You Won't Relent... (Part 1)

It's been awhile!  I though I would chronicle my post-Moldova journey more than I have, but I couldn't seem to grasp quite how to approach this stage of the adventure.  It was messy at times and full of it's own share of ups and downs, just like in Moldova.  The difference may only be in my motivation to write out the places God's led me through and things He's teaching me.  So here's to a renewed focus on Him and a deliberate effort to mark His hand.

This weekend has been rough.  The best analogy I can find is that I've been a spinning top caught up by the events of life, needs of friends and new activities.  But a top doesn't spin forever, midweek I began that wobbling phase and rolled off the table of composure this weekend.

Several weeks ago, I discovered Psalm 31:5, "For you are my rock and my fortress; and for your name's sake you lead and guide me." As I meditated on that verse, my heart began to repeat back the significance that it held for me: "God, you are the ground beneath me and a wall about me...the ground beneath me and a wall about me." That was such a source of strength and comfort through the next week.

Well, somehow I began to get more and more caught up in what I was going on around me.  One friend moving, another friend moving, meet up with this person, touch base with this friend, remember to write a letter to my cousin a officer candidacy school, church membership class, a new director at work.  I firmly believe that God has called me to be a faithful friend and to pour out His love at every opportunity He gives.  But I began to get swept up in the circumstances.

In a recent reading from My Utmost for His Highest, Oswald Chambers lays it out like this:

If you live up to the highest and best that you know in the outer levee of your life, God will continually say to you, "Friend, come up even higher." Here is also a continuing rule in temptation which calls you to go higher, but when you do, you only encounter other temptations and character traits.  Both God and Satan use the strategy of elevation, but Satan uses it in temptation, and the effect is quite different.  When the devil elevates you to a certain place, he causes you to fasten your idea of what holiness is far beyond what flesh and blood could ever bear or achieve.  Your life becomes a spiritual acrobatic performance high atop a steeple.  You cling to it, trying to maintain your balance and daring not to move.  But when God elevates you by His grace into heavenly places, you find a vast plateau where you can move about with ease."

I had entered the acrobatic performance, ceasing to take these burden to God to carry and work His grace through me, and instead taking it upon myself and falling into a huge, deceptive pit of obligation, instead of true love.

The result was a misplaced perspective on my external relationships, as well as on my own personal relationship with God.  I stopped seeking His face.  I snuck a prayer in here and there, but lost the deliberate focus on God my Savior that we all desperately need.

I was becoming weary and exhausted of hearing everyone else's issues.  And the more I took on myself, the less time I spent seeking direction and strength from God (you know, aside from desperate "God, please help me" please which really only equated to "Please make this right, because I'm not ready to actually hand it over to you yet." And the less time I spent seeking God, the more opportunity I gave for the Devil to sneak in his lies: "You have no skills.  You can't compete here. This job won't get you anywhere.  This isn't what you should be doing.  You won't make it.  God won't be able to use you for anything."  Lies.  Such obvious lies where you're walking in the Truth.

This morning my pastor preached on the hope we have through Christ's death.  He talked about the darkness that covered the land from 12 pm to 3 pm on the day Christ died and the significance of the darkness.  It was a supernatural darkness that covered the land, and it was God's judgment on sin. He talked about how disorienting it is to be in pitch black darkness.  And then he made a point that really brought it home for me.  He said, "The degree to which your life orbits around Christ is the degree to which you are walking in the light, but the degree to which your life orbits around anything other than Christ is the degree to which you are walking in the darkness."

I had begun to orbit around circumstances and roles and obligations.  And I began to walk in darkness.  In Galations, Paul tells the church, "For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery," and "You were running well.  Who hindered you from obeying the truth?" (Gal. 5:1, 7)  And when my top finally stopped spinning, and I lost all momentum, Christ was waiting.

This weekend was definite period of breaking.

"Carry Me" by Jenny & Tyler is a beautiful piece for the breaking and the rebuilding.

Broken-hearted I come, 

My cup is empty, my mouth is dry.

See how quickly I fall,

Burdened with darkness,

Heavy in lies.

I want to cry, but I can't.

I try to stand, but I fall down again. 

I need You to carry me,

I need You to carry me,

I need You to carry me,

When I am weak.

Oh this can't be enough,

To just say I'm sorry,

To confess my fault.

When I've hurt you so much,

And now I am asking 

For you to do more

I want to cry, but I can't

I try to stand, but I fall down again.

I need You to carry me,

I need You to carry me,

I need You to carry me,

When I am weak. 

I'm always weak...

When I first met you I drew you in close to me.

Your weakness covered by strength and security.

I've never left you, nor will I ever leave.

Child believe, child believe.

But you are strong...

When I first met you I drew you in close to me.

Your weakness covered by strength and security.

I've never left you, nor will I ever leave.

Child believe, child believe. 

I need You to carry me,

I need You to carry me,

I need You to carry me,

When I am weak.