Have you ever walked through that desert with God? The one where, no matter how hard you look, you can’t seem to find Him? When, in fact, the harder you look, the farther away He seems to be? I’ve been there lately. For a WHILE. But this morning, God sent me a love note through a friend. I love it how He shows up right when I’m on my knees and the most desperate for Him. He’s like that, isn’t He? Right where we need Him.
Now, on to our Word for this Wednesday! Be ready for II Timothy next week, and please, drop down into the comments and share your thoughts on I Timothy!
I Timothy 1:12 (NIV)–I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me faithful, appointing me to his service.
God considers me faithful enough to serve Him. Me. Me who, just this morning, was literally on my knees crying because I’m so wretched and I get things so wrong. Me. Who has royally messed up big time at points in my life, and who messes up in countless ways every day. Me. Who balks and cries and yells and screams and judges and criticizes and completely misses the mark and goes my own way and sometimes wants the world more than anything. Me. Who, by every other standard, would never measure up.
But God lets me serve Him. He slips on those Jesus glasses and looks at me through the sacrifice of my Savior. He doesn’t see me how I am, filthy and wrong and broken. He sees me as I can be, as I will be. He sees me the way He created me, the way He wants me to be. Because of what Jesus did on the Cross, God doesn’t see me the same way. Right now, even as I type this, there are tears. God loves me bigger than I can ever begin to fathom.
He loves me so much that He calls me. It makes me think back to the very worst thing I ever did. If you’ve been here very long, you know I struggled for ten years to forgive myself. God forgave me. He helped me to forgive everyone else. He helped me forgive myself (which took a whole lot longer). And then… He took that massively awful thing, turned it on its head, and used it. He. Used. It. He took this awful thing I did and made the other side of it beautiful for Him, for His glory, to help others. Nothing in our lives is wasted. He can even use the bad. That floors me. I mean that literally. That realization has actually laid me on my face in the floor before, crying before Him, because He is just that amazing and that good and that holy and that loving.
It reminds me of the song that made me cry for an hour coming back from ACFW Conference last year. This is all so heavy on me this morning, I have a feeling someone besides me needs to know it. God’s like that. We don’t travel roads alone, and we don’t travel them just for our sake. There is always someone else to touch. I love Him. I love Him so much…
-JB
Dawn Lucowitz says
1 Timothy 4:7-8 – Have nothing to do with godless myths and old wives’ tales; rather, train yourself to be godly. For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.
I love, love, love this verse right now. For the last 2 years I’ve worked very hard to get myself back into good shape physically. For my 31st birthday I bought myself p90x and did it faithfully. For my 32nd birthday I decided to train for a half marathon, which I completed (and reached both of my goals). At the same time I was doing these things, I knew I also needed to really work harder on my faith journey. I invited…actually begged, God into my training with me. I knew I needed to lean on him. I knew I needed to rededicate my life to him and really get into His Word. The half marathon, up to this point in my life, has been the most humbling and spiritual thing I have ever done.
Well, now I’m another year older and wanted another challenge for myself. I had no idea where this year’s challenge was going to take me. I prayed on it (but not nearly as much as I should have) and thought about it often. This year, I am memorizing the book of James (along with a friend back at Fort Campbell). I am horrible when it comes to memorizing anything. But, I know I can do this, in time. It may literally take me the entire year, but what better way to spend a year that focusing on memorizing God’s word. This also forces me to meditate on His Word as well (since I am focusing on a verse ever day or so). I do think there is something to say for keeping our bodies in good shape physically, and I believe God wants us to take care of the temple he created and dwells in, but I understand that we must train to be godly. I am not saying just memorizing a book of the bible is going to make me godly, but I believe that this is a practice that will keep me focused in the right direction. It is something that I must discipline myself to do until it becomes second nature (like working out).
I also love that we are being told to train to be godly. This implies to me that we are not just godly. It doesn’t just happen. It is something that we must all work at.