Built on the Rock

I know nothing about the breaking in of horses, and yet I feel I am going through that process in some way.

I’ve always been (choose your adjective of choice) energetic, unstoppable, stubborn, willfull, go-getter, effective, productive, a little over the top etc. etc. 

Lately though in giving every part of me over to God, I have had to almost physically restrain myself from my natural tendencies.

In that, I feel completely useless.  I feel ineffective, I feel un-productive.  I question if I’m doing the right thing. 

I feed myself with God’s promises that when we are weak, we are strong, that he has greater plans for us than we know, that we can depend on his character which only wants the best for us.

In many ways, I feel like I have settled into these new realizations - I see myself reacting to situations differently now. 

All that is missing is the open path.  The one where I get to run and run and run, mane flowing in the wind, in the freedom to use my gifts and abilities.

My running will look different now.  It will be bridled in Him.

I heard something very thought provoking today….

There is no democracy in a Kingdom. 

There is only one vote that counts.

 Do you embrace Kingdom living or not?

by John Fischer

Our thought for today comes from a woman who has had more difficulties to deal with than a lot of us put together. That is why she has a right to say what she says, and why we should take notice when she says it.

“I know discouragement comes easy, but I also know things happen when God is ready for them to happen and not a second sooner. God knows why he wants things to happen in the order they have to. We just need to be ready when they come.�

This is a woman in a complex situation seeking to hold onto a childlike faith while displaying an adult-like wisdom. What she’s saying is that she has recognized there are two different time zones going on when it comes to correlating God’s will and our experience. One I’ll call My Desperate Time (MDT) and the other, God’s Own Time (GOT).

Most of us run on MDT. MDT defines our reality. It’s what we see and feel always. We are conscious of it the minute we rise up in the morning until we put our weary heads on the pillow at night. We measure pleasure and pain by it; we judge our overall state-of-being by it.

God, on the other hand, exists in another time zone entirely. In GOT, His will is always done, and nothing is ever late. GOT also takes into account the MDT of everyone, which can often get tangled up. You see there are as many MDT zones as there are people, and that means they can often be in conflict. But with God there is never any conflict. There is only one GOT and as far as He is concerned, everything is right on schedule.

This is why it is utterly silly to wonder if God has heard our prayers based on whether or not He has acted in MDT. God always hears our prayers — He has most likely already answered them — he just answered them in GOT.

Most of our issues with God are all about time zones. Think about the hapless Bible character, Job. Job was smack in the middle of MDT all the while he was suffering, and his best friends were trying to figure out why God wasn’t doing anything in MDT. Well, we know now that God rarely does; He is always in GOT and we can see that now, in Job’s case, because his life ultimately caught up with GOT. Eventually, all MDT will be GOT. In fact, that will be what heaven is all about. We will all be kicking back in God’s Own Time.

So faith is mostly all about time zones. When you pray, know that you were heard, and move ahead, believing in GOT and just maybe, MDT won’t be so desperate.

**

John 15:7 But if you make yourselves at home with me and my words are at home in you, you can be sure that whatever you ask will be listened to and acted upon.

God has such an ability to speak though His written Word.  That is why it is so important for us to be in it daily…to be in it more than we are ‘in’ TV, ‘in’ phone conversations, ‘in’ our day-to-day stuff.

I have been struggling with some last bits of independence that just don’t want to die.  I think I’ve given it all up, and then BAM, I’m hit with another revelation of something else that needs to go.

I went through a study on being a Bond-Servant of Christ. 

What does that mean? 

Through a voluntary decision of love, that we choose bond servant status. 

(if you read in Exodus 21:2-6 you will see how servants were ‘branded with an awl put through their ear…ouch…that would be something hard to volunteer for!)

We choose to be Christ’s bond servant. 

That means we give up our rights..the Master has absolute posession of us, we have nothing. 

We accept that we may get less than we want, and may also get more than we deserve…yet out of love for our Master, we choose to accept each and every provision with gratitude.

Oh how I struggle with that!  I want what I want and I want it NOW.  I’ve never been into possessions, but I want answers, I want direction, I want clarity.  I am being taught to accept and be grateful in my “not-knowing”. 

I have to walk in faith knowing that what God has promised, I have. I have to be secure in my faith, knowing that what I see, hear and taste all around me is not all that there is. 

He has called me into a new realm with Him. 

Through my deep, heart-wrenching sobbing yesterday, I had to enter a new place of saying  “I accept what you have for me; I put no faith in myself or my abilities; I choose to be less than I think I am today knowing that Your ways are higher than my ways, and only in you I have all power to overcome, to minister and to live.

Colossions 2:9-10

For in him all the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily and in Him you are made full, who is the head of all principality and power.