It was a rainy afternoon and a girl and a guy were hanging out. The girl was overwhelmed with homework and studies and the guy offered to help her. They were in the middle of a long project and she says "I'm so sorry…this is gonna take longer than I thought..I'm so sorry."
He replies, "You just don't get it..Do you?"
She answers, "No, what don't I get?"
He answers, "I want to help you, no matter how long it takes."
I told this story to my best friend Grace and how we were talking about how romantic it is and how she hopes that a guy will treat her like that someday. Grace realized that this is a beautiful picture of how God loves us.
We sit and say "I'm so sorry, fixing my heart is going to take a whole lot longer than I thought!!"
God says, "You just don't get it..do you?"
We say, "Get what?"
God says, "I will help you, no matter how long it takes."
God is a big man who is patient, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. I just start crying when I think about how full of grace God is. He loves us and he cherishes us and wants us to know that there is no heart too complicated, or to broken for Him to fix.
He wants to love us through every season, and every problem.
What is your biggest fear? Where do you run to when you feel as if you have no where else to run?
In each and every heart, we long for home. We long for a place where our soul can be completely well. Yet, even when you go back home and sleep in your bed, your never satisfied. We begin to idolize comfort and control for we want to feel at home but nothing on this earth satisfies. Before long, we run into things we can't control. Our anxiety and fear rages for we no longer can control everything.
This is where God is calling us out of hiding. If we idolize control, we usually run away from intimacy. Feelings can't be controlled and so therefore we don't trust others with our heart.
I don't trust others because if I do I feel that I'm out of control. For once I trust them, they could hurt me or damage my heart. That is a disaster. Yet, if I'm hiding from people, then there is a pretty good chance that I'm hiding from God. God told me last night that my heart needed to come out of hiding. He had my mind and my soul, He had my love, but my trust and my heart was elsewhere.
I thought it was hard for me to trust because my heart was broken. Although there has been many agents that have tried to break my heart, my heart is maybe just chipped. Its still whole because I haven't let it feel. I don't let many people in, because I feel out of control. For once I give my cares to someone else, I have lost control. I have lost control.
Yet, God told me that I don't give my heart to others when I care about them, instead that He holds my heart and keeps it safe. I don't have to worry about barricading it, or dropping it or letting it go astray.
So, it all goes down to trust.
Now, why I asked you your biggest fear, is it's a great way to find your idols as well as what your not trusting God with. Fear comes from a lack of trust in God.
Last night, my friend talked about that God died on the cross so that we wouldn't have fear and shame. He died so that we could be free!!! Free from our fears and free from shame. So why would we hold on to shame? Why would we live in fear? God really wants me to face my fears. He has recently challenged a lot of my fears. For example, I had a fear of change, so he put me on a pine cove team that traveled across the lower half of the U.S. where for 6 weeks, everything continuously changed. I hate trying new things. Not only was this new but I had people on my team who pushed me to try new foods and
experiences.
Fear can never help…it can only hold you back.
I repeat Fear can never help… it can only hold you back.
Yet sometimes, fear feels like your best friend. Something you can grasp a little tighter when you have to do something out of your comfort zone.
Yet, I ask if you were to reach the end of your life and saw that you remained in your comfort zone your whole life, how would you feel?
We are called to have a trust without borders, a faith that walks on water.
"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us,2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." Hebrews 12: 1-2 Let us throw off fear, I know it's been entangling me. It's hindered me from great experiences. It's crazy how much food I've never tried, and how many roller coasters I've never ridden. How many places I haven't been. How many sleepless nights I've had. How many days that have been filled with fear and anxiety, when they could have been filled with love and joy.
So get tired of it!!! Lets get rid of it with God's help. Yet first we have to trust God and give him everything and then come out of hiding and run to him. Listen to the song "Out of Hiding" by Steffany Gretzinger.
Yet the good thing is our faith is not our own, Jesus is the perfecter of it. So let him perfect your faith. We don't have to conquer our fear on our own, Jesus Christ perfects us.
So, in short, come out of hiding and run into his arms.
So, we are talking about God and that how we view Him is the most important thing about us.
I find that a common misconception is that God is a passive God. He sits it heaven and watches. Some people believe that God is like a clockmaker. He created the earth, and now he is just watching it do it's thing.
Yet, this is not true. Not if, we believe in the gospel. The gospel speaks of an active God. God so loved the world, that He gave his only begotten son" John 3:16 He loved therefore He gave. Jesus died and rose again. These are all action verbs. It doesn't say that He sat and watched. It says that He came.
Now, we have talked about grace before. Yet did you do anything to deserve God's gift of His son? No!! We were completely passive. He lived the life we should have lived and died the death that we should of died, so that we could raise with him from the dead. He lived our life, died our death, and rose again. Sounds pretty active to me, but We sat and just took the gift, if you've become a Christian.
You were passive and He was active.
So, if you get on a plane and fly across the world to The Vatican and step into the Sistine Chapel this is what you see:
Now, I think I've talked about this before. Yet, my whole life I thought that the gap between God's hand and Adam's hand was because of our sin and because of our sin, we were separated from God and God couldn't get any closer. Yet, in reality it's because of Adam. God is active; He is reaching down and seeking to touch his wonderful creation. Adam is lackadaisical and could care less. Adam is passive.
As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins,2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient.3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath.4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy,5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus,7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—9 not by works, so that no one can boast.10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Ephesians 2:1-10 Yet, the moment we were born we were dead, dead to our sin and objects of wrath. Last time I checked, a dead person couldn't really be an active person. A dead person is a passive person. Yet in Verse 4 God comes to the rescue and saves us by his love and mercy. God made us alive. When someone can't breath and you do CPR. The one that can't breathe is totally unconscious. If it doesn't go right are you going to blame them? No! your going to blame the one giving CPR. They are the ones active.
So, lets go on today believing that God is actively involved in our salvation and our lives. He isn't just a clockmaker; He is the creator, redeemer and friend.
