an actual snippet from a conversation with a friend last night...
me: i just wish God would tell me what to do and then i can say yes, and that will be how i'm obedient.
him: have you ever spent time thinking about how good you would have been as a pharisaical jew?
me: (laughing)
him: i'll take that as a no. maybe you should take some time to think about it.
me: (still laughing) i hope that was supposed to make me laugh.
him: (begins laughing)
the truth is he's right. i want my faith to be straightforward in the way that i want the rest of my life to be laid out for me. i don't particularly dig the "go with the flow" or "let's see what happens" kind of approach. i like plans. i like timelines. i like direction.
God continues to turn that on me. and i mean that in a good way! right now i feel that my life is about learning obediance...but it isn't the model of obediance that i want. it isn't Him giving me rules or a path to follow. it's about me listening to Him daily and explicitly trusting Him to open or shut doors. it's about me waking up in the morning and asking the same question every day. "what now, God?" "just wait, I'll show you..."
last night i was discouraged because it seems like i've been learning this same lesson my whole life. and i don't know that i'll ever get to a place where i can truly say "i've learned that...let's move on to something else." i think i'll always struggle with this kind of trust.
today, i'm okay with that. the tension between my human nature and what God wants from me reminds me of the gap. it reminds me that i need him. as much as i want to get to a place where i can say "look how much i've grown!" i don't ever want to get to a place where i say "i don't need you anymore God."
so He continues to speak. and i continue to listen.
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I'm so there, Mademoiselle Friedom. I liken my relationship with God to going sky diving without an parachute, except it's ok because God doesn't need a parachute to land both of us safely on the ground. The only bad part about it is that most of the time it just feels like I got pushed out of the airplane. Of course, I know everything will be fine because everything has always been fine. It's that fear that infiltrates us, and takes over if we're not careful. I may not always fear the unknown, but I do fear the one thing that I know isn't even possible: which is being alone. That's a lesson I keep learning all over and over. I'm thinking now, the plane drop is just going to get higher and higher, the fall longer and longer, until I get a hint; so I might as well learn to enjoy the ride, right?
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