Beloved: BEING

Crawling under the down comforter and propping up pillows as I pick up the book again.

Blinking, trying to stay awake long enough to read and to get quiet before I fall asleep.  Sure I could skip this step but doing so has lead to those kind of weird, but not quite memorable dreams.  The ones that wake me up feeling disoriented and confused.

The words speak of solitude.  Embracing solitude.  To stop running, and stay in that place where busyness and distraction give way to the true condition of my heart and soul.  And what I see is dark.  Much of the righteousness I thought was there...was self-righteousness.

I am learning the season of BEING

Not running around not filling up my schedule even though worries of finances and desires for connection press in daily.  BEING.

Heck, I have been distracted for the last 30 minutes instead of writing this post.

What keeps me from sitting down and just being is that I am squeemish about who I am.  Seriously...it's like I can't stand to be around myself.

After four different sources have confirmed that this is my season to be and not do, I am trying.

So how exactly does BEING tie to my OneWord for the year?  BELOVED.

They both start with BE.  Resounding in my ears is JUST BE!  I LOVE YOU!

Each of those dark places and things in myself that make me squirm are the things that Jesus is after.  See, He isn't afraid of my darkness.  He is all about loving the darkness out of me.


So much of my posturing and desire to be busy is my own fear of facing up to myself; all of me.

Nothing cuts through distraction like a five hour drive.  Driving back from my parents' God broke through.  I didn't like it.  I didn't like feeling so exposed.  The sickness of sin in me.  How do I say these words, labels that seem to put me in a "caution: dangerous" box.

Liar


Damaged


Masturbation


Unstable

Other words I still can't put forth to anyone but Jesus.

With the road open before me, only the sound of the engine and the tires running over cracks in the pavement, tears welled up in my eyes.

I've got you.  I'm not afraid of your darkness.  I. Love. You. Period.

He is loving me.  Loving the hell right out of me.  Facing up to my own darkness, His light pierces.

...And HEALS...RESTORES...MAKES NEW...


The Enemy has tried but He cannot destroy me, the being that God himself gave life to.  It hurts but to not resist the call to solitude.  To be okay with more time and less income.  To be okay with not understanding and not having answers to let God do what HE needs to do so that I can BE good with me.

Maybe this is true for you too, needing to BE so that God can shine His light into your dark places.

Randomocity from Reading Journals

Heart Friend = K

Scared of leaving all I ever knew and now in returning something is off.  I don't quite fit anymore than I didn't quite fit in South Korea.  Even though, my heart found a home there.

Fears that I will screw something up irreparably meet the word that He has given me so much honor.

I go all in.  Right now...I'm not plugged into much of anything.  Which is beautiful to find not much being asked of me, but with it comes bouts of loneliness.  I need community but I don't really know what I need from community right now, nor do I know what I can give.

Don't shrink back.  A prophetic dream that I would be seen as a traitor and an agent of death...bringing the Kingdom to the dark places.

No casting stones.  No telling someone how their story is supposed to go.

A seeming oxymoron:  The tender warrior.  The one who is the fiercest because they are first the softest.

Stop filling the needed silence with unknowing answers.  When others can't see the rationality, I seek to fill the gaps of understanding even when I'm not supposed to at all.

The reoccurring thought that I will go to the least, the broken, the lost, the sick, the poor.

I want to be a wife and a mom but I need a man with calling who can also carry the weight of my calling too.

The guitar that I asked God for and was given without any explanation.

His bigger story is the redemption and adoption of humanity, perfect communion once again.  And He is calling me into that as a warrior.  Satan tried his best to take me out.  He terrorized me.  I became the fearful, angry child.  There was no fight in me.  The covering I needed was absent in its fullness.  No armor, so I built up my own.  And I stayed in the fortress of my own making.  Reclusive, because invisibility seemed to be the only refuge I had from the outside beat down I was getting.  What drove me even crazier was that the shame and oppression on my person was even heavier.  He has drawn and is drawing me out.  I am to be a warrior.  Special forces.  One with profound honor given that is fiercely undeserved but given out of truely unconditional love.  So faithful, so tender is the fierce love of Jesus.  Jesus the judge.

Death?

Death where is your sting?  Grave where is your victory?

My heart aches right now.  I process the revelation that death brought into the world by the Fall weighs heavy in my personal life.  These are not words I want to be writing.  They are thoughts I'd rather not be contemplating.  Yet, I go there.

I stare down darkness.  

As I've thought about the whole situation, I'm broken and yet I'm certain that death is not defeat.

Oh, how Satan has convinced us that if a Christian dies of something so evil as cancer that God cannot be good or powerful enough, or the believer didn't have enough faith to be healed.

LIES!!

An understanding of the resurrection is a clue:

Jesus died but He didn't stay dead.  He defeated death and as followers we are joined to His resurrection.

Satan only thinks he wins when a Christian dies.  Satan cannot steal eternity, because Jesus holds the keys, the victory.

For all my days, for the days of beloved ones, there is a weightiness about the loss of life, but not fear, not hopelessness.

Instead there is life; Abundant life!  Life with Abba!

Following Jesus Looks Like...

Right now following Jesus:

Looks like loving other people's children.  Playing games, giving hugs, cooking food, teaching responsibility, and somehow showing what it looks like to love Jesus.

Looks like staring down darkness and refusing to back away, and doing it afraid.

Looks like laying down walls and picking up armor.

Looks like listening and only speaking when the words are words of life.

Looks like being settled in being unsettled.

Looks like reconnecting.

Looks like letting myself be shown true, unrepayable hospitality.

Looks like less Bible study, and more talking with the Holy Spirit.

Looks like more "being" and less "doing."


Sure following Jesus has looked like this in other seasons of life, but it has also looked much different.  That's the thing about following Jesus, everyone isn't on the same prescribed path, and a path doesn't look the same all the way along.  What following Jesus looks like for you may look sort of similar but also very different from me.  Even so, I'm with the body of Christ ready to cheer them on.

Jesus says, "Follow me."

I ask, "What does that look like?"

And he says, "Follow me."

Forgiveness In the Moment

I've never met Kim Jong Il, but I've heard plenty about him.  I've heard the second and third hand stories of what is going on under his leadership in North Korea.  Some accounts coming from South Korean friends who have met North Korean refugees.  I've seen some of the propaganda coming out that portrays the dictator as a benevolent father to his people, while reports are that North Korea is facing crippling famine.

And I have scoffed.  I've called the man insane, crazy and even a freak.

I can understand why the government of South Korea, where I lived for a year, has tried to give aid but has had to pull back due to the constant tensions and threats of war.

No lie, I could call Kim Jong Il the modern day Hitler, except he rules a dirt poor country.

I'd like to believe that the dictator has softened with age and with illness.  But it's hard to believe when I sat as air raid practice sirens still sound in South Korea, when he refuses to disband nuclear ambitions which would open the doors for desperately needed food to enter his country.

And here I sit with the phrase: NEVER BEYOND.

Never beyond.  No limit on grace.  To forgive even when no repentance is in sight.  To forgive a man.

He's a man.   

Crippled by sin and convinced by the devil that he can some how keep his regime together, and slowly dying like every other man.

I sit, humbled, drawing slow breaths as I dialogue with Jesus:  "You formed him, you died for him.  Same as every other man.  Same as me."

May that goodness that drew me out of the darkness and into repentance, draw the man, Kim Jong Il.  Give grace because no one is ever beyond.  Even if grace is mocked.

The craziest thing is when forgiveness meets the offense, in the moment.

Like Jesus speaking from the cross,  "Forgive them, for they know not what they are doing."