Inpouring and Overflowing

I work at a winery. Whenever I walk through the front door, particularly in this season, when the harvest is beginning to come in, the ripe smells of plenty surround me. In the back of the store, bright fermenting vats stand in regiments and, in the front, bottles of deep flavors fill bins and shelves. When a customer comes in, I set a glass before him and pour a taste of wine, sparkling and clear. This place is full and rich; it overflows with tastes and smells.

You want this richness. You incorporate it into Your picture of life, Your hope of heaven.

...my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.--Psalm 23:5-6

In fact, cups overflow in heaven, too, but they do not contain any liquid.

...the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb. Each one had a harp and they were holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.--Revelation 5:7-8

The house of the Lord, the halls of heaven, serve up more than mere wine. We men, Your children, fill up Your cup with prayers that sparkle and satisfy, that provide conduit to Your power, that glorify You and flood heaven with Your praise. Like wine, prayers smell sweet and satisfy, then spill over into the golden lap of heaven.

Rather than vats and bottles, angels and saints stand rank on rank before You. Rather than wine, Your glory fills every space. The aroma of prayer drifts up from this poor earth to fill Your cup and then, You fill my soul.

Thought for today: This world is God's reflection. Where do you see His truth in it?

Riding the Wave

I wake up in this world every day. I share my existence with a man, a cat, a tree. I listen to birds and the noise of distant traffic. I smell vivid lilies or a heady skunk. I am in deep. Life surrounds and covers me. But I am a human being. I live in a world that is like me--vibrant, temporary, and flawed.

God, however, is something else, and has shown enough of Himself for me to define Him. This is the definition of God: He who has the power to give life to that which has none, to call out that which is not as though it were, to promise with unfailing power and confidence, and to fulfill every promise made in His perfect will.

He (Abraham) is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed--the God who gives life to the dead and calls out things that are not as though they were...he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what He had promised.--Romans 4:17, 20

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

Like I have lived every day of my life in this world, God lives in an infinite creation of His own making. I am surrounded by what is like me, but God surrounds Himself with Himself, perfectly sufficient and powerful. And, because I am His reflection, I share in the glory of His infinity. I am taken up in it as I raise my eyes to Him in faith. God is both the irresistible force and the immovable object.

God is like the vast ocean--unrelenting, consuming, overpowering, but at the same time beautiful and refreshing. Even as I am drawn down into Him, He bears me up.

Thought for today: God makes Himself known to everyone. How has He made Himself known to you today?

God: Father or Host?

We like to entertain and our guest rooms are often full. Most of the time, guests are not family members, but anyone from sweet friends, to occasional hangers-on, to near, needy strangers. Whoever they are, we believe God brings them and we try to make them comfortable accordingly. Recently, though, as we welcomed our granddaughter for a couple of weeks, I realized something important about guests.

Through Him (Jesus), we have access to the Father by the Spirit. Consequently, you are no longer foreigners or aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household.--Ephesians 2:18-19

A chasm of difference yawns between the way I welcome a young unrelated guest and the way I welcome a granddaughter. For a casual guest, I fluff pillows in the same way, and make sure she has toiletries and clean towels in the same way, but do not concern myself so much about whether she brushes her teeth every morning or eats properly or what poet she may prefer so I can plan for her next birthday gift. And I certainly do not giggle at infant resemblances in family pictures or discuss which pieces of my jewelry she may prefer to inherit. Nor does a casual guest ask for advice regarding college choices with an expectation that I will be there later to help. An unrelated guest does not have privileges like these. On the surface, relatives act respectfully and with consideration for one another just as we would to anyone, but underlying expectation and responsibility apply from both sides that we cannot ignore.

So exists my relationship with God. I am his daughter. He has adopted me. Without Him, I would still live in His lovely world, would still see the sun every morning and the stars every night. I would eat the food He has provided and smell the flowers He made and hear a bird call. I could not, however, lay any claim to it. I would be a guest in His world, able to use what He provided, but only for the short time I stay.

As a daughter, and only as a daughter, I have rights and privileges. God makes His guests comfortable, but He loves His children as His own. I know I have an inheritance and bear His resemblance. As a daughter, I have responsibility to Him and He teaches me. As a daughter, I learn the family secrets, the truths, and am invested for the long haul. As a daughter, I do not only enjoy the guest room of earth, I know that the inheritance of heaven is already prepared.

Thought for today: How do you understand your daughterhood or sonship?

Shadows of Regret

It is both a wonderful and terrible thing to grow old. With years comes experience, and a calm familiarity with the wild twists life tries to throw. I can look at illness or misfortune or financial change with a straight face because, after long acquaintance, I recognize them. "Oh, yes, it's only you..I've seen you before."

But the accumulation of years holds also the terror of regret. Here, I have lingered incapacitated, useless. Old sins and errors have left sad wakes of damage and hurt that no action on my part can change. They lurk and mock. They niggle away at hope. Unlike private sin, these sins have altered not only my life, but the lives of the people I love--my husband, my children, my sweet grandchildren. Every time I look at them, they stand in the relentless shadow of my regret. "You struggle today because of what I did...and I can't undo it."

But You, my God, my Savior, have something to say about this, too.

Cast all your cares on Him, because He cares for you.--1Peter 5:7

This is the realm of the impossible, where I fail and You shine. I have already crucified my life to You, but I have wrongly retained responsibility for the lives of those I love. These are the groans for which there are no words, the utterings that You, Holy Spirit, whisper directly into the Father's ear. I have to give myself to You as You gave Yourself to me, and cast my cares on You for the rest, for all the rest.

My sin helped to shipwreck my family, but just as my life was not beyond Your reach, neither is theirs. You will not punish them for my sin. You can call them, just as You called me. I cannot do any of this, but You can. My reliance on You in this is my next leap of faith, and the faith I need to do this must come from You.

I can do nothing to change the past. I can rely on you to change their futures, however. My regrets have been gods to which I have knelt too long. They have brought neither power nor joy. I have hoarded them. Now, I lay them at your feet and, with them, pray for your will to be done in us all.

Shhh....

Be still and know that I am God...

I must be still not only because You come in whispers, as for Elijah, but because You have something to say and will be heard, no matter what.

Be still and know that I am God. I will be exalted among nations. I will be exalted in the earth.--Psalm 46:10

I must keep still until the racket of ME dies down enough for me to remember Your thundering majesty. I have to interrupt my consuming self-possession so that You may be exalted. And You will be. You do not need my permission, but You do want my attention. You, who are my constant companion in all times and places.

When I am still, inside and out, You surround and consume me. It is then I see You more clearly, then I face my sins, then I find forgiveness. It is only then I know the quiet of peace, hope, and confidence in the middle of the only place they can exist, Your exultation.

Heaven on Earth--the Freedom to Confess

It's not hard to understand why someone who doesn't know God would be reluctant to confess fault. Someone who has no God, but has to admit their own imperfection, is not only wrong, but alone. It's a prison of sorts, propping up a sagging structure on no foundation, no way out, no way to repair what we know is in truth is broken. For someone who has no God, living with irredeemable wrong must bring dark echoes of fear.

Faith and the freedom to confess go hand in hand because for the faithful, confession brings no fear. If I bear fault, but have no God, I am wrong and alone. If I confess to God, however, I know immediate communion with Him. I have sinned, but He is always near to pick me up. I may fall to my knees, but rise by His side, and confession is the only gate that opens into this sweet field of grace.

In fact, taken to its logical result, resistance to confess sin constitutes a lack of faith. Reluctance to admit wrong demonstrates failure to understand the very nature of God. He is holy and I must remember it. Stubborn, intentional, ignorance of God's majesty circumvents knowledge of a love most obviously demonstrated in forgiveness. If I know who God is, I know who I am, and will immediately confess my sin. When I know who I am, I know who God is and will immediately worship Him. The concepts cannot be separated.

God does not deny or ignore my sin, nor can I. He faces it--calls it exactly what it is, and what I am in consequence of it. God tells me that I am wretched, not because He made me that way, but because I have turned my back on the very glory He put in me. But, even as God tells me the hard truth, and as I utter my acknowledgement of that truth in repentance, He extends His hand. As I struggle toward Him, He keeps picking me up. If I refuse to admit who He is, however, I struggle alone.

Repentance brings me directly into God's throneroom, at His feet, in His presence. If I stand on my own strength, unwilling to admit fault, I stand alone and know the fear of it.

If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. I we claim we have not sinned, we make Him out to be a liar and His word has no place in our lives.--1John 1:8-9

Until your old age, I am unchanged, and until your hoary years I will carry you; I made you and I will bear you, I carry you and I will rescue you. To whom can you liken Me, or consider equal, or compare Me that we should seem alike?--Isaiah 46:4-5

Means, Motive, and Opportunity

They crawl up on me sometimes. The basic, vital truths about God that exist all the time, all around, just sneak up behind me, then all in a moment, jump up and say 'Look, here I am!' These truths, the ones God saves for special gifts, these I treasure in my heart, like Mary. I put them in a special place, take them out in private moments, turn them over in my hands and say, 'Oh, yes, you still are beautiful.' And so today.

Not by might or by power but by my Spirit, says the Lord--Zechariah 4:6

Short and sweet. And so simple. When I see God, I see power. I look into a thunderstorm or an avalanche and see Him. I hear birdsong and a baby crying and see Him. I feel a bird's shy feathers or the sweet pressure of a kiss and see Him. He is wind. He is flame. But He tells me that, no, He is not to be found in only those ways. He wants me to recognize all of Him.

God differentiates Himself. He is three and one, but Jesus does not know everything He will do. He is three and one, but He both keeps and reveals secrets. By faith, I connect to His power (see yesterday's blog), and through that power, I usually think I understand Father and Son, but He shows me more. He shows me His Spirit.

I see power, but God says no, you see Spirit. His power is Spirit. His strength is Spirit. Spirit moves mountains. Spirit cracks thunderbolts. Spirit breathes out wind. Spirit raised Jesus from the dead.

Spirit provided the motive power that made the world from the Father's creative idea. Spirit embodies motion and work. So, the Father, Son and Spirit exist as concept, flesh, and work, all holy, all finding expression through me, their mirror image.

When something is conceived, it is through the Father. When something is done, it is through the Spirit, using the hand of the Son. This is why Jesus never knew the day or the hour. Knowing comes from the Father. doing from the Spirit, and means from the Son. Perfect. But I already knew that.