In the Palm of Your Hand

You already have it, you know.
The world in the palm in your hand.
You have God and God has you. You are safe in His arms for all eternity. What more could you want?
Plenty, as it turns out.

There are two ways to live a Christian life:
The first is to experience salvation and live in the freedom of it.
The second is harder. It is the way of sacrifice:

 If I do not intentionally sacrifice, that is, eschew the things of this world I could otherwise enjoy without sinning, I will live a materially-based Christian life.
I will still go to heaven, and while I'm waiting, will enjoy the world, but I will miss something else.
If I intentionally sacrifice what comes naturally to my physical body, I am more likely to attain a full, spiritual relationship with my God.

Abraham had to offer God Ishmael before he was given Isaac.
I have to do the same.
If you would be my disciple, you must deny yourself...--Matthew 16:24

More is required of a disciple than of a believer, or even of a follower and, if I want to be one, I have to deny myself. Becoming a disciple requires discipline.
I cannot pray my way into this. It requires action. My action.
Jesus has already saved me. Now, He has shown me my part.

So, we have the world in the palm of our hand.
Now, it is for us to turn our hand over and dump it out.
In doing so, we are only making room for the better part.

What We Should Be

A while back, the US Army ran an ad campaign that urged potential soldiers to "Be all You Can Be."
Good advice, I thought.  And not just for soldiers, but for anyone.
But maybe I was wrong.  At least some of the time.

After all, Jesus wasn't.
Christ Jesus, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death–even death on a cross!--Philippians 2:6-8

When He became a man, Jesus was not all He could be.
He is God.  He reached His potential when He created the world, when He defeated Satan, and will do so again when He comes back to finally reclaim this world.
As a man, Jesus was clearly underachieving.

So, in following Jesus' example, are we ever to do the same?
Maybe.
Why did Jesus do it, anyway?
...the world must learn that I love the Father and that I do exactly what my Father has commanded me.--John 14:31

And if that meant to lay aside His Godhead and become a man, so be it.
What does that look like for us?
If I love God and He wants me to teach someone how to fish rather than do the fishing myself, I must.
If I love God and He wants me to lay aside my leadership or capability in favor of a husband or an employer, I must.
If I love God and He wants me to let someone fail rather than bail them out, I must.

God gave us all gifts, but we are to exercise them only as God commands.
I not only have to consider what I can do, but must stop to think whether I should.
Perhaps the right slogan should not read "Be All You Can Be" but "Be What the God You Love Wants You to Be."

Defining God

Who is God?  What is He?

We talk to Him, we pray to Him, we witness regarding Him, we experience Him, but can we explain Him in a few words?

This is my definition of God:
He who has the power to give life to what has none, 
to call out that which is not as though it were,
to promise with unfailing power and confidence,
to fulfill every promise made in perfect will.

I am the Lord, the God of all mankind.--Jeremiah 32:27
Ah, Sovereign Lord, You have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and outstretched arm.  Nothing is too hard for You.--Jeremiah 32:17
Not one word has failed of all the good promises He gave to His servant Moses.--1Kings 8:56

God lives in an infinite creation of His own making.
He surrounds Himself with Himself, perfectly sufficient and powerful.

I, as a human being, share my existence with a man, a cat, or a tree, but do not, cannot, share all my essence with them.  I am part of God's world as they are part of mine.

We know that God, by His very nature, surrounds us, and yet we still say we need to find Him.  We reach for God, but grab His creation instead.  Knowing God means that I expend less effort in finding harmony with the world, but yearn instead to find harmony in God, allowing the world to fall in line next to me as we all worship Him.


I honor God's power and marvel at His miracles, all the while looking for His face all around them.  God is Himself.  There is no other.

Forgetting to Blush

Our pastor says that we have spiritual lockjaw.  When an opportunity comes to speak about the things of God in a non-church setting, we clam up.  I was thinking about this the other day when, predictably, the phone rang.  And I did it.  I stopped short of what I might have said had I been in church or with a believing friend.  I measured my words so that they became palatable.  When it came time to show my love for Christ, I took a step back, lowered my head, and blushed.

And I remembered...

Mary took a pint of nard and poured it on Jesus' feet and wiped his feet with her hair.  And the house was filled with the fragrance of perfume.--John 12:3

Mary did not measure the perfume she used.  She did not stop short of extravagant love in wiping Jesus' feet.  She didn't think first of what the others present in that room might think or how they would receive her actions.  Neither did she do it to poke them, to remind them of their own failings.

She simply loved her Lord.  She could do nothing less.

We are taught how to talk to people about Christ.  We are given phrases, even whole scripts with proofs and logical argument.  We are told to prepare our testimony so that we will know what to say when we have an opportunity.

I am beginning to think that we have got it backward.  Spiritual lockjaw is not an obstacle to be overcome.  It is the result of shallow love. 

I know this because of my love for my husband.  When we walk into a room, I am proud to walk visibly beside him, to hold his hand, to praise him, even to embrace him if the opportunity presents itself.  I do not think twice about this.  It is pure joy. I never measure its cost.

When I measure the cost of my love for Christ, I do so because my love for Him love lacks depth.

I say that Jesus is my Lord, my life, my deepest love.  I really do say this.  But, in the clinch, I don't act like it.

I must come to Christ without artifice, just loving Him out of the richness of our intimacy, an intimacy even deeper than that I share with my husband.  If this love, this intimacy, exists in private, I will not measure it in public.  Its fragrance will fill every room I enter, every situation He brings.  

In the end, I lack not the courage to testify about my God.  I lack a love true enough and deep enough to banish the idea that expressing love for my God takes any courage at all.

Already Begun, Part 2

When my children were small, I remember beginning their training with short words and simple sentences.  "Don't lie. Don't hit. Don't steal."  When they grew a bit, I offered them alternatives.  "If you eat your dinner, you'll get dessert.  If you don't finish, your dad will eat your cake." They understood these principles and, in their own way, were grateful for that understanding.

In Part 1, we talked about how a new year not only comes in the middle of our own life story, but also well into God's plan for His world.


God, a much wiser parent than me, gives us simple, straightforward choices, too.

This day I call on heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses.  Choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice, and hold fast to Him.--Deuteronomy 30:19a


Following simple instructions first is how we grow up in God.  Just like a toddler learns that she is not the center of the universe by doing what she does not want to do so that she can get what she does want, so do we.

We acknowledge sin so we can enjoy the benefits of truth.
We repent so that we may be saved.
We forsake sin so we can approach God.

We do not want to do any of these things, but this is the choosing God commands, the casting of our lot with life rather than death.

And like a good parent, God not only tells us what to do, but why to do it.
Listen to His voice and hold fast to him,
For the Lord is your life.--Deuteronomy 30:19b

We not only follow the Lord to attain life, but the Lord IS Life.  Life is not the blood that beats in our veins or the breath that fills our lungs.  It is not thoughts or actions or desires.  Life is HIM.  When we choose Him, we choose the life we were born to, the life we walk through, dream through, fight through.  When we choose Him, He gives life, and we do not wither, but grow.

And He has more.
See Part 3.

Whose Life is it, Anyway?

Sixty years ago today, amid bright pulsing pain and a rush of blood and water, my mother gave me birth. I drew my first breath in this world, saw first light, knew cold. I cried then and, for the first time, consciously lived. I did nothing to initiate this, but grasped it with both hands. Life. My life. Mine.

For sixty years, I have marked time by the beat of my own heart, commanded long muscle to move, watched my own coalescing breath. I have married and borne children of my own, bought and sold, learned, then spoken and written. I have desired and acted on those desires. By the sheer power of my own will, I have changed the world. I have LIVED.

I know You gave me this life. Men and women can will union, but not its product. The creation of life's spark belongs to You alone. And so with mine. You made this life specifically for me, then gave it to me as a gift. Or did You?

For a long time, it seemed so. But slowly, I lost possession. You began to take it back. I know when this started. It began the first time I called you Lord. You showed me how desire became sin, then made me push it away in disgust. You showed me how will becomes stubborn disobedience and wrenched me from it. You turned my steps down only Your path. Every day, by your command, I shrink. Soon, I may disappear, become a star that simply fades against a velvet background and eventually winks out. What is happening to my life?

For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that His life may be revealed in our mortal body.--2Corinthians 4:11
He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.--1John 5:12

You gave me this life; now You take it back, not to leave me with nothing, but to replace it with something greater. You gave me this life so that I understand not how great it is, but how great You are. Once I know You, really know you, You will take my life completely back and give me Yours in its place. I want this, but tremble and hold on. I do not know any more where I end and You begin, but my grip loosens daily. Some day, some sweet day, my fingers will fall open.