True Love

I entertained the pictures of red and pink Valentine hearts swirling and falling and dancing everywhere around me. Every time I turn my thoughts to the Lord lately I feel him pressing the urgency of knowing – and flowing in – His love. So, this shower of “love” seemed a welcome and expected vision of Jesus’ love for me. It wasn’t romantic, but it was … “sweet”. Sugary sweet.

Ugh. Suddenly I knew this was just my mind creating in pictures what is commonly associated with love.

The picture morphed to a Jesus-looking man down on one knee before me, crying and pleading for my returned affection – after all, he had given so much and longed for my response. I surveyed the scene for but a moment and cast it away, for it as well was no more than a failed attempt of my soul to define love.

Then I pictured a man in a dirty white robe carrying a cross up a hill. The reality that scene represents is surely the most profound act of love ever to exist on earth, but even this came from the woeful inadequacy of my imagination.

“Then what is true love?” I whispered in frustration to the dark. As I strained to see the definition that escaped my expectations, an unsettling feeling came over me – an emotion so foreign I could grasp neither words nor mental image of it for more than a second. It was such a continuous flow of pure, unselfish action that my mind had nowhere to file it. It was a pouring out of selfless service with no expectation of reciprocation. It flowed from a heart capable of receiving love and service in return, but IN-capable of either demanding it or pleading for it. My words are empty in describing its other-centered purity.

I wept with incapacity to hold what I was trying to behold. How many times have I prayed, “Pour out your love to me. Make me love like You!” Yet, THIS Love! - I was not sure I wanted this Love! This Love would annihilate my ambition and demolish my flesh. It would blow up my ideas of sweet, self-righteous servanthood while it bulldozed my expectations of even getting appreciated. This Love WOULD carry a cross up a hill, while telling those it saved, “Don’t even weep for Me.” It would give everything and demand nothing. THIS Love was scary. I’d never experienced anything like it and knew it exists nowhere within my natural character. It is so big, I could not hold it for more than a mere moment and continue to fail to understand it.

Is this really the Love with which He loves me?

What if I let that realization sink into me?

What if I somehow allowed even a drop of it to flow from me to others?

What if this is the Love with which He intends for us to love God and love our neighbor...

What if we don’t . . . can’t . . . and He continues to love us anyway? Not because he has obligated himself, but because True Love is incapable of anything less?

What if the Love of God really is “shed abroad in our hearts THROUGH THE HOLY GHOST” ? For that is the miracle it would take to receive it. (Rom 5:5)

Poured Out

Poured out upon the alter,
He bridges time and space
His blood between the cherubs –
The embodiment of grace

Never does he falter
Though with pain and sorrow sighs
One hand in God’s, one hand in mine,
Triumphantly he dies

Mortality’s undoing -
Adam’s life is spilled.
He, draped across the mercy seat,
All righteousness fulfilled.

Trusting and Declaring

If you know me, you know I've been on a kick about making declarations for a while.  Prophetic declarations that initiate and integrate the realities of Heaven into the realm of the Seen.  This is based on the authority we have in Christ and is modeled by Jesus over and over again in the Gospels.  Sometimes we see results immediately and sometimes we have to keep declaring. (A favorite motto the Lord gave me a while back is: "Prophecy yourself out of your gunk!")  Sometimes we have to keep declaring Truth to ourselves so that we even come to really believe the thing we are declaring!

That's why it seemed so important to me when I realized that there is something much greater than declaring and that is TRUSTING.  In fact, just trusting is more powerful, though they could certainly go together. 

Here's the important distinction: 
I Declare because I trust God and believe that His will is being carried out in Heaven.  I do not trust that the thing I desire will come to pass just because I am declaring it.  The first is God-worship.  The second is self-worship.

Say the Name

"A sweeter sounding word,
   these lips have never said.
A gentle name so beautiful,
  my heart cannot forget.
Just a whisper is enough
  to set my soul at ease.
Just thinking of this name
   brings my heart to peace."*

Ah, the name of a lover is honey on the lips.  The mouth forms the word by heart and lets it escape with a smile.  It's mere sound carries a scent and a sillouette, as it stills the heart and flips the stomach.   It rings with desire, with affection, and with security. I'll say the name....  

There is a name I whisper to the fears of the night and with the sighs of the dawn.  Sometimes I feel a little foolish repeating it in the grocery store or at the dinner table "just because."  With this name we heal the sick and cast out demons.  By it, we implore the heavens and bring down strongholds.  Many are aquainted with its power and whip it out like a sword or an edict.

But how often do we whisper that name like the name of lover?  Does it escape your lips like a contented sigh on a sun-drenched day?  Does it fly like a kiss, gentle and warm, as you caress the memory of the one who loves you more than you've ever been loved before?  In that dreamy space between wake and sleep, does it roll over and over your tongue until you can nearly taste its sweetness?  Do you blush at its intimacy?


To say the Name that way -- well, it's like holding his hand or touching his cheek.  It is savoring every last drop of its meaning.  It is not irreverant or overuse.  To have it so close, to relish its power and its peace, delights the one to whom it belongs and draws him nearer still.  To cradle it in the conscious soothes the soul and opens the heart to love. 

"I will say this holy name, no matter who agrees,
  for no other name on earth means so much to me.
I'll say the name . . . 
    Jesus"*

* song lyrics: "Say the Name" by Margaret Becker & Charlie Peacock, 1993

Dance like David Danced

Last week I began to feel the real dance of David.  It is a dance that rejects all dignity and loses all sense of self.

In the back of the auditorium as the worship leader sang, I twirled and stomped and jumped and flailed.  My long necklace threatened to fly in my face and it had to come off.  My shoes had already found their place under the row of chairs, but soon my socks were annoying me as they scuffed on the new carpet and I tossed them in a corner.  My sweater was cumbersome. Off it came.  My earrings stuck in my flying hair. They too had to go.  Anything else and I probably would have gotten arrrested! 

I danced for justice.  I danced for mercy.  I danced for the rows of spectators all facing forward, numbly glued to their chairs.  I danced because God is holy. 

As I peeled off the layers of my identity for the freedom of the spirit, I heard the jeers of Michal ring in my head as if the words were aimed at me:   "How the king of Israel distinguished himself today! He uncovered himself... as one of the foolish ones....!"   It really hit me what David did when he danced "with all his might, girded with a linen ephod" before the ark of God.  (See 2 Samuel 6)  This wasn't a guy off the street in his boxers and tank.  This was the king of a mighty nation, who was shedding, bit by bit, all the signs and symbols of his authority as king!  His purple robe - it was cumbersome.  His crown - it was heavy.  His signet ring - it probably flew right off his finger!  His breastplate.  His jewels.  His shoes.  His scepter.  All the trappings of his very God-given identity! It all came off.

God became his identity.

Jesus, too, shed his identity as King.  Every right, privelege, and "perk" of being God, he forever thrust aside for a greater purpose, and now I was being challenged to do the same.  I was being challenged to do more than shed the outer accessories of my wardrobe, or even the tattered remnants of my reputation, in this wild dance.  I was being asked to clear the temple the way Jesus cleared the temple for the zeal of his father's house. Only this time, I was the temple.  And his zeal was his love for me.

To "dance like David danced" is not a form or even a ferver; it is an attitude that crucifies self for the love of someone higher.  It is a clearing away of all that is not worship.  It is abandonment of all I've achieved, all I've become, and all that I clutch for security.  It is Trust.  It is an exchange of fear for freedom, entitlement for abundance, proving myself for the relief of having nothing to prove.  At the end of my justifications, in the purity of my nakedness, I finally fix my gaze on him, the One who made me and loves me with everlasting love.  In the reflection of his eyes alone, I finally see beyond the garb of identity to who I really am.... his beloved, his priceless creation.

And I dance.  For sheer joy.

Acknowledging God

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.  In all your ways, acknowledge him, and he will direct your paths."

 I do trust God -- on the surface -- don't you?  I give lip service to his being in control of world events and believe in my heart that He is my eternal savior. Having memorized this oft-quoted verse since my childhood, I'd come to believe that if I acknowledge the sovereignty of God in my life (or, as some translations say, "make him known" to others) that he is obligated to straighten out my paths and make the way before me easy and sure. Yet, nearly every time I ask to hear his voice of direction lately, the only words I comprehend are "Trust Me." 

In order to trust God, we've got to give up our own understanding of things.  The Hebrew word "Understanding" in this verse is  biynah, which according to Strong's Concordance  means "knowledge, meaning, [idiomatically] perfectly" and comes from biyn the meanings of which include: "separate mentally (or distinguish); attend, consider; be cunning; diligently; feel, inform, instruct, have intelligence; look well to, perceive, be prudent.... be skillful; think....."  There are many verses in Proverbs that tell us to seek this kind of understanding, but Prov 3:5 says that leaning on our own version of these things keeps us from trusting God, and honestly, if we do lean on this understanding, it is sin.  Frankly, thinking is one my biggest problems -- I get to thinking, and can't stop.  I roll things over and over in my head, according to my own understanding.  And when I can't stop thinking, I can't start trusting. 

"Trust" is batach and has a much deeper meaning that is going to take some meditating upon to really soak it in.  It is a primitive root that literally means "refuge" and by extension has come to mean "to trust, be confident, or sure; be bold (confident, secure, sure); careless; make to hope; (put, make to trust)."

So let me reword that cliche-sounding verse that we think we all know so well:
"Be confident, bold, and even careless or carefree, as you make yourself hope in the Lord and stay within the refuge of him.  Be fully confident and secure in his ability to take care of you.  Do not depend on your intelligence, cunning, or prudence.  Your consideration and perception are insufficient, so let go of them and stop looking to your mind's ability to properly sort things out or instruct you in any way."

The next phrase expounds on this meaning:  "In all your ways acknowledge him.... "
What does acknowledge mean these days?  My Microsoft thesaurus links it to words like recognize or greet.  When you're in a conversation and someone else walks in the room, you might smile or nod toward them to acknowledge their presence.  If someone does something important, their companny may give them a  VIP award and ask them to make a speech, in order to "acknowledge" their accomplishment.  But is that the kind of acknowledgement that makes the Almighty stoop down from heaven and take notice of my little path? Perhaps it is giant fanfare that he wants, or non-stop witnessing?  Look at what Strong's says: yada = "to know (ascertain by seeing)" It includes "... acquainted with... assuredly... be aware; for a certainty; comprehend, consider, discover; familiar friend; famous; feel; kinsman; (cause to) know; lie by a man... mark, perceive, privy to...."  This is much different than what I've ever been taught!  So let us again rephrase the cliche:
"In all your ways, know God!  Ascertain who he is by seeing him!  Become acquainted with and comprehend him with certainty, as you would a relative or dear familiar friend.  Discover who he is.  Perceive what he is doing and by familiarity become privy to his secrets... and he will direct your paths."

See, it's not about manipulation.  "If I make a big enough deal about God, he'll help me."

Nor is it about assumption.  "I know God (as in, I'm saved), so whatever comes across my path must be his will."

It is about intimacy.  A well-cared for child does not ask permission from her parents on every tiny little detail.  She is acquainted with them and what they would do or ask of her.  She knows what they will say because she has already studied them and knows their habits and character.  They have told her things they haven't told other children; she has been let in on family secrets that help her understand their choices and idiosyncracies... even understand herself. When her own understanding fails her, she can come into the refuge of their greater knowledge, let go of her cares and leave her troubles to their trustworthy wisdom. All because she "knows" them.

No earthly parent truely or adequately fills the above scenario, but whether your parents come close or are the complete antithesis, God is perfect.  He is trustworthy.  He is know-able.  Knowing him, and not our mind, will direct our paths.

The ABC's

Accessing
Blessing for a
Creative
Destiny and
Everlasting
Favor,
Gaining
Heaven through
Intimacy with
Jesus, and
Keeping
Love's
Majesty
Near, we
Open
Portals to
Quintessential
Revelation and
Shining
Truth for
Utterly
Victorious
Warfare and
eXploits in
Yeshua's
Zeal.