Minding Blowing Grace
5/12/08
I recently read a line from a Madeline L’Engle book where the character makes a statement that we needed a new God, a God big enough for the atomic age (paraphrased). I began to wonder since the wonderful world of quantum physic has changed our understanding of even the atom, ‘do we actually need that ‘bigger God’?” Another thought flitted across my mind, ‘why a bigger God when the atom is so small?’ I understand the need for more aka bigger knowledge of Him who compacted such power in such a small particle; however as the ole saying goes ‘bigger is not better’. In fact for me it’s the minutiae of Abba’s attributes that I find the most mind blowing. His attention to the smallest details, the tiniest of the tiny, this is one of my greatest delights and greatest cause for reverence and wonder. This leg of the journey that I have been on for the past seven years has shown me His no small amount of attention to the smallest areas in my life.
I have this Bible that is all mixed up. It is a yearly devotional one so it has bits of the First Covenant, Psalms, Proverbs and New Covenant grouped together so that you read a portion for all these areas every day and finish the entire in a year. I’m not sure I ever actually read it like I was suppose to, though for those of a legalistic bent, I have read the Bible through and even taken notes on it, mucho notebooks filled with study notes so don’t despair in my lack of using this Bible as it was intended, for I contend that I have used it as Ruach (the Spirit) intended for me to. Hmm, yeah, I just open it randomly not knowing where I will land (since it’s mixed up) and expect for Ruach to use it to guide my reading or thoughts for the day. Does it work? Ahh… yeah, or I wouldn’t keep doing it! I do know there are times when it doesn’t seem to be working in that the answer to my question is not on the same page as the one opened? Uhuh, then I know He is saying, ‘not ready to talk to you about that one’ or at least that I am going to have to wait for further instruction not a quick freebie. Do I suggest that others do this type of radical listening? Nope, I just know it works for me.
Since I’ve never been good at journaling and I blame my eighth grade English teacher for this. One day in a lecture she commented, ‘don’t write down anything you aren’t prepared to be read publicly by whomever.’ She then nailed it by asking, ‘do you think Anne Frank would have written some of her intimate thoughts if she knew the world would have read them later?’ Oy Vey, no way! So I don’t keep a regular journal and if I did it would be more like, ‘today I did…I saw….it probably wouldn’t have I thought…my writings come as close to letting people in to my whacked out mind as I am going to publicly allow and even they are cloaked in layers which few peer hard enough to see through anyway. What I do-do however, on a regular basis is write a date and thought by the Scripture which I was given in direct answer to a question that I was asking at the time. I have notes jotted down like ‘nailed it’ and a date; or ‘soon, Abba, I believe’. Though many of these dates do not correspond with the promise happening at that time they were in direct answer to my questions and later questioning again just in case I misunderstood or Abba forbid I am one of those whack jobs that just open the Scripture and expect to be spoken to (okay I am one of those) He gives me further Scripture ‘nailing it’ the promise not the date of fulfillment. I can say with complete transparency for any and all to read that it has been those constant encouragements from the Scripture that were directly correlating to my questions that kept me from falling into despair or losing heart completely.
Let me give you an example, when I was diagnosed with Celiac Sprue, I was forbidden to eat bread. Now you need to know that I had survived a previous illness of the spewing kind on dry toast. To suddenly tell me the only thing that really stayed down was a no-no to me and not for just a little while but forever; that was a blow not only for the diet but to something which did and still does bring me much comfort. I was obedient to the docs and cut out all gluten containing products but went to prayer and ask Abba was it true? Was I going to have to give up bread? Check Eccl 9:7 (date beside it 4/11/03) I wrote “I will eat bread”. There are other bread promises and it would have been nice if I had dated when I first was given the go ahead by the docs to eat bread again but I don’t journal mostly so anyone who has been around me will attest to the fact that it was months not years that the bread was given back to me as a gift. Oy Vey, I have an Abba who cares about His daughters taste and comfort and is not above telling me ahead of time that He ‘sweats’ the small stuff and intends to restore. By the way the docs are still trying to figure out how I have Celiac but don’t have the crimped villi that Celiac causes…it’s a mystery, at least to them, I just smile and point upward and shrug my shoulders.
For quite awhile now I’ve been praying, ‘teach my fingers to do battle and my hands to make war’ (from the Psalms) and He’s been faithful to awaken me with a sudden ‘wow’ understanding of either a dream or a vision or a flat out word and I fully understand how the enemy has used certain things against us and how I am to fight it. Most recently He gave me the biggest key yet to defeating this strongman that has been intent upon destroying my body (along with others) and our church, if I were audacious I would say this whole region, and no, I don’t suppose I’m the only one to be given this insight. That it’s come now along with a host of other Scriptures and conversations with Ruach, adding confirmation of other prophetic voices, I’d say we are ready to fight, we have the right weaponry, we’ve been training on the small stuff; hence basically I feel this stronghold is coming down now. I don’t think necessarily that it’s going to be easy but neither do I feel as if it’s going to be horrifically hard. This morning in fact I was putting laundry into the washer and I started laughing and said, ‘Oy, Abba You knew it was time now, that what needed to be set in place for us to be freed was coming now, and so You’ve stirred my heart, directed my reading, caused me to revisit the promises…. You could have done a miracle years earlier, but we would not have learned to fight, we would not have learned to depend so radically on Your voice, nor that waiting is precious, a gift of intimacy in this journey You’ve had us on. We would also not have affected so many others if the journey had been shortened. You’ve positioned men like You promised me in Nehemiah and we can build and be prepared to fight at the same time. The fullness of Your time is come and we can embrace all that You showed us over these past seven years. This journey has been a hoot! I can say that now, in fact I insist in going on record before I’m healed and totally delivered that this journey has been more than worth any outcome cause it is undeniably true that You have been with us, sharing our wilderness trek, giving living water from the rock in our lives. You’ve taught us to hate slavery for ourselves and others and to embrace Your promises for us and the nations. Woo-hoo, Woo-hoo, we dance and we will fly, Your joy our strength.’
K
5/12/08
I recently read a line from a Madeline L’Engle book where the character makes a statement that we needed a new God, a God big enough for the atomic age (paraphrased). I began to wonder since the wonderful world of quantum physic has changed our understanding of even the atom, ‘do we actually need that ‘bigger God’?” Another thought flitted across my mind, ‘why a bigger God when the atom is so small?’ I understand the need for more aka bigger knowledge of Him who compacted such power in such a small particle; however as the ole saying goes ‘bigger is not better’. In fact for me it’s the minutiae of Abba’s attributes that I find the most mind blowing. His attention to the smallest details, the tiniest of the tiny, this is one of my greatest delights and greatest cause for reverence and wonder. This leg of the journey that I have been on for the past seven years has shown me His no small amount of attention to the smallest areas in my life.
I have this Bible that is all mixed up. It is a yearly devotional one so it has bits of the First Covenant, Psalms, Proverbs and New Covenant grouped together so that you read a portion for all these areas every day and finish the entire in a year. I’m not sure I ever actually read it like I was suppose to, though for those of a legalistic bent, I have read the Bible through and even taken notes on it, mucho notebooks filled with study notes so don’t despair in my lack of using this Bible as it was intended, for I contend that I have used it as Ruach (the Spirit) intended for me to. Hmm, yeah, I just open it randomly not knowing where I will land (since it’s mixed up) and expect for Ruach to use it to guide my reading or thoughts for the day. Does it work? Ahh… yeah, or I wouldn’t keep doing it! I do know there are times when it doesn’t seem to be working in that the answer to my question is not on the same page as the one opened? Uhuh, then I know He is saying, ‘not ready to talk to you about that one’ or at least that I am going to have to wait for further instruction not a quick freebie. Do I suggest that others do this type of radical listening? Nope, I just know it works for me.
Since I’ve never been good at journaling and I blame my eighth grade English teacher for this. One day in a lecture she commented, ‘don’t write down anything you aren’t prepared to be read publicly by whomever.’ She then nailed it by asking, ‘do you think Anne Frank would have written some of her intimate thoughts if she knew the world would have read them later?’ Oy Vey, no way! So I don’t keep a regular journal and if I did it would be more like, ‘today I did…I saw….it probably wouldn’t have I thought…my writings come as close to letting people in to my whacked out mind as I am going to publicly allow and even they are cloaked in layers which few peer hard enough to see through anyway. What I do-do however, on a regular basis is write a date and thought by the Scripture which I was given in direct answer to a question that I was asking at the time. I have notes jotted down like ‘nailed it’ and a date; or ‘soon, Abba, I believe’. Though many of these dates do not correspond with the promise happening at that time they were in direct answer to my questions and later questioning again just in case I misunderstood or Abba forbid I am one of those whack jobs that just open the Scripture and expect to be spoken to (okay I am one of those) He gives me further Scripture ‘nailing it’ the promise not the date of fulfillment. I can say with complete transparency for any and all to read that it has been those constant encouragements from the Scripture that were directly correlating to my questions that kept me from falling into despair or losing heart completely.
Let me give you an example, when I was diagnosed with Celiac Sprue, I was forbidden to eat bread. Now you need to know that I had survived a previous illness of the spewing kind on dry toast. To suddenly tell me the only thing that really stayed down was a no-no to me and not for just a little while but forever; that was a blow not only for the diet but to something which did and still does bring me much comfort. I was obedient to the docs and cut out all gluten containing products but went to prayer and ask Abba was it true? Was I going to have to give up bread? Check Eccl 9:7 (date beside it 4/11/03) I wrote “I will eat bread”. There are other bread promises and it would have been nice if I had dated when I first was given the go ahead by the docs to eat bread again but I don’t journal mostly so anyone who has been around me will attest to the fact that it was months not years that the bread was given back to me as a gift. Oy Vey, I have an Abba who cares about His daughters taste and comfort and is not above telling me ahead of time that He ‘sweats’ the small stuff and intends to restore. By the way the docs are still trying to figure out how I have Celiac but don’t have the crimped villi that Celiac causes…it’s a mystery, at least to them, I just smile and point upward and shrug my shoulders.
For quite awhile now I’ve been praying, ‘teach my fingers to do battle and my hands to make war’ (from the Psalms) and He’s been faithful to awaken me with a sudden ‘wow’ understanding of either a dream or a vision or a flat out word and I fully understand how the enemy has used certain things against us and how I am to fight it. Most recently He gave me the biggest key yet to defeating this strongman that has been intent upon destroying my body (along with others) and our church, if I were audacious I would say this whole region, and no, I don’t suppose I’m the only one to be given this insight. That it’s come now along with a host of other Scriptures and conversations with Ruach, adding confirmation of other prophetic voices, I’d say we are ready to fight, we have the right weaponry, we’ve been training on the small stuff; hence basically I feel this stronghold is coming down now. I don’t think necessarily that it’s going to be easy but neither do I feel as if it’s going to be horrifically hard. This morning in fact I was putting laundry into the washer and I started laughing and said, ‘Oy, Abba You knew it was time now, that what needed to be set in place for us to be freed was coming now, and so You’ve stirred my heart, directed my reading, caused me to revisit the promises…. You could have done a miracle years earlier, but we would not have learned to fight, we would not have learned to depend so radically on Your voice, nor that waiting is precious, a gift of intimacy in this journey You’ve had us on. We would also not have affected so many others if the journey had been shortened. You’ve positioned men like You promised me in Nehemiah and we can build and be prepared to fight at the same time. The fullness of Your time is come and we can embrace all that You showed us over these past seven years. This journey has been a hoot! I can say that now, in fact I insist in going on record before I’m healed and totally delivered that this journey has been more than worth any outcome cause it is undeniably true that You have been with us, sharing our wilderness trek, giving living water from the rock in our lives. You’ve taught us to hate slavery for ourselves and others and to embrace Your promises for us and the nations. Woo-hoo, Woo-hoo, we dance and we will fly, Your joy our strength.’
K
