My God...Your God

These days my inner life resembles a battlefield.
My mind is constantly under assault.
Old habits die hard.
Old enemies, a familiar presence, entertained with a twisted sort of intimacy.

I feel like Much Afraid on her journey to the High Places(Hinds Feet on High Places) as she stares at the path in front of her that leads into the desert....this is not what you promised...this path cannot lead to your promises! The Shepherd asks her to trust him implicitly even when it looks like he is lying.

My problem is not so much that I think God is lying.
It lies in the fact that my definition, my persepctive, my portrait, of God... is twisted and distorted.

Re-building the fire each morning is a job I enjoy.
The coals can be tiny and hidden among the mounds of ash....but it only takes a few and a breath of air to bring the fire back to conflagration.
As I add kindling and breathe on the coals and pull out the damper to allow more air in, the fire leaps into being again. The difference between the winking embers and the roaring blaze is less than half a minute.
Food for thought!
Daily.
My despair can melt away in the face of such imagery.
Breath of God breathe on me.

Recently I realized that the coals in my heart were burned down to almost nothing, and that a cycle was emerging: Inspiration, passion,waiting, hope,wearying and despair.

Repeat.
Repeat.
Repeat.

What was missing is: ACTION

Why?
It is killing me.
Slowly but surely.
This cycle is chronic. terminal. fatal.

This morning before the fire I realized why.

The fault lies with the God I serve.

Shocked?
Please don't call.
I haven't fallen off the edge quite yet.

Repeat.
The fault lies with the God I serve.

Kim Clement has a book: Call Me Crazy But I'm Hearing God.
He talks in this book about the difference between God's intentions and his actions.

Intentions.

Actions.

Separate and distinct from one another.

Why?

Why does God not do what he intends?

Because the key to them being one and the same lies with me.

ME

me

mE

Me

Moi.....

It is all about me....Rick Warren was wrong...((grin))

Choice.

I choose.

From the beginning it has always been so.

God intends.....man chooses....God acts.

Confession time.

Today I saw the God I serve.
He is a teacher.
He has a big pen.
He has a big score pad..a big measuring stick....
He doesn't grade on a curve.

I live like I have to measure up.
I perform my heart out for good grades.
I need to make the deans list to be worthy.
I create a series of standards in my own mind... and am immobilized unless they are reached.
The God I serve cannot accept anything less.
Than perfection.

And I am not.

Perfect.

God.

It is so sick and twisted.
It is so arrogant.

I'll allow that God can use anyone else in any form....but me.
See I know me.
I live with me.
I know my humanity.
I am failing.
I am fallen.
I can't get up.
But I try.
On my own.
To be my own savior.

I live guilty. Of underachieving.
I live fearful. Of failure.
I guarantee both.
I choose.

It is never enough.

IT NEEDS TO STOP.

This is my God.

It is NOT God.

Thus are God's intentions thwarted.... in me.
His actions however...bring me round again...back to his intentions....thank God.

He remains constant.
Faithful.
Sacred.
Waiting.
Loving.

I need the furnace of Shadrach..Meshach and Abednego.
I need Daniels's lions den.
I need Paul's Damascus road.

My God is killing me in the name of GOD.

So here I am.
40.
Forty.
Four ZERO.
Yes forty years old!!!!
The New Year approaches with alarming speed.
2008.

I am done. undone.

Will the real God please step forward.

This model is counterfeit.
I surrender it.
Gladly.
With relief.
There will be no more command preformances.
The show is cancelled.
finito.

Repeat: will the real God please step forward.

The God who made me.

He doesn't do bad art.
He doesn't accept the critics reviews.
He uses what he makes.
He loves what he does.
He finishes what he started.

He never FAILS.

my GOD?

Exactly.

He...is all about...me.