(no subject)

My head is going to explode.

I can't figure out how to make all the pieces fit together right.

I need to catch my breath, I need to
I need catch my breath, give me a moment now
- dcb (you are my joy)

Sunday, June 2nd, 11-something-PM

I just reread this journal entry from a few weeks ago and I was convicted in a sense that I've already begun to let the focus behind these words dissolve. My prayer for the next couple of weeks is for laser-like focus on God's Kingdom, God's mission, and God's character. I have been really busy and pretty tired these past few weeks. May my heart align with Jesus himself, the one who, in his exhaustion, defeated temptation itself in the desert, fed thousands, healed the paralytic, and cast out a couple thousand demons from a possessed man, had compassion on the crowds, and spoke the truth with love. God, I pray for wisdom, direction, rest, peace, joy, and strength.
~
I'm on a plane from Atlanta back to DC.  It was already going to be a late flight, but it's even later now with all these weather delays. Somehow, I'm not even a little anxious. I know I won't get very much sleep tonight - maybe 4 hours at most - but I serve a God who can multiply rest. For the first time in a long time, I am really, actually, honestly believing that. The past 5 days of training in Chattanooga with 10/40 Connections has been truly transformative for me. I suppose the time was ripe (is that the right way to use that word?) for the birth of new fruit in me. The Holy Spirit was gracious in allowing me to truly receive the teachings to be equipped and challenged and motivated to 'go out.'  I cannot stop thinking about how nothing else really matters outside the Kingdom of God and His mission.  If I say I believe all this ("all this" means everything in Scripture, including and especially the hard verses) - if I say I believe it, then I have to be ALL in...I must be one hundred percent sold out for the sake of the Gospel. I don't think I realized until just recently that I've been holding on to some dreams and comforts out of my fleshly desire for security, stability, and success. I wonder - have I counted the cost? 

It really hit me when Leslie talked about empowering Jesus-following women to advance God's Kingdom, which even includes women planting churches, leading ministries, teaching the Bible, etc. There are millions of women in hidden and unreached places in this world that men can't really reach.  This is a really big deal. Millions of women who are picking tea leaves or herding cattle or anything else - we need to reach them. We must train up and send out women to reach these unreached. I want to join in with what God is doing in the 10/40 window. I think I'd rather be used in helping to bring God's Word there than I would in a place that already has access to Jesus. Why? Not because I don't love the people in the reached places, but because I want to see the Bride of Christ readied and made complete. I want to see Jesus come back! Not before all my brothers and sisters have had a chance to hear, though. So let them that have ears to hear, hear!  Soil, be fertile. 

Lord, send out more workers to the harvest. Here I am - send me. I will go. 

May You direct my heart into Your love and guide me in Christ's perseverance. Amen.

sweat is the kindest creature

"I said not long before that work and weakness are comforters.  But sweat is the kindest creature of the three - far better than philosophy, as a cure for ill thoughts."  - CS Lewis, Till We Have Faces (91)

If you haven't read Till We Have Faces, you should.  I read it this year, and it immediately made it to my top-5 favorite books list. As I was clearing out my notes on my iPhone earlier tonight, I came across a note where I had bookmarked this quote when reading through Till We Have Faces back in January & February.  There is something about the cleansing power of hard physical work and sweat to work through the tangled mess that sometimes is life - people and community, circumstances, problems, etc.  How timely, then, that my air conditioning seems to be broken again (or maybe it's just finicky?).  I didn't have time to run tonight. Instead, I'll consider the sweatiness of grading over 300 papers worth of HWs, tests, and projects work enough to calm my anxious spirit as I look forward with eagerness to the things that lay ahead.

The rain pours tonight. 

"Because He Lives"

David Crowder's "Because He Lives" at Passion, 2012

"Because He Lives"

God sent His Son

They called Him Jesus

He came to love, heal and forgive

He lived and died to buy my pardon

An empty grave is there to prove my Saviour lives

Because He lives I can face tomorrow

Because He lives all fear is gone

Because I know He holds the future

And life is worth the living just because He lives

And then one day

I'll cross that river

I'll fight life's final war with pain

And then as death gives way to vict'ry

I'll see the lights of glory and I'll know he lives

Because He lives I can face tomorrow

Because He lives all fear is gone

Because I know He holds the future

And life is worth the living just because He lives
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Today I am reminded that there is great fullness to this life. Satan came to steal life, kill it, and destroy it. Jesus came to restore it, redeem it, and make it full and abundant.  (John 10:10).  Jesus has come. It is finished. He is real, resurrected, and living. The King...he reigns! Today matters. 

"Like sunlight burning at midnight, making my life something so beautiful, so beautiful. Mercy reaching to save me. All I need is you - so beautiful." (Francesca Battistelli)