And yet, I know that you manifest power through the weak things of this world.

You used a barren couple past the age of childbearing to create a nation as populous as the sand of the seashore.  you used a young shepherd with a slingshot to slay a giant.  You used a poor little boy with five flat loaves of coarsely ground barley bread and a couple of small fish to feed thousands. 

Help me to see, Lord that this is how you characteristically work. 

Help me to see that I don’t need the adequate back account Philip recommended or the abundants assets Andrew hinted at.  All I need is to place what I have in your hands, like that little boy did.

Give me the faith to realize that you will bless what I give, no matter how small the loaves or how few the fish.  No matter how meager the time or the talents or the treasures I place in your hands, you will multiply them.

I don’t have much, Lord, but I give you what I have.  Take my coarsely gound life and the small skills that accompany it.  Take them in your hands, Lord.  Bless them.  Multiply them.  Use them for you glory and for the good of others.

Help me to realize that you are the true bread of life.  Whenever pangs of hunger grab at my soul, help me to see that the bread in other windows – no matter how seductive to the eye or sweet to the taste – is not what I should be eating.  Train my spiritual palate to long for you.  And teach me that you are my daily bread and all the bread I will ever need.

Lord, Jesus, I have a friend who has never tasted such bread.  His name is Dave.  He has sampled from life’s smorgasbord, tasted from all that life has to offer.  But he is starved for something more.  Starved for love.  For acceptance.  For forgiveness.  For meaning and purpose.

Help me to lead him to you, Jesus.  Prepare her heart so that I might be, as someone once said, merely one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread . . .

Thank you, Jesus, for this life you have given me.  Thank you for dying on the cross so that I can have an intimate relationship with the Father.

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them.  For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.

Oh, I sure hope so.  God knows (and I mean God really does know) how much time I’ve wasted recently.

Time is our most precious commodity, is is not?

He will return my wasted years.

Wow.

a shelter from the storm

This is our God.

He will wipe away your tears and return your wasted years.

This is our God.

A father to the orphan

a healer to the broken

This is our God

He brings peace to our madness

and comfort to our sadness.

This is our God.

This is the one we have waited for.

This is our God.

a fountain for the thirsty

a lover for the lonely

He brings glory to the humble

and crowns for the faithful.

This is our God

So call upon His name

He is mighty to save.

This is our God.

I guess I decided to read this book because I knew of the author through my previous home church in Fayetteville, NC.  Johh Bevere spoke several times at the church, and I was always intrigued by what he had to say.  I didn’t seek out this book, I just happened to see in the bookstore and picked it up.

The closest example that describes God’s invitation to me would probably be when the disciples saw Jesus walking on the water – walking as if he would pass them by. 

I definitely think prayer is a dialogue.  I think God has been communicating his love and care for me, and his approval of my attempts to draw nearer to him, even as little as they are.

“To a large extent, we have done this in our churches as well; we’ve preached more of what Jesus will do for us rather than who He really is!  As a result we have cultivated many who serve God primarily for benefit rather than in joyful response to who He is.  It could be compared to a woman who marries a man for money; her motive is not to know her husband for who he is, but rather for what he can do for her.  Oh, she may love him on some level, but for all the wrong reasons.

People who emphasize the blessings of God to the neglect of a relationship with Him create disciples who come to God to get something, rather than those who respond to Him for who He is.  He is like no other and none compare to the wonder of Him.  Once God is encountered, as Moses experienced, the promises all fall into perspective.  He is so much more wonderful than anything – even His blessings.”

Looking over my previous posts, I pause to note that I don’t consider myself depressed anymore.  Do I still struggle with sheer hopelessness?  Yeah, on occasion.  Do I still procrastinate?  Of course.  Do I still spend most of my day stuck indoors?  Yeah.

But along the way, things have changed. 

I completed summer school.  I took three classes: I dropped one, recieved an incomplete for the other, and recieved an A in the third.  That’s definitely progress, considering its been almost a year since I attended class three days in a row.  I felt such accomplishment the first time I went to class two days in a row.  It was definitely a turning point.  I could finally be proud of something I had done recently.

Of course, I should never stop thanking You for this victory. 

And although I still struggle for consistency with You, I am in a different place than I was a few months ago.  I can remember what it feels like to walk with You.  I can remember all the great things You’ve done for me.  And in remembering all these things, I can feel the emotion attached to them now.  I feel things like joy and yearning, peace and confidence; such a far cry from the tearless sorrow I felt months ago.  Speaking of tearless, my former state of crying at the drop of a hat hasn’t returned, but perhaps I may never return there.

But I feel joy - joy when I’ve been with You.

Oh, continue to restore me.  Push me to greater depth and consistency with You.

I will trust You, no matter what.

Exodus 34:6

God=good and good=like God

Can good exist outside of God?

No, of course not.

If good exists outside of God, that would mean that God is not all good.  If God is not all good, then He must be partly bad.

Exodus 33:7  Moses took his tent and pitched it ourside the camp, far from the camp, and called it the tabernacle of meeting.  And it came to pass that everyone who sought the Lord went out to the tabernacle of meeting which was outside the camp.  So it was, whenever Moses went out to the tabernacle, that all the people rose, and each man stood at his tent door and watched Moses until he had gone into the tabernacle.  And it cam eto pass, when Moeses entered the tabernacle, that the pillar of cloud descended and stood at the door of the tabernacle, and the Lord talked with Moses.  All the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the tabernacle door, and all the people rose and worshipped, each man in his tent door.  So the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend.  And he would return to the camp, but his servant Joshua the son of Nun, a young man, did not depart from the tabernacle.

Love, Schaeffer says, cannot be a banner that we carry around, or a slogan that we repeat like a mantra.  Love must be evident in practice.  All truly great Christians, he writes, have gentleness and tenderness about them, a gentleness and tenderness that is manifest in the delight they take in spending time with little children and the energy they gladly expend on “little people.”  Such love demonstrates that a believer truly has met with the Lord.  For the Lord carries little children close to his heart.  The Lord does not break “the bruised reed” or quench “the smoldering wick.”  The Lord has time for every one of his people – not matter how insignificant they may seems to the Christian leader who has his own big agenda in mind.”

From True Spirituality, by Francis Schaeffer 

And this was only the introduction by Jerram Barrs.

Just imagine how good the rest of it is.