Cost of Living

No one asked her if she wanted to be born. 

No one asked if she was going to be able to pay her way through life. That had already been considered. Just as the first man was chosen and created, so was she. 

Jehovah knew the needs of the first one He created. He met each one of them before He brought him to life, and then He taught him how to live on the land: in perfect communion with Himself. 

Generations later, she stood on the same earth, breathing the breath of the same God. She knew the footprints she left would be as different from the first man's as the impressions on her fingertips. But what they would share would be an incredible neediness and a brutal dependency for survival.  

The One they knew as Mighty and Powerful, they would first learn to call Jehovah Jireh, Provider Who will never fail. 

Is He not the same yesterday, today, and forever?

Is His word not the truth and His promise that which remains?

God is not a man, that He should lie,
 

nor a son of man, that He should repent. 

Has He said, and will He not do?

 Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?

Numbers 23:19

Be Careful Little Ears...

A person who asks questions will usually hear answers.

But who will give the right one? 

And whose response is most important to the one who asks?

An ear can hear many things at once, 

but a heart and a mind can only listen to one thing at a time.

Choosing to listen requires tuning out everything else that is heard.

Listening is active. Hearing is passive.

The Day She'd Know Her Name

Another morning waking up with that familiar longing. 

"I want to be beautiful." 

She sat up, looked at herself in the mirror--hair unbrushed, face stripped of its mask. Then she closed her eyes and thought, "I want to be found lovely." 

Letting herself fall back onto her pillow, she threw the blankets over her head as her wishful thinking became brutally undermined:

"Your hair needs serious attention. And you have got to cover that face of yours, gross... You're lucky no one sees you now... You know, you're only pretty when you're dressed to the nines. Casual is just not cute on you... You've really let yourself go... And frankly, you're not good enou..."

"ENOUGH!" she shouted abruptly as she sat up. She took a deep breath and cried quietly. 

She was filled with frustration and hungry for the truth: Who said she had to be a certain way? Who told her she was ugly or out of place? Who had set the standard? 

Her King spoke:

"Someone who could care less about her. Someone whose only aim is to see her in the grave - lifeless, zapped of joy, and emptied of any idea of her worth, purpose and authority. Someone who forgot that the day she'd know her name and its meaning, he who veiled her sight would regret ever touching her."

In the days following, she walked even closer to the One who told her the truth, never minding personal space. She drank in every word He said and felt herself grow stronger with each one. 

One evening, she sat outside with the One worthy of her trust, and she asked, "How much do You love me, Papa?" She waited quietly, excitedly, curiously.

"Daughter, you see the stars in the sky? See how they shine brightly... And, daughter, see the trees and their branches raised up to the sky praising Me? I made these for you to see. Do you like them? I made them for you to see, My daughter. Tell Me, do you like them?"

She looked up at the velvet sky, then to the great oak trees that shared the ground she sat on. "Papa, I like them!" she said smiling. "They are truly incredible." Then she asked again, with the same curiosity and a new boldness, "Papa, I want to know. How much do You love me?"

"Daughter... My daughter, I love you more than these. I love you so much more than these."

She let her heart sing in a language only its Maker knew as a quiet wind blew and wrapped her in the softest cashmere. The leaves in the trees and every blade of grass cheered the Master, for what was affected by the wind could not stay silent. 

On a new day, they walked hand in hand, and He answered a question she had asked with her heart many times, for He knew the longings that still taunted her. 

The One who loved her magnificently said:

"Expect to see My beauty in yourself."

Had ever a statement been heard by her own ears, she knew not. So she inclined her ear in order to catch every precious word. 

"I made the heavens and the earth, the stars in the sky, the birds in the air, and the fish in the sea. I made that sea and the mountains and the meadows that you love. But you... only you I made to bear My image. I make beautiful things for you to enjoy, and I make people beautifully so that the world can see Me. I made you to be seen and cherished. I see you; I cherish you, and of all creation, I chose you, a human, to reflect Me. People are the creation I chose to give a desire and a capacity to love and to receive love...

And I chose women to bring life... Just as I give life... Like Me... In My likeness."

Goodness Rescued Her

Today, she crossed the River that kept her from a life where joy and peace prevail. Finally, she breathed deeply and calmly without hesitation or timidity, and she sat quietly without obligation to stay or go. She stood for righteousness in spite of the honeyed words of the antagonist,

Because today, she was taken by the greatest Storyteller ever known.

She loved discovering with Him the perfection in the unexpected and the adventure in an ordinary day. And as He shared His latest chapter, she could hardly hold back the giggles that swirled in her spirit. Neither could she turn her gaze from His face as He stared back with a smile on His countenance that lit up her own. Every lovely thing she once beheld faded beyond recall. She tilted her head back as laughter gushed from her core and flooded the atmosphere.

Exceptional.

Resplendent.

Holy.

Unchangeable.

Today, she looked into His eyes as He spoke without words. Tears streamed, a smile stretched from ear-to-ear, and nothing but cheers of adoration burst from her heart. His declarations were like a fiery sword, severing and mending, defining and purifying her blazing heart. 

She stood tall on her knees, preparing for His cue to turn the page, this time with a greater fondness and confidence in the goodness and stability of her favorite Author.

  

Today, she worshiped the One who would remain the greatest Author of her day, and forever.

Beauty called her. 

Covenant protected her.

Mystery pursued her. 

Goodness rescued her.

...

Kwiky Car Wash God

Drive up, give a little money, shift to neutral, and expect a work to be done correctly and completely, the first time. The car wash: A predicable routine.

It’s rare I hear someone bragging about how wonderful the drive-thru was, or talking about how eager they are to go back. Boasts, more often, are heard after a vehicle has been washed and waxed by hand. (Guilty.)

Boastful or not, there are these two people: ones who drive up, pay, expect, and then are off to the busyness that governs their lives. The others drive by and think, “I could do a better job myself.” And quite a job they do, with hoses and buckets full of suds, fixed on getting every inch squeaky clean and sparkling in perfection.

But… 

“Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?” Proverbs 20:9

God is far too creative for routine. People are creatures of habit; God is not. He’s not even a creature. So we better believe God will never be put in a box, not by no one! He cannot be contained, and He wrote it down because He knew we’d think otherwise:

Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You. How much less this temple which I have built! 1 Kings 8:27

What is boxed in, however, are our ideas and expectations. Limits are placed out of fear, doubt, and lack of knowledge - not on God, but on faith. How many times have we, when we see a part of ourselves that’s less-than-desirable, driven ourselves up to God like He’s a car wash?

“Okay, this is how it went down last time. So, I’ll need to play THIS song, and sit like so, or was I laying? I said these words, but I must be careful not to stutter, otherwise I’ll have to start from the beginning. Oh, and I need to pay; there’s no way this is free. Here’s my sacrifice, no biggie, I didn’t really want that anyways. Routine? Check, check, check. Deep breath. Alright… ‘Here! Clean me! Change me!’”

What? Do you need a diaper change? Seriously, that's the word-picture the Lord gave me in response to my “cry” one night, and boy did it leave us rolling in the aisles! All of our yucky bits aren’t surfaced for the sake of pointing, cringing, laughing, or measuring ourselves on the “terrible” scale. They’re not even to make us ask God to “change us” (enter mental pic) and then leave. 

God is not out to get me and catch me in the wrong. He’s out to give me all of Himself, purposefully and intentionally, to become every single thing that I need by invading every aspect of myself and my life, big and small, including the areas I want to keep hidden. He doesn’t take me out from under the cleansing Blood, point and say, “Eww, check that out!… What do you have to say for yourself?… Now ask Me to accept you again. Come on, ask,” and re-place me where I belong. What a cruel God He would be. Not the good and gracious, just and true, covenant-keeping God of the Bible. 

It’s not the sacrifices He is after. It’s our hearts—your heart and my heart. Really, truly, it is not about how good we are, but about how good He is to you and to me. So when we see something about ourselves that makes us go “Ick! That’s mean. That’s so selfish,” (just for example, of course) it is the desire of our God to reveal to us a part of Himself we didn’t know before, to give us a new understanding of who He is, so that He can become something wonderful and magnificent for us in that area. It is then that we are transformed from glory to glory into Christlikeness.

If I was the joy set before Christ - the picture, the thought that helped Him endure the Cross - what a joy I must be! I can’t even think of a dessert worth waiting for an hour, on an empty stomach, no less. And I love me some sweets. Especially red velvet cupcakes, or oatmeal cookies, or Godiva chocolate brownies... Focus. Anyways. We were that joy! We still are, and the extent of His delight in us has not diminished!

Fact: I am in Christ. God put me there. And He will never consider taking me out, not even to show me the yuckies. Not now, not ever. I’m there to stay, for better or for worse. This means I am righteous. I am holy, and this is how I am seen by God, even when my actions don’t match.

This is not to say God is by any means blinded by love. As Graham Cooke says, “God is not disillusioned with us; He never had any illusions to begin with.” He really does see us where we are, as we are. He sees all our yucks, even the ones we don’t know about, and He actually likes us. None of this “I-love-you-but-I-just-don’t-like-you-right-now” business. 

I don’t know everything God has said, but I do know one thing He will never say: “If you could just be less bad and more good, you would make My work so much easier.” He just doesn’t think like that; His thoughts are nothing like mine. He’s much too eager to share life with you to expect you to pay up every time a mistake is made. But when it is time to repent of a bad attitude or behavior, He is ready and waiting with a gift that is perfect and timely--a part of Himself. 

My dear friend, Cathey McCrary, once told me that everything God tells us and does for us is never to bring fear, but to draw us deeper and bring us closer to Himself. He corrects, He warns, He instructs. He is a God to be known, a God to be loved, and a God who is out to make known His love for us. 

So let us live in Christ, victoriously placed in righteousness.

Now may the God of peace 

who brought up our Lord Jesus from the dead, 

that great Shepherd of the sheep, 

through the blood of the everlasting covenant, 

make you complete in every good work to do His will, 

working in you what is well pleasing in His sight, 

through Jesus Christ, 

to whom be glory forever and ever. 

Amen. 

Hebrews 13:20-21