Grey Matters

Black and White gave clarity before it left me blind
It taught me well, till it became my suffocating bind
It made me good until my whiteness was my crowning blight
Till darkness pierced my soul and I, because of it, found light
Grey does pose as if to threaten holy doctrinaire
But I believe it means to say that Christ is everywhere

The Things That Keep Me Up at Night

Oh sure, I have your garden variety worries, like “how will my kids go to college”, or “how long will a bad catalytic converter last before the cylinder heads in the engine blow”…

But I also have a concern of a different kind that I like to visit every now and again:

It worries me that Solomon fell out of devotion to God even after receiving more wisdom than human-kind had ever known.

I don’t like how, after devoting a lifetime in the desert wilderness to finding the land of milk and honey, the Israelite’s heart much sooner became again, defiant, once they got there.

And it gives me no small twinge of discomfort when I consider that the once-bright angel Lucifer was able to turn away from God, even as he was able to see God’s majesty and glory unveiled, face to face.

I wonder, will the unchanging God still have need to be a warrior God even when the old earth has passed away? If God is Redeemer now and eternally, what does that say about my need for redemption eternally?

I have no trust in myself or my staying-power, nor should I. But I don’t like that.

So one night, after spinning out once again in each scenario, concluding each time that I am forever-need; I lay there, quiet, and I heard it:

“You are no match for my patience”.

It made me swoon. It made me dream about falling backwards, arms spread wide, into a thousand arms of grace. It made me willing to accept my forever-state.

From the beginning, and in the end, it is God who will save me, and He knows this.

Blessed Are You

Blessed are you with defiant, disobedient children.

You grieve the anguish of God. You align yourself with Christ insomuch as you lament the reactions and the choices which keep your children from the goodness at hand. And from the ways which bode well for them in the end.

I wish I could end here, but I have a confession to make. It’s not just them for whom I grieve. It’s me, and what they do to me, and what sort of reflection the show of me. My ego—always making it about me. It’s too much! I can’t take it! So last month I paid a professional eighty-five bucks just to tell me that my kids’ disobedience isn’t my fault. I wanted to hear, from somewhere outside my own head, that my children’s poor choices weren’t a result of … me—a lack of perfection in me. He said “Kids aren’t our grading card”, but I couldn’t believe him.

I went on a walk the next day. “God!” Quite exasperatedly, I asked, “What does all of this say of me and what am I to do?!” God could have pulled a “Natalie”, which would be to over-lecture me on something about ego and my true focus, or to point out that I certainly haven’t been perfect myself. But He simply asked me, “Do you think I am a good parent”?

I have experienced goodness, and also crises. I can see both from the other side now, and they look radically different from that angle. I know that God is good. In goodness and suffering, I have experienced that God is emphatically, always good.

“Yes, you are good”, I said.

“And what do the world’s choices say of me?”

I can say with certainty, that my own choices have not altered the fact that God is an unchangingly good parent to me. Regardless of how He is perceived by others, or how others see Him in light of my defiance and turning away, God is good. It may look like God is uncaring or unimportant or cruel, but I know otherwise–the world’s choices reveal that God is even that much more compassionate. It is possible that good is good despite someone’s reactions to it, just as Christ is good regardless of what the world’s aversions to Him might say.

So, what am I to do? After some contemplation, the answer seemed clear: Mine is to be in Christ. And however that translates into my children today, is in God’s hands.

I am tempted to fiddle with and expand that sentence, because it sounds so simplistic and ignorant. But His yoke is gloriously light!

Parents, you work tirelessly and hard. You long for the good in your children. You agonize their resistance to good. This is exactly right! Believe this with me, as I am hoping to be convinced (again) this morning: God is good. And you are good—perfect, in fact!—as you are in Christ. Don’t let your second-guessing, or comparison, or other’s reactions deter you from this Truth.

Muscle Memory

During the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, gold medal-winning Olympian and sports broadcaster Dominique Dawes made a comment as the USA women’s gymnastics team was warming up. “These girls could do their routines in their sleep”, she said, addressing the question of why we see gymnasts meditating on, or walking through the motions of their routine before their performance. It’s not that these athletes might forget what comes next in their dance, Dawes was getting at, it’s simply something to keep them focused—and to keep them from thinking about other things that might psyche themselves out of a top-performing mentality.

Dawes’ first sentence resonated in my head, prompting a signature reaction of mine, which is to gaze out a window, unblinking, mouth breathing (the same manner in which my girls sat mesmerized during their first and last viewing of “Barney”), and begin a slow-motion hair twirl, completely stoned on the naturally ensuing question in my mind… “what routine am I doing in my sleep?” I pondered and contemplated, me and my dry teeth, missing the whole tumbling performance. I don’t exactly remember when I came-to. Maybe football season.

While there are also some certain differences, the parallels have been drawn many times before between athletes and the Christian life. As all athletes do, these girls had set their sights on a prize (in their case, Olympic Gold) long ago. An appropriate routine was created, and through practice among other things, the prize was now before them.

So I considered my own current routine with (and without) the Prize of Christ; and also, I wistfully imagined a time when my oneness with Him would yield a continual Christ-like “routine” that would be so natural I could do it in my sleep—eyes open or closed—resting or working. And this was where I started, thanks to the 2012 Olympics, but it lead to two bigger questions.

The first one: As Christians, do we know our Prize? More than just stating it, do we truly actually intimately know Him, whom are calling our Prize?

If I truly knew that my Prize is The Redeemer who spared (already done and doing) no expense to be with me, then why am I still trying to earn Him? Am I instead ascribing to a false list of “oughts”, or maybe to the esteem of having an admirably spotless record?

If I actually believed that God is the only all-powerful, all-important reality, then why am I still trying to impress Him with my own strength, or spearhead any sort of agenda that is not His?

If God is love, why do I do things out of fear or guilt?

If God is perfect completion and infinite value, then why am I searching for it instead at the bottom of my to-do list or in my perceived ability as a mother?

If I understood that God’s desire was to unite His goodness with His creation, why do I make my business about delineating and dividing?

If we really knew The Prize, would our daily routine look any different that it is right now?

The second question: What sort of prize is my current routine illuminating?

Have you ever set out to be a good steward of a resource in a way that honors Christ, only to discover that you have enthroned the resource itself, or something like control or security or ego instead? (Color me guilty).

Have you ever spent your entire prayer time centering on a request, and not at all on Christ, and then wondered why you felt even more hopeless or uncertain?

Here’s a sick fact: I have experienced being healed of a thought pattern—a craving—only to resume the behavior leading up to and indulging in this thought simply because I didn’t know how to fill up my day without those motions. I didn’t know how to (or want to?) live in an unfamiliar territory of freedom, and soon enough, the old behaviors lead to a renewed craving for the very thing I’d been healed of. I simply couldn’t imagine a lifestyle where my old habit wasn’t dictating my course. My habit was my prize; and my routine reinforced it.

But we can exploit the flipside of that human facet and find its blessing. Sometimes participating in an act of God’s, like an act of unselfishness or compassion, can serve as a catalyst which generates a craving for an Eternal Prize, not a temporal one.

This segment of our eternal life on earth is partly intended to train for the life to come which includes a routing of finding our need and our fill in Christ. As we train our muscle memory with Christ, to make a routine out of denying ourselves of bitterness, dejection, greed, pride, etc., God-in-us is offered room to increase.

What is our part in becoming more truthfully aligned with what is real eternally? Ought we to change our routine, or change our goal? God is omni-present enough to inhabit both paths, and both are part of my on-going redemption story. Today I’m convicted to start with Christ and abstain from my usual diversions. But whatever we do, let’s choose it for the purpose of self-emptying and Christ-filling, knowing that we can’t rightly do either one without our eye on an ever-clearer Prize.

Help us, God. Awaken us to the True Prize. Help us see and believe the Truth of who you are. Show us what we are really doing in our sleep. Reveal to us what isn’t real, and give us the courage and will to part with it.

God’s Provision

God provides perfectly for His will.

He provides for His perfect plan. He provides for His purpose for all creation. He provides for Himself within us.

Have we gotten confused? Did we think God was out to promote any other way? If so, we are likely wondering if God really does answer prayer. Perhaps we have come to believe that God is distant and biased. Maybe we have even begun to doubt that He is good.

God provides perfectly for the “eternal us”. He provides a way for salvation to wrestle its way in and work itself out.

Has God provided for me? If I jump into an eternal frame of mind (as best I can), I can imagine what God might provide in order for me to know Him, or to envision a reality with and without Him. I begin to see in my own life what God has given so that I might be changed and refined into someone who edifies, and is edified by, the Kingdom of God. Here are some of the provisions that come to mind:

He gives me a venue where I can learn to be hardworking, disciplined and persistent.

He has placed within me a seed of Himself—a desire, a need, for purpose and value and completeness.

He has given me an experiential understanding of joy, love, freedom and life.

He provides for my humility.

He has given me reason to exercise the muscles of obedience.

He has revealed to me that we are fallible, fragile, and finite.

He let me have an understanding of disease and decay.

He brought me to a place where I opted to give up my own plan for myself.

He has taught me the importance of choosing well.

He forgives me, every time.

He provided hope in my suffering.

He gives me a place to experience relationship.

He gives me space to want Him.

He gives me air to breathe, a mind to reason, and senses to feel.

He gave me the desire for my life to matter.

He put in me a yearning for Truth.

He gives me a sense of my relative smallness.

He gives me time and ways to practice the eternal occupation.

He lets me experience what He is like by giving me the chance to be responsible for others.

He lets me experience the true state of all creation by providing me seasons of neediness.

If I look straight at Him and nothing else, I can have peace and courage.

He continues to carve out space for the unexplainable, and room for awe.

He gives me rest and I occasionally take Him up on it.

My newest most prized gift is the gift of remorse for time spent without Him. (Many will note: I am often remorseful).

He is my help, my guide, and encouragement as we navigate through fear, loneliness, darkness, injustice, uncertainty…

He is committed to me, He knows me, He will give me give me everything in His Kingdom just so we can be one.

He will provide for my death.

He is constantly offering me the opportunity to trust.

He paints for me everywhere, the illustration of evolution and transformation.

All around me, He creates the narration of restoration.

Have you ever experienced a grace that lightens you, an empathy that softens you, or a hospitality that restores? Have you ever received a kindness that compels, or seen beauty that inspires? Have you ever gotten to laugh your way into a better perspective?

These are the things which illuminate and nourish eternal life within us. These are the good gifts of the Father, who loves us. He grieves as we are weighed down by the stones of our frantic insecurities, and everything else that He has already overcome. He longs for us to know Him and to choose Him, and so He gives Himself constantly, even while we reject Him, or refuse to see Him, because He is gracious and infinitely generous.

Were we hoping instead that God would pave the way to a less promising destination? Have we suppressed our huge need into something that might be satisfied with a personal success instead of The Creator of the Universe?

Without thought or worry or even my own acknowledgement of Him, I can see that God provides abundantly for my true life. His provisions are everywhere, in everything. In fact, I’m not sure if I need to worry about anything at all except maybe for the inclination to resist Him, or to hold out for a presumably better plan.

The Wind

I hate it.  I don’t like the wind.  Ruining plans, changing the landscape.  Things breaking, falling, in the current of breath which prunes and scatters.

 

It strips the deadwood and blows the fertile seeds, driving out both as they leave behind the familiar.  And whatever was left behind, stands—forced to become stronger in the resistance.  All this for the purpose of a greater harvest someday. 

 

But for the nostalgia that spring is, my friends are sneezy, no one’s sleeping, my kids are cranky, and I’m dizzy to the point where my only goal of the day is just to remain upright.  

 

Nothing inspires more than new growth and a vision for what might be.  But the turbulence enabling this to happen is the part I’d rather have behind me as quickly as possible.

Turn to Me

“Turn to Me”, God says over and over and over again to the Israelites.

 

“Turn to Me”, God says to them on their way to the Promised Land.  And again, He says “Turn to Me” even more, after they’ve come inside.

 

They would inherit a great land, because perfect provision is a fact of The Eternal Reality.  They would live amidst sweetness and beauty and peace, because these are the essences of God’s goodness.  They would be handed impossible victories that they only need show up for, because God’s triumphant mightiness inhabits the actions of the people for His purpose.  And when they entered the Promised Land, they would be given areas to cultivate and their work would yield blessings because these are privileges within the Kingdom of God.

 

All the while, God’s inevitable hope for Himself manifests perfectly—His nature is being revealed to all.  Through the Israelites, we see that God is powerful, the all-knowing Leader, He is good and desirous of good for others, He is aware, and relational, present, and so on.  And even more, God exemplifies to the world through His chosen people that He is patient, long-suffering, forgiving, constantly tending, and is the rescuer of the lost. 

 

I used to believe that the purpose of the Israelite’s quest was simply to get to the Promised Land.  However, now I don’t think the goal of their wanderings and inhabiting of the Promised Land centered on a specific place, slaying giants, or enjoying milk and honey. 

 

Speaking from experience, when I make my purpose about destinations and acquisitions (even holy ones), I become narrow minded, cocky or easily frustrated, and I lose discernment—“which battles am I to fight again?”  While the reality of God’s Kingdom certainly offers incentive for us to want to get there, God can’t be merely about getting people to a place, because then what?  We’re still the same restless people who have been romancing a concept, only now we’re captives in a vaguely familiar territory.  A fabulous territory, yes, but will we know how to stop looking for paradise once we get there if the only thing we’ve been practicing so far is the pursuit of “someday”?

 

If eternal life is simply “knowing God” as Jesus says in John 17:3 (which is both a state of being and a state of doing), then heaven must be, above all other things, the state of being eternally focused on Him.  The point of all this toiling and wandering right now, and God’s purpose for the Israelites and for us, is to slowly settle into an eternal posture of our choosing, based on our personal knowledge of The Eternal God. 

 

Life is here that we may learn to be turned to Him, and experience a flood of reasons of why this is a good thing for us.  As we are plowing and tilling the daily tasks which He has brought before us, God is cultivating us into being people who are turned to Him in all things. 

 

We are expressly not to turn to our fears, or our worldly perceptions.  We are not to reject God (the simplest definition of “sin”) when the old ways fictitiously re-emerge as more appealing or more certain than the present circumstance or the reality of God.  With God’s empowering, we can get comfortable in our eternal position of facing God now, and pray that this would become home to us. 

 

Turn to Him—not created things or falsities—because He is the source of patience, forgiveness, presence, and goodness.

 

Turn to Him.  Doesn’t it sound refreshingly simple?  Doesn’t it make our burdens and digressions feel suddenly redeemable?  Hasn’t every other way begun to prove itself to be fallible?  Isn’t it inspiring to think that we can have this One Great Thing amidst all the other illusive luxuries that are always just out of reach?

 

So turn.

 

 

Exodus 20:20

And Moses said to the people, “Fear not: for God is come to prove you, and that His fear may be before your faces, that you sin not.”

 

 

Nativity

“God is coming!” was the creed

They’d fervently repeat

For just as sure

They knew they were

Without Him, incomplete

 

Millenniums they’d waited

For solidarity

And peace and gain

And freedom’s reign

And ultimate prosperity

 

They waited in their temples

With each rite and good deed done

In loss and war

They waited for

Yahweh’s Anointed One

 

Suddenly, humble willingness

Brought favor from Lord

A readied heart

Let Life impart

It’s fulfilling reward

 

This lowly hostess, thrilled, said

“Let my mean state not belie,

The Christ’s within!”

She told her friend

“How fortunate am I!”

 

Then she and these were called home

To count in their heritage

They went despite

The dusty plight

That was their pilgrimage

 

The modest town they walked toward  

Was their fated destination

But each step more

Carved longing for

A Kingdom revelation

 

The imminent Emmanuel

Near crowning from the womb

Soon did implore

At His bride’s door

Alas, there was no room

 

So Love made home of emptiness

The meek, It would adorn

Wrapped in the space

Of commonplace

The Ancient One was born

 

Heralds burst with gospel news

Some nearby heard them sing

In threads of need

These were indeed

Quite fit to see the King

 

A band of scholars seeking wisdom

Crossing hostile land

Flush with treasure

By Truth’s measure

Sought with thanks in hand

 

And there within the skies

For even dust reflects God’s light

Was heaven’s lead

For The Great Need

Shining in the night

 

Boundless Wealth lay beating softly

Waiting to be held

In broken lives

Where wounds deprive

And where the humble dwelled  

 

Unexpected nearness hid the Gift

Of the Most High

Laid in a bed

Of daily bread

And many passed Him by

 

But nearer crept those gathered

From far corners of the earth

Where each could stand

Equally grand

Upon Messiahs birth

 

Now, true, the essence of the Lord

Had always been at hand

As each made thing

Is made to bring

Us into His good plan

 

As kindness, joy, endurance, help

Power that heals division

And warmth and air

And love laid bare

Embody His provision

 

So too, compassion, faith, trials

And empathy in mourning

Forgiveness, trust

And mercy must

Be signs of His adoring

 

But there!  The Incarnate, in a child

Just as it was foretold!

Could He indwell

Their lives as well

From this Divine threshold?

 

Abundant Goodness woven into flesh

Might mean they, too

Could have their skin

Be woven in

To Ageless Life anew

 

Silent, still, and mesmerized

Eternal Life was found!

They’d seen the face

Of peace and grace

I AM was on their ground!

 

The tender, perfect Holiness

Which quenched their desperate void

Was found amidst

The plain eclipsed

By hearts now overjoyed

 

Perfectly aligned

Under the God-revealing light

Creation bowed

Greatly endowed

With salvation’s delight

 

As passage leads to passage

So the  next scriptures will score

The prize is God

In now’s façade

That we would know Him more

 

Rejoice!  He comes to us through

The Illuminated Way

That Life in full

Could meet our soul

Each ordinary day

 

And as we journey toward the Hope

Beyond Earth’s gripping spell

May our prayers be

For eyes to see

Love’s present Noel

American Idols

American Idols

 

I have a secret, I live for a thing

I say I know better, I say God’s my King

But reality’s flesh and questing for bread

Has my vanity seeking its bracing instead

 

Don’t insult me by saying I “live for the dollar”

Or “happiness isn’t the color of collar”

To say I seek money is crude and passé

I’ve got current names to help forge my way

 

What’s your god or idol—your reason for being?

That slippery promise you find yourself clinging?

 

Some live for credit, respect or fame

“For the sake of the Lord, I must have my good name!”

Oh, but that’s silly, I know that the Lord

Does not need the me-driven merits I hoard

He needs no one’s coattails, no one’s good grace

(Although, for myself they’re quite tempting to chase)

 

Some evolve into living for gods claiming good

In the guise of striving as Jesus would

Their god is their fruit; or guilt makes them give

“If I do this for others, I might truly live!”

For penance or strokes or by misguided notion

The need for good record is cause for devotion

 

Whatever we value, therefore we seek

In turn, we might give it to those we deem meek

But presuming these others depend on our deed

What do our actions tell them they need?

 

Some futures are void of divine intuition

“My plans absolutely will come to fruition

With steely might, and my idol: control,

I’ll play my cards right, and not need a soul!”

 

Some need admiration to keep them in play

“How can I make people love me today?”

 

In the name of envy, some champion fairness

“If blessed with those things, I’d never be careless

My gifts are not precious, I’d rather be you

If I’ve got some hardship, you ought to have, too”

 

The Power-god deftly creates a division

“Poor, weak-minded minions need hope from religion

‘Invisible’ God is for those who will fail

The paramount requisite is to prevail”

 

Some gods will tout no real megawatt worth

They say “Just find meaning in roles here on Earth

Seek no harm or grandness, and you’ll get the nod

Have your hopes to get by, but none to know God”

 

The god of the past and of circumstance now

Says “Joy’s at the mercy of me somehow!

To ensure good tomorrows, sell out to a plan

That doesn’t depend on divinity’s hand”

 

Some have been trapped by the god of dejection

Destruction of worth is their only projection

We’re wonderfully made, but their lies will sound true

Like, “We’re not the problem, the filth is you!”

 

The wisdom of Earth looks you straight in the eyes

And says “Letting go is reeeeeally not wise”

 

Living for comfort, you won’t have to share

If you don’t have to hurt, you don’t have to care

 

Logic imprisons with doubt for great lengths

“Just love with your mind, ditch your heart and your strength!”

But doubt’s pregnant bond means Light is nearby

As we wrestle in dust, and lean toward the sky…

 

We’ll worship talent, depend on success

And with insecurity, pile on excess

“Pick me!”  The gods call, “I am what you need

I’m purpose, fulfillment if only you’ll heed”

 

They thieve us with worry, tell us to begrudge

And offer beholders a conscience to judge

When minds are captive to their cunning quorum

A chance for Christ turns into mind-numbing boredom

They distance the mind from our grave consequence

And deter us from choosing obedience

 

We prize them intensely, but if one should fall

Life won’t seem worth living, we’ll think we’ve lost all!

And though there’s an Infinite reason to live

That Truth gets denied by the great ego’s sieve

 

“Seek first the Lord!”  Is the cry of the Cross

“All else will lead you to nothing but loss”

But increasing flesh is our near-sighted choice

Creations corruption began with this voice

Why do we, in frailty, seek only fraud?

Crumbling entities rather than God?

 

No! Let’s climb to the highest terrestrial rung

To the level which we can still carry our dung

And we might hear this, (but we won’t think it matters)

“Heaven’s for people who fall from their ladders”

 

I said “I believe” when my faith was begun

But I’ve no faith to say “Thy will be done”

Not if it threatens that thing that I grasp

Not if unclenching is what I’m being asked

 

But now I feel far from anything Holy

I don’t have the strength to resist as gods pull me

Yet, past the veil, surprised, I would see

The arch-god empowering these idols is me

 

To the heartache of God, who’d fill any taker

The Tempter turns eyes to the made from the maker

Continuing, foolishly acting the pawn

He rusts and reveals what doesn’t live on

Hoping that we will so choose and assume

This decay for our soul’s eventual doom

 

But how does one find that Great Kingdom shrouded

If beauty means “profit” to eyes that are clouded?

Perhaps to “deserve” isn’t the goal

For that which I earn does not make me whole…

Are my beloved idols my spirit’s demerits?

But if I renounced them, what might I inherit?

 

The cause of my illness is my woeful crown

My god-centered foolishness won’t put it down

This terminal safety I seek for myself

Is what I consider to be my great wealth

Should I be remorseful?  I see no plight!

Half of the world calls my gods a “right”!

 

The name of my idol?  It’s unknown, I’d say

I loathe to acknowledge the weight of my day

I have a secret; I say that I’m free

But this bondage is even a secret from me

 

My motives are spawned by a hidden infection

It’s daunting to face an impoverished reflection

To keep myself full

I cover my soul

With layers on layers of “rightful” protection

Ask!

I’m not much of an asker.  My reasons for this have varied over time.  I began life not wanting to ask for help.  Then, as it can go with God’s risky generosity, I believed (for awhile) that I didn’t need help.  And when I finally realized that I did need help, I asked, begged and bargained; yet in that time even my most basic and noble requests were denied, or seemed to fall on deaf ears.   So I became even more certain that I hated asking for things. 

 

While people might not give because they can’t, God doesn’t give because He won’t.  This fact exacerbated me as I grew to discover my neediness.  I spent several years wondering why I ought to ask God for anything at all.  God’s will was going to happen no matter what, right?  Why want anything of God if it meant I had to depend on someone I couldn’t understand, or want things that seemed to have no practical value?  Requests were asked almost tongue-in-cheek, until I eventually stopped asking for anything from God. 

 

Fast forward nearly a decade.  Through the greatest gift (God’s revelation of Himself), and the greatest miracle (the change of a human heart), I still wasn’t much of an asker; though now, for entirely different reasons.  I was in the process of becoming content in all things—so content that I didn’t see the need to ask for much beyond the necessary forgiveness, and helpful insights and enablings.  I had been learning how to live by accepting, not by asking.  Whatever I got was good enough for me (if I had the right mindset), and I could never quite own the idea that we ought to be spending much time petitioning an omnipotent God for a version of perfection as determined from within a flesh-bound universe.  Too much focus on the needs of that entity begat more focus on the needs of that entity, and that granted me nothing but the feelings of despair and anxiety that was my flesh-bound universe.  In fact, hindsight had made me grateful that God didn’t grant many of my previous requests.  So here again, I wasn’t an asker.  I didn’t ask.  Instead, I trusted. 

 

I had thought that this was the end-all destination of my spiritual calling—to live in trust, surrender, gratitude and submission.  I was enjoying the freedom of not needing to ask for anything, knowing that God was in all things, working for the good in all things for me—which is why the prompting stood out so much when it came, out of the blue, early one winter morning:

 

“Ask!”

 

It was a thought or a prompting which came sometime around four a.m.  Ask?  I tried to go back to sleep.

 

“Ask!”

 

“OK, God, I ask that you would please help me go back to sleep”.

 

“Ask”.

 

I got up to contemplate the idea of asking, and came up with an impressive response: “God, teach me what to ask for”.  I figured I aced the quiz, and hopped back into bed. 

 

(Is it true?  Do I really still think the point of Christianity is to say the right thing, and then turn over and go back to sleep?   Perhaps one of my problems is that I still ask without wanting the answer at any expense to me…)

 

Well, fortunately for me, over the next few months, I didn’t completely give up on the idea of asking.

 

I contemplated.  Ask for the right thing?  Maybe.  For things of the world?  Maybe.  For everything?  Nothing?  For spiritual gifts? 

 

The period of denial and God-silence years ago had enabled me to realized that my old prayers were essentially requests to be successful (or at least to survive) independent of God:  “Grant that I might take care of my own self according to my own understanding!”  And I learned that the less I painted my agenda in prayer (by talking about it incessantly), the better I could see past the boundary of my understanding, and into something more infinite.  So why spend time asking?  Heck, why even talk at all?

 

I knew I didn’t need to worry about what to eat or drink or wear, and as it says in Matt 6:32-33 “even the pagans ask for these things, but instead seek the Kingdom of God…”  This verse seemed to affirm my focus on seeking rather than asking. 

 

Yet still, there was that encouragement… “Ask!”

 

There seems to be no convincing answer as to why we should ask things of a God who already knows our needs, except that God tells us to ask Him for things.  Perhaps it’s something about His design being a relational one; or something to do with us being lifted to a status of working in cooperation with God (see John 15:15).

 

Maybe I’m to ask so that I can hear the desires of my heart. 

 

Or maybe I ought to ask so that I know to take the gift when is given to me.  Many times a gift is not seen as a gift unless it has been asked for.  And the asking buttresses the wanting.

 

Perhaps it is in the asking that one body connects to another, just as I had experienced that asking initiates the knitting process within a community.

 

How about this: Ask because I need.  By asking, I begin to understand that I am by nature, need; and apart from God I can do nothing—least of all discern His voice, and find His kingdom or offer anything of eternal value to it.

 

What if I considered the alternative scenario?  What would it mean for us, or say of God, if we served a God whom we could not ask?

 

Still, even the plainest answers to “why must we ask” are too high for me.  But should I wait until I understand the mind of God to do what He asks?  No, that would be stubborn and self-righteous.  That would be putting me above God.  He doesn’t answer to me.  My role is to obey.

 

So ask already.

 

I asked God to tell me what my needs are.  And in response, a thought emerged: “I need to know that I need God”.  The word “know” was intended to mean “realize, accept, live like, believe, be certain”, and even “love”.  For example, I need to love that I need God, and believe that I need God…

 

Then, I prayed a prayer of nothing but “asks”.  The prayer gave me a daily portion of gratitude and the fleeting gift of humility.  From outside of my vanity, my kingdom, my name, I prayed, feeling fully allowed (and encouraged!) to bring even my most mundane needs to God.  The prayer went something like this:

 

“God, please address my need for food and a home, and comfort, hope, security, peace, fun, and to feel valued.  Please hear my desire for a known direction, and for our efforts to yield something actual and purposeful.  Please give us certainty, money, health, joy and rest.

 

Help me see you in the things I ask for and in the things I get.

 

I pray for sensitivity to your subtle, quiet promptings.  I pray for the willingness to obey them, and for the desire or discipline to ask for these same things again tomorrow. 

 

Correct my hopes.  Align my goals with your purpose.  Teach me your desires and enable me to live them.

 

I pray for the desire to “mind the one thing”; and for an earnest community which has these same desires.

 

Show me the work you have for me, and let me be satisfied with that alone. 

 

I need forgiveness. 

 

I want to see my temptations the way you see them.  Give me your perspective on sin.  Let me see it for the death that it is.

 

Give me your love for others so that I can love them, too.

 

Give me discernment.  Give me wisdom.  Reveal the lies I still entertain. 

 

Keep me awake to the eternal reality. 

 

Strengthen my faith—that you are enough, you are all I need, and that you do provide completely. 

 

Help me know your name so that I might ask of the things within it.

 

Give me the humility to know that I need you, to know that you are God, and the courage to make space for you by sacrificing myself.

 

Help me know your voice, and the voice of my enemy. 

 

Give me awe for your infiniteness, and help me be mindful of your presence within each finite moment.  Give me remorse for the time I’ve spent being unmindful of you.

 

Remind me that you prize my stillness, waiting, brokenness, surrender…

 

Help me not just ask for all these things, but also move toward them, and learn to live as if they are already within me.

 

Amen

 

 

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