Waiting On God

One of the ways I try to be God is constant, furious activity inside and out. If my life were a car I would be a 66 GTO and I would burn the tires every time I took off and would redline the rpm (go as fast as possible!)

But God has hijacked my GTO and has driven me to a nice, quite roadside picnic area and parked. We are doing NOTHING but sitting there and He looks completely contended just to be with me. At first this drove me absolutely nuts!

I would say to myself, "I don't have time for this! There is way toooooooooo much to do!" He would look at me knowing my thoughts and place his hand on my shoulder and calm my anxious heart and thoughts. Without words He was saying, "Paul, all those things that you are hurrying about will be OK . . . just sit with me for a few minutes. Our time will satisfy you and renew your strength."

It made no sense to me (and if you are god of your life everything MUST make sense.) How could sitting still and waiting do ANYTHING? Yet I learned he was 100% correct. Here are some advantages of waiting that I have learned.

1. It reminds me that I don't have to be in CONTROL of my life and the lives of everyone else.

2. It invites me to be expectant. I am learning I don't have to plan and manage life. Instead I can wait for what God presents to me each day.

3. It allows me to put my roots of trust deep down into the life of God.

4. It protects my mind from distraction . . . I can keep my eyes continually on Jesus.

As you experiment with WAITING be patient with those around you who may not understand what you are doing. Our friends and family members have been taught a take-charge-make-it-happen attitude. So they may not grasp what you are trying to do. Look to our Father for how you should respond to them. Enjoy the easy yoke of waiting on God. Let me know what you think.

Baby Stepping to BIG

Who said spiritual growth and maturity are instant? Where did we get that idea from? All I know is that at some point I thought that after you start a relationship with Jesus you SHOULD be mature fast. It’s kind of like a young couple who births a new baby, enjoys it one day, goes to bed, then awakes the next morning to an 18 yr. old they send off to college. That type thinking is so whacked! No it is more than whacked . . . it is wrong . . . not biblical . . . inaccurate . . . CRAZY!

Again and again in the Scriptures we see growth and maturity pictured as a process that takes time. Hebrew 5:12-14 provides us with 3 images of this growth process: a baby vs. an adult, milk vs. meat, and a student vs. a teacher. 1 John 2:13 speaks of young men, fathers, and little children. We see the process of hard dirt being taken to field of 30-100 fold increase in Matthew 13. Israel progressed from Egypt to the Wilderness then to the Promised land . . . again a process.

To know Jesus is to be in process from LITTLE to BIG. There is no way to get to BIG other than “baby steps.” Each disciple of Jesus has the potential to move bit by bit into the image of Jesus (becoming BIG). Yet there is a huge barrier to anyone being encouraged to walk out their “baby steps.” The barrier is a lie that has become orthodox in our version of Christianity. The lie goes like this, “You have accepted Jesus so there is no place for sin or weakness.” WRONG! WRONG! WRONG!

Starting a relationship with actually Jesus creates problems. One problem is now you have the living Light of God residing in you exposing all the trash that once was hidden. Seeing all that sin and weakness will give you plenty of practice repenting. Another problem is you don’t know how to live as a disciple so you do what the rest of us do sin and fail . . . sin and fail . . . sin and fail.

The difference now is you can run to your Heavenly Father ever time you sin or fail and get a celebratory hug along with tons of acceptance for returning home. All you have to do with sin and failure is go home, period! You cannot add to this in any way.

After being hugged and accepted several hundred times you get stronger and you want to sin less. Amazingly sin begins to look pretty stupid compared to being in the embrace of God. With each baby step you more into union with Christ, into intimacy with the Trinity until there comes a time that you receive His love so well that it hurts when you are not marinating in it.
BUT this is a process. It is being with Jesus today, and then being with Jesus the next day. It is living in the present completely enveloped in His Presence.

So come and baby step to maturity with me. Put away the shame that screams “You should be bigger than you are!” Be the size you really are and take another step toward maturity. And after that step take another one. See how it gets easier as you go. Keep it up, you are doing real well.

Let me know what you think.