What Have I Done Becomes What Will I Do?

Although I am doing my best to be a courageous and transparent person when I write, there are still aspects about my life that I choose to keep personal and private.  A couple of those categories include politics and religion (please note...not faith, but denominations & buildings).

I avoid those two things because we all have the story that God is writing in us, for us, and meant only for us.  It shapes our choices.  It shapes our comfort zone.  It shapes our inner circle.  It is full of feelings.

With that being said...I am weary.  I am weary of the blame-game.  I am weary of the self-entitlement we give ourselves to share our opinion.  I am saddened by our world and the things that are taking center stage.  The war we are fighting my friends can not be won on social media, the nightly news, or a well-lit stage donned in red, white, and blue.  It can not be won in well-preserved buildings with beautiful stained glassed windows.  It can only be won in in our story, in the personal and private time we give to God.

Ephesians 6:12  for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

When the first plane hit the twin towers, I was packing a diaper bag to take my 15 month old to meet my husband at the OB/GYN's office to hear the heartbeat of her future brother or sister.  As we entered waiting room, the second plane had hit.  All I could think was, "What have I done?  What I have I brought life into?"

  

This morning, fifteen-ish years later, as I sit drinking my coffee, reading my devotions, and journaling...I watch my once 15 month old pack her gym bag and grab her keys to drive herself up to the gym, and my thoughts remain on her future:  What does it look like in this world...what will it look like for her children?

Go get in your car, squeeze your hot-mess-of-a-self into your tiny closet, in the cleansing of a hot shower, on the beach (if you are so lucky), with your coffee on the porch, in the middle of a field at sunrise or sunset, in the front pew of an empty church...go get intimate, up close and personal, and humbled before God.  That is where the war begins...

He knows we are burdened.  He knows we have our own thoughts about how things should work.  He sees us doing life with and without Him.  Go get transparent with Him, wherever you feel safe or unkept, whatever your comfort zone or complete-and-utterly-alone zone - He will meet you right where you are.  

James 4:2  You desire and you do not have, so you murder.  You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel.  You do not have, because you do not ask.

What would you ask Him for today?

What is the big thing?  Our nation?  Race relations?  Organized Religion?  Poverty?  

Who or what has He placed specifically on your heart today?  

What do you need from Him?  Faith?  Financial relief?  Healing?  Rest?  Truth?  

My family got me a shirt for my Birthday that reads, "Not Today Satan".  I am thinking I should wear it more than just one day a week...I do not have time for his shenanigans. I can see him manipulating our world, but I am doing all I can to be a light and not a shadow.  I can feel him celebrating his division among God's people, but I will not be a part of his party.  Not.  Today.  Satan.  

The Armor of God.  Prayer.  Love that surpasses all understanding.  Let us vow today to stop seeking blame, and start becoming the solution.  I don't know what that looks like, but I am hitting my knees and praying to the One Who does.