SLIGHTLY LESS SINFUL THAN YOU

Rush hour traffic.  Running late. You know what I'm not caring about in these moments? Obeying the speed limit.  Honestly, I'm just trying to go slightly LESS fast than the fastest driver out there!

I know 79mph is speeding.  By a lot, even.  But I also know that I'm not speeding as much as the guy who just passed me going 83--and so I know I probably won't be pulled over and held responsible for my 79mph.

As many of us do this out on the road, I'm convinced we're doing it in our spiritual lives as well.  

We're called to holiness, but it seems a lot of believers are more concerned about where they land on some kind of "spectrum" of spiritual life than on really desiring holiness.  

Before we know it, our aim isn't holiness, nor honoring our God with the lives He gave us.  And our lives become one big game of "I'm slightly less sinful than YOU."

Yes, I do it.  And I cringe at the thought, because it's not at all what I long for!  I want purity of soul.  I desire rightness of action. I long to do what God wants, not just a slightly more sanitized version of what somebody else is doing.  

I don't want to buy this lie...

Heathens   <------- ME ------->   Legalists

...the lie that says, "Everyone who is more permissive than I am in their choices and actions is a heathen, and everyone who is less so is a legalist."  What??!??  When did I become the standard?

I am not.  You are not.  We are called to holiness, as He is holy.  We fail, we fall, we need His grace.  But we are, in no uncertain terms, called to holiness.  

No more "I can watch this because someone in my small group watches this--or worse."  Holiness.

No more "So-and-so doesn't report everything on their taxes, either."  Holiness.

No more "Nobody else reads their Bible either."  Holiness.  

I am the LORD, who brings you up 

out of the land of Egypt.  

So be holy, for I am holy.

Leviticus 11:45 

* Is this a struggle for you?  What are some of the standards you see yourself setting for your life that are based on what other believers are willing to do?

  

 

SHE SCRIBBLED IN MY BIBLE

Really.

At first I wasn't happy about it.  I mean, come on.  My Bible? Of all the books she could've defaced. That thing is meant to be passed down to her someday.

But when I thought about it for more than 5 seconds, I smiled.  And now it is, by far, my favorite page in my Bible.  

Because she simply wrote in the book she found open on the table.

My Bible just happened to be that book.

Joy.

And now this page serves as a reminder of a day when my tiny girl happened upon an open Bible.  Yes, she wrote all over it.  But the main thing is that she happened upon an open Bible I had been reading.

Again...Joy.

Because, if I'm completely honest,  it's far more likely that she would've scribbled on my iPhone or laptop.  She sees me using those things a whole heck of a lot more than my Bible.  

And that wrecks me!


I would let that precious, tiny thing scribble on all the pages if it meant that daily she would come down the stairs, bleary-eyed and bed-haired, to find the open Bible I've been reading.  

Father, You gave me life to do the very thing of sharing truth with my children.  But more than just reading it to them or telling them about it, I want them to see me read it.  I want them to perceive my love for truth.  I don't care what they do in life if they just walk with You and love Your Word!  Keep me mindful that I GET TO be an example for them in regard to the Word of truth.  I GET TO show them what it means to hide it in their hearts, that they may not sin against You--a profound privilege!  Why don't I do it more?  God, strengthen me to impart truth.  It's not a breakout session of what I'm here to do.  IT IS WHAT I AM HERE TO DO.  

* What would YOUR children most likely scribble on? 

These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts.  Impress them on your children.  Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.  Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.  Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.   

Deuteronomy 6:6-9

WHEN A SNAKE CHOKES

"Whoa, look at THIS, Mommy!" my son said as he grabbed my hand and pulled me out the front door.  

Near the tree in our front yard I saw a snake, but I had to take a closer look;  Something was odd about it.

It had choked to death on another snake.

I had never seen anything like it.  And to be honest, it gave me chills.

Because this year our family has encountered the most vicious attacks.  We have been face to face with evil. Evil. We have come up against the stare of the most vile and vitriolic stuff imaginable and stood eye to eye with the darkest of things, though we have stood in innocence.  

And we know there's a serpent behind it all.  Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms (Ephesians 6:12).  

I believe the same serpent who enticed Eve into sin is still trying to do his thing.  But the very one who seeks to devour us WILL choke. 

This hope means everything!

Yes, this snake will strike the heel but our God is victorious.  He will crush his head.  

When that cunning serpent comes after us, we need not give him reverence, nor honor him with our fear.  

It's okay.  That snake's gonna choke, y'all.

The God of peace 

will soon crush Satan 

under your feet.

Romans 16:20

THE BLESSED UNREST

Finding yourself broken over what is or what is not?  Really, it's not necessarily a bad thing.  

Oh, it feels bad.  Crappy, even.  It rubs at our hearts until we're raw.  But these thorns in your flesh and mine can be the very things that drive us to do something about them.

Don't dismiss your brokenness.  It can be a beautiful catalyst.

Is there something that annoys you, frustrates you, angers you, keeps you up at night about the way things are...or aren't?  Is there a holy unrest gnawing away at you, refusing to be ignored?

Congratulations.  You're blessed.  

The blessed unrest is a gift, in spite of the way it seems to grate on your soul.  It hardly seems a benefit when it drives you to your knees.

But there--in our face-down state--there is an awareness that the God of all creation is calling you to right a wrong--to be in on righting something that coincidentally happens to be breaking His heart, too.  

I have wrestled with these broken-hearted questions of my own:

Why don't Christ-followers love the Word--I mean, really hunger for it?  Why isn't it a priority even for those who love God and want to walk in His ways?  Why does it seem so hard to consistently be in the Word?  And if we believe what it says, then how can we manage to go sun-up to sun-down without prioritizing any of "our" time to read the thing?

And why does the term "Bible conference" bring up images of an old-school, Gaither-gathering snoozefest? Who on earth is going to do something fresh?

No idea why He called such a broken, jacked-up individual, but He did.  The odd answer, I suppose, is me.  

I am.  By the grace of God alone, I am doing a new thing.

GodBreathed was born of a blessed unrest.  And what started as frustration has grown into a Word and worship experience that is happening in 5 days in Atlanta. 

What will spring forth from YOUR frustrations?  What might YOU be called to do?  What wrong may God be putting on your heart to right--right now?  

Please don't excuse the holy unrest.  

Consider how God might be poised and ready to bless the ever-loving heck out of you and the rest of the world through it.  

Thanks to Ben Arment, my Dream Year coach who taught me that frustration shapes a dream, to my family for encouraging me to walk in the calling God had in mind, and for the rest of the Dream Year 2012 team for constantly inspiring me to live wide awake to the stuff of God.