It seems that when the Holy Spirit is working, He doesn't just tear apart one area.
He is out to wreck it all.
The Holy meaning to make the broken whole.
This morning's verses were again in John 17 - the words I wrote out were the words that He prayed to His Father. The ones that speak of the unity between the Trinity and then they turn from a heavenly focus, to an earthly one. His focus turned to the ones who believed and the ones still to come...
And the words from this mouth? They tumble out so easily - the ones that speak venom and malice, and when I step back, I'm horrified. This past winter I studied the book of James and there are those verses that focus on the tongue and I have them before me and my heart is broken.
How can I move from a time with Jesus, where I think, I can do this, stand up and quickly become the fool?
There was an evening, about a month or so ago, when Tony leaned in close and said the hard words that I needed to hear. He asked me if I feared God. If I saw Him as more than a Friend, as more than Someone to hear my complaint and my prayers? Because when I keep doing the same wrong thing over and over again, could it be that my view of Jesus is skewed?
So I have begun to pray for eyes to see His holiness - and He is answering. And it's hard. Because when you begin to see glimpses of His purity and holiness, your own sin becomes horrid and large.
My words I spoke? Left a horrible taste in my mouth and the heaviness pressed in.
So I have begun to pray for eyes to see His holiness - and He is answering. And it's hard. Because when you begin to see glimpses of His purity and holiness, your own sin becomes horrid and large.
My words I spoke? Left a horrible taste in my mouth and the heaviness pressed in.
We sat down for dinner this evening, the heat curling the wisps of hair around Lyla's forehead. A friend had come to the door to play, but before I let them go out, we went over the ground rules...
~ Stay in the front yard.
~ If you have to use the bathroom, come inside (said to a son who finds it easier just to use the front step)
~ Your brother and sisters are your first friends - if you can't be kind to them, you aren't ready to handle the responsibility of your other friendships and will have to come inside.
I was met with, But what happens if we can't?!!
And I looked at them and told them that they probably wouldn't be able to,
but it was the next words out of my mouth that breathed hope into my own heart that needed to hear it;
But Jesus can.
We are twisting and flailing on this earth, while we wait in the middle for Home. And we mess up and tear each other apart and it seems like we'll never get it right.
That word "justified"?
Elyse Fitzpatrick explains it like this, (well, maybe I'll paraphrase it a bit...)
Being justified is "just as if I had never sinned". But not only that,to be justified is "just as if I had always obeyed".
Elyse Fitzpatrick explains it like this, (well, maybe I'll paraphrase it a bit...)
Being justified is "just as if I had never sinned". But not only that,to be justified is "just as if I had always obeyed".
God knows I am but dust. He knows the sins I struggle with and lose to at times, but because I have faith in Jesus, when He looks at me He sees the perfect record of Jesus.
And Jesus walked through life perfectly.
And that perfection covers me.
Amazing Grace.
I offer Him my anything, and He takes my open hands and all of my mess and He takes me at my word.
The process is ugly and hard and the worst seems to be constantly rising to the surface - but if i keep my face turned to Him, lifted in hope and not bent in shame, He'll keep changing me - all of me - to look more and more like Him.
