Monday, July 23, 2012

Lord,
How discontent have I been these last couple of days?  Wickedly discontent.

Good timing for a lesson today about Psalm 90 and the importance of numbering my days and not wasting my life.

Nothing surprises You.  You are sovereign.  (I love the word "sovereign.")

You know the wickedness of our hearts, the secret darkness lurking in thoughts we would never willingly allow to escape.

The heart is deceitfully wicked.  Who can know it?
Answer: You.  You know it.  I try to mask and pretend even around You that I'm not as awful as I am, but then I realize that I'm vainly striving to convince You of anything other than reality.  And it is so much better, so much more freeing to just honestly and humbly confess the depravity of my thoughts and beg You to change me, to cause me to be grateful because in everything You have a great purpose: to cause me to be better and more like You, to help and comfort others who will later walk this same path, and for me to desire heaven more.

Change, comfort, fill me.  You know me so well.  I am so glad.

the truth about history

History is not a limited territory with defined borders that can be contained, conquered, and controlled.  It is instead a vast and limitless ocean that can only be explored and charted.  The farther you sail into the ocean of world history, the more you realize it is a journey with no end.  However, you can drop anchor at any point and probe the depths of world history where you are, and those anchors can become permanent places in your children's minds.  People, events and ideas are the anchors that will hold history in place for your children.  Your goal is not to try to cover the entire ocean surface of world history, which would require a very fast and shallow trip, but rather to pick some specific routes, stop at the most interesting places, and out down as many historical anchors as you can.  The more anchors you can create, the easier it will be for your children to begin to sort out and make sense of world history.  The best way to create those anchors is through reading whole, living books that make history come alive.
~Clay & Sally Clarkson

Monday, July 16, 2012

less of me


Circumstances of life sure have a way of blindsiding you sometimes. And yet we know that God uses everything in a life to grow us so long as we respond appropriately.

I wonder sometimes how many weird, unpredictable, outrageous things can come into a life? How many times have I said: “Really?! Who does this happen to?!” The answer is me and others who don't want a plain old apathetic, complacent existence. And it's ok.  I want radical. I want turn-the-world-upside-down-and-shake-it-up. I want to come to the kingdom for such a time as this. And I know that if I truly want to live for Him, then crazy stuff will flow my way.

Rejection happens.
Bad-decisions-turned-redemption-stories happen.
Miracles happen.
Love stories happen.
Crazy relatives happen.
Success happens.
Marginalization happens.
Slander happens.

How will I respond?
MORE of You, Jesus, and less, less, less of me.