The following excerpt is from a book I’m reading again by Baxter Kruger, I love how the Lord, because of his intense love for me, is getting in my face, it says, this is the proof of His love!
“What if our noble causes turn out to be mostly entertainment for our own latent sorrow? What if our wonderful passion to help turns out to be a narcotic? We stay busy for others, but could it be that our busyness is actually for us? Could our sacrifice be another way of saving ourselves from our sorrow, a pat of affirmation on our own backs?
Don’t you see how much emotional energy we use protecting ourselves, hiding, keeping our façade stable, managing our inner world, trying to keep the wheels from coming off? The pain is real, and it is intolerable.
Life becomes a long, self-centered quest to find relief. The presence of the Father’s Son in our darkness means it does not have to be this way. He brings a beautiful life for us to live.”
Why are the wheels so to speak falling off in so many lives especially within those who have had such sterling and supposedly flawless doctrines incorporated into there belief system? They have gone “by the book” according to them, sacrificed, given, gone the second mile and yet like our brother Job, woken up to a nightmare, or as Morpheous said in welcoming Neo from the movie the Matrix, “Welcome to the real world.”
Learning experientially the reality of grace although totally free is going to cost us everything. I love what our brother Paul said regarding the man, Christ Jesus; because of this man, I have suffered the loss of all things!
In my humble opinion I see before my eyes in my life time the unfolding an up to date contemporary rendition of an ancient book by the name of Job, unfolding all around me, the sad thing is this, in the process of the Father allowing the wheels to fall off in our lives as it was done in Job’s, the Father of our spirit is mostly undetectable in our pain and confusion to the extent, he is mistakenly being rebuked as Satan, or one who is trying to destroy our lives; when in fact this has nothing to do what so ever with a malevolent evil force usurping the Father’s control over my/our destiny.
Could it be much more to the point that He simply wants to destroy what is working within the hidden darkness in all of our lives that which has purposed to destroy us?
Oh the magnitude of the Father’s great love for us, in allowing our religious minds to be greatly offended in order to set our hearts free!
Rich
Rich,
Your recent posts, especially this one sure blesses. Rich, about a month ago you related to someone’s article “worship”. Please send the link.
Love in Christ, Don
Don,
Thanks for the encouragement my friend.
I’m not sure just what link-article on worship you are remembering?
Rich
Rich –
Boy do I ever struggle with this. Working so hard sometimes to “keep the wheels from coming off” and getting lost in a sea of questions:
Is this God testing me? Is this Satan attacking me? Is this a consequence of my own actions? How should I respond? What is the purpose of it all? …and on it goes.
Interesting that you mention Job. It occurs to me that he never figured it out either and I’ve never found in God’s response to Him that Job gets the answers to his many questions.
I just read a couple of days ago from Henri Nouwen’s book The Return of the Prodigal Son the following:
“Many of my daily preoccupations suggest that I belong more to the world than to God…All the time and energy I spend in keeping some kind of balance and preventing myself from being tipped over and drowning shows that my life is mostly a struggle for survival: not a holy struggle, but an anxious struggle resulting from the mistaken idea that it is the world that defines me.”
Thanks to God that he doesn’t stop offending my mind to set my heart free.
Randy,
I just saw your comment, thank you so much for sharing your heart with me and those that will continuing reading here as well.
I am short on time, work is just around the corner calling out to me, but, I do want to say one thing in response to your thoughts.
It is very, very, easy to confuse our identity with our current experience-circumstances and situations.
Hopefully I can share more thoughts on yours, simply wanting to think out loud is one of the most freeing but dangerous things a person can do, but its within that divine tension I see Him inviting me..Yahooooo
Randy,
To quote from our brother Henri, I read this, this morning…Many people live with the unconscious or conscious expectation that eventually things will get better; wars, hunger, poverty, oppression, and exploitation will vanish; and all people will live in harmony. Their lives and work are motivated by that expectation. When this does not happen in their lifetimes, they are often disillusioned and experience themselves as failures.
But Jesus doesn’t support such an optimistic outlook. He foresees not only the destruction of his beloved city Jerusalem but also a world full of cruelty, violence, and conflict. For Jesus there is no happy ending in this world. The challenge of Jesus is not to solve all the world’s problems before the end of time but to remain faithful at any cost.
I love how Jesus said, In the world you will have trouble (and so much is packed into that word) but, be of good cheer, for I have over come the world, also, Peace give I unto you, not as the world gives!
Simply asking Father to unpack that on an individual, personal level is where I see Him unpacking that reality in my daily living.
Rich –
Thanks for the reminder – we were never promised a “trouble-free” world. In fact, just the opposite. This is a concept that my mind gets, but my heart has a hard time accepting.
You have given me something good to spend time thinking on – that is to ask myself during those times of trouble: How do I remain faithful? (NOT How do I solve this?) I’ve spent way too much time throughout my life on the latter rather than the former.
I appreciate your challenging thoughts.
Randy
Randy,
The magnitude of His thoughts toward and for us is something so incomprehensible and yet, the invite is there to freely partake of His unending love.
Recently back a few weeks ago while on my holidays, I finished up reading my first Donald Miller Book, which was in fact his latest one released last year, “A Million Miles In A Thousand Years”(What I Learned While Editing My Life).
I loved it so much I encouraged my wife to read it as well while she was away for a week. Father is so good in meeting us right where we are even when we have no idea “where” that might be.
IN his book both my wife and I were so encouraged to set into motion what Donald stepped out to do, rewriting his life story. This isn’t about trying to clone or imitate what he had done, far from it, all I/we know is that He is opening up a whole new chapter in our lives in trusting him as we rewrite our life’s story.
I said to my wife I had this thought re: our rewrite, that it was His love for us that was the ink in this rewriting of our story!
I’m not sure why I’m sharing this with you not really knowing you at all, all I know is I sense so strongly to simply encourage you in being prepared to receive so much more that our Father has hidden for (not from) you!