brokenness, confusion and fear - there He meets me and calls me higher. 

Do you have a routine? A quiet place and time to get away with God, to hear His voice and pour out your heart before Him?  If not, I'd recommend that as a starting point.  For me, it has to be early morning to happen at all.  I have to be intentional.  Grab a journal and write down your experience with God, your troubles and what God says to you.  My journals, since I was young, have been a series of letters to God sprinkled in with words He's said to me.  I've come to spend time each time I journal now, asking Him what He has to say and writing down His response.  Try it.  He might surprise you!

I don't know what it looks like for you - all of these look good to me! But the key is that He wants You and really KNOWING HIM and BEING KNOWN requires time and intention.  

One of my favorite authors of all time is Jeanne (Madame) Guyon.  She found an intimacy in relationship with God in prayer and through suffering that I find inspiring.  I was recently given another book recently: The Devil In the Castle that talks of faith (somewhat like Pilgrims Progress) as a progressive journey in which we can stay in the courtyard of faith, distracted by devil, things of this world or even ourselves and kept from entering the depths or we can progress steadily in our journey toward the ONE in the center of the castle who beckons us. "All Christians... have a special obligation to pursue intimacy with Christ through making personal prayer a part of daily life.  Personal or mental prayer is more than the mindless repetition of vocal prayers...Personal prayer is, above all, the welcoming of the Word of the Father into our hearts and allowing Him to dwell in us in the fullness of His sovereign dignity. This receptivity to ultimate meaning takes attentiveness, time, and silence.  The WORD MADE FLESH will act in our imagination, memory, intellect and affectivity in accord with the freedom that we grant Him, in accord with our obedience to His will.  Because His salvific power always heals and intensifies our humanity, even vocal prayer, to be a Christian, must be an exercise of an intelligence of heart bowed in obedient adoration."  "For every Christian, prayer is meant to be a journey into intimacy with the Lord, a drawing closer to His healing radiance...The same face-to-face awaiting us in glory is ours in the shadow of faith when we dare to draw close to the Lord, who has made Himself so close to us." And finally, "The demons know that, because of Baptism, the soul has a special pass to the TREASURE in the very heart of the castle, which is GOD HIMSELF." More on that later... Let's run after this TREASURE,  this PEARL OF GREAT PRICE.

Blessings upon you as you dive in and discover Him there - He's in the waiting. Let me know what you think, what you find.