This is what process looks like...

I nodded my head as they shared their responses to my offering of where I find myself in life.  I was humbled by what these shepherds in my life have seen in me and what they see God doing in and through me. Their words confirmed what internally I already knew:

I need to stay.

I've been in transitional cultures for the last 10 years.  I admit that I've thought that staying anywhere longer than a year, particularly in the Upper Midwest, was being complacent in light of knowing God has called me to the Nations.  If I am called to the Nations, why would God have me stay? Particularly in such a small city.

But what I pridefully failed to understand is that I am not ready.  While I know the glory of this promise, the process is just as glorious, and just as fruitful.  Why wouldn't God keep me in local church where I am loved, provoked, prayed for, and asked to serve?  Why wouldn't He put me in a city where, that while small, I have seen issues that are micro reflections of the issues I see on a global scale?  Why wouldn't God use the process so that my heart is fully His, fully healed?

Stand up, you complacent women;listen to me.  Pay attention to what I say,you overconfident daughters.  In a little more than a year you overconfident ones will shudder,for the vintage will fail and the harvest will not come.  Shudder, you complacent ones;tremble, you overconfident ones!  Strip yourselves bare and put sackcloth around your waists.  Beat your breasts in mourning for the delightful fields and the fruitful vines,  for the ground of my people growing thorns and briers,indeed, for every joyous house in the joyful city.  For the palace will be forsaken,the busy city abandoned.  The hill and the watchtower will become barren places forever,the joy of wild donkeys,and a pasture for flocks,  until the Spirit from heaven is poured out on us.Then the desert will become an orchard,and the orchard will seem like a forest.  Then justice will inhabit the wilderness,and righteousness will dwell in the orchard.  The result of righteousness will be peace;the effect of righteousness will be quiet confidence forever.  Then my people will dwell in a peaceful place,in safe and secure dwellings. ~ Isaiah 32:9-18

I choose to submit to Jesus in the process.  I choose to prepare for the time that I know for certain that the Spirit is sending me out with the word ekballo.  

Being Jesus' disciple and beloved isn't a rush to a particular point of arrival; No it is about embracing a life with Him.  Walking many roads, growing together, living a story with the Author and Perfector.

This is What I Was Made For

A picture painted while in prayer for friends standing outside in freezing temperatures on Halloween, passing out free coffee and hot chocolate to drunken collegiate revelers.  A picture to this day that has stood as a prophetic word over me.

The word on this is: This is who I am; This is what I am made for.

God desires worshipers   He wants those who will enter into His love and enjoy who He is.

He wants this of me, and He wants this of all men.

In garments of royalty, covered in the blood of the Lamb, wholly abandoned to Jesus, standing in the fires of the Holy Spirit, planted next to rivers of Living Water, pushing back darkness and establishing the Kingdom of God, to the glory of the One King Yahweh.

The Call

As they were going along the road, someone said to him, "I will follow you wherever you go." And Jesus said to him, "Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head." To another he said, "Follow me." But he said, "Lord, let me first go and bury my father." And Jesus said to him, "Leave the dead to bury their own dead. But as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God." Yet another said, "I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home." Jesus said to him, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God."

For over 10 years, I look at this passage, and I know, this is my call.  These were the very words of Jesus calling me to follow Him.

I said yes.

Sometimes I get frustrated with God, and I question, "Why didn't you tell me it was going to be like this?"  Yes, from this passage I had the indication that following Jesus would not be easy, but many days it is easy to feel so defeated with my failures and the evil of the age.

The Holy Spirit emphasized recently something new about this call.

Jesus is the Bridegroom coming for a Bride.  And this is the all to forsake all others for the sake of Him.  It's an invitation to take His name and to bear His yoke.

And when I said yes, and when I continue to say yes over and over again, it moves His heart.  He declared His love and I chose to respond to Him.

The journey is not easy.  It is a denial of my flesh, a spiritually violent act, in the face of criticism for choosing Him, but my heart becomes more alive and more free as I ask for more grace to love and give myself wholeheartedly to Jesus.

Jesus knew me.  He knows me and He wants me.  He knows the weakness I feel.  He eager desires that I learn from Him.  He is humble and patient, demonstrating jealous love.  He knows when the temptation is there to tell Him I will only give myself to Him partially or when I don't have the desire follow Him in the moment, or how other relationships pull for my greatest allegiance and affections.  But each time I repent, I say yes again, it means everything to Him.

This is my call: I say yes.

Yoked

"There is no such thing as not being yoked.  You will be yoked to the master of sin or you will be yoked to Jesus."

These words echoed around in my head and my heart.  This is the calling to a life of responsiveness.  Not just a moment at a conference but a yoke, bound to Jesus.

"It is no small thing to bear the name of Jesus and then walk in compromise.  It is not a small thing to bind yourself to God and then resist Him."

The first and greatest commandment is to love God.  He is longing for the day that He can return for a fully prepared, equally yoked Bride.  A Bride who loves the Bridegroom with all she has and is...and is pulling in the same direction as He leads.

My heart was marked in that morning session.  God loves me and He is calling me into intimate partnership.  This is my choice to respond to Jesus.

And so my One Word 2013 is Yoked