Am I down on any of these things? Oh, not at all, but the Lord says that He has plans and ways that are not like ours, and like my pastor talking about the mess of the back of a tapestry, there is a day when the Lord's plans look like a beautiful piece of artwork, His poema. That's my life. That's your life, if you belong to Jesus and give it to Him. We only get to see the mess most of the time and He gets to see the artwork He is creating, but every once in awhile, He might turn it around to give us a glimpse that that mess was His handiwork and the other side of it is incredibly beautiful because He is doing it!
How do you avert that identity crisis? Well, I am watching our oldest go through it, and I believe that even as off track as he has been, it only takes the Lord a moment to solve this for us if we will humble ourselves before Him and ask Him to solve it. We just have to want the Lord to show us and be led by Him rather than attempting to blaze our own trail and do things our own way. We have an identity crisis for that reason to begin with. The fall of man in the Garden of Eden was created from a departure from the Lord, His plans and ways and man thinking the Lord was holding out the good stuff. We are truly kidding ourselves when we think that doing it our way, smacking with such pride, coated over with indignation and pain from our past hurts and mistakes, is brave and makes so much sense and then we have the unmitigated gall of seeking encouragement from others who will support our delusions rather than seeking the Lord and those who know Him who will speak His truth into our lives and saylet us know own way looks like a tornado made touch down everywhere we have walked.
Oh, harsh, I know, but really, is that not the truth? There are some who pull this off and it looks prettier on the surface or from the fence they have built that only allows you to get so close, but underneath, not so, kind of like our current home. It was 9 years old when we bought it and figured we had a good base and would update and do some things to it to personalize it as we lived in it. Well, no matter how those walls looked, once you got the speed square out or took off a switchplate or outlet cover to put something prettier on, all you would end up seeing is the nothing was square and that the part was the cheapest one made in China not hooked up correctly and that we were just lucky we hadn't had a fire....and it happened over and over again. Same thing with those who want to do that. Some might just decide not to pull off anymore switchplates when they know they are just going to find a new mess. Trouble with that is that it's a bad plan if you want to keep your house from catching on fire at some point. We need not be fooled thinking that others aren't as much of a mess as us. Not so. It's those who trust in Jesus with their lives who have their walls put into square, even if they have to be ripped down, who are no longer in danger of fire because they were totally rewired and given brand new parts put in correctly!
It's the identity crisis that leads us either into the arms of Jesus and ends it with the beginning of a new life in Him or straight to hell with sincere intensions to stay ignorant and distracted or to fool ourselves into thinking we are making a good show of it. Those who know Jesus, as flawed as they will always be as humans, they know the truth and will continue speaking it into the life of the one who is still lost. Better for the storms in life to be circumstantial and we held steady through it, than the storm being inside us and we are tossed every which way and lucky if we survive. If you are in the world without the Lord, you are "lucky" to survive. If you have the Lord, you don't even have to spend a moment worrying, about anything!
So there was a passage in the Bible that I planned to get to with all this, and I was thinking about our oldest because he is almost done with the first part of discipleship and getting ready to enter very much unwillingly into the next part where there is much more interaction with the world and feet on the Word of God being fed into him these last weeks to see if he cannot get beyond an identity crisis and wondering what is next . Jesus said in Luke 8:22-25:
" 22 Now it happened, on a certain day, that He got into a boat with His disciples. And He said to them, “Let us cross over to the other side of the lake.” And they launched out. 23 But as they sailed He fell asleep. And a windstorm came down on the lake, and they were filling with water, and were in jeopardy. 24 And they came to Him and awoke Him, saying, “Master, Master, we are perishing!”
Then He arose and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water. And they ceased, and there was a calm. 25 But He said to them, “Where is your faith?”
And they were afraid, and marveled, saying to one another, “Who can this be? For He commands even the winds and water, and they obey Him!”
When you get into the boat with Jesus, you are going to make it. He didn't say that trouble wasn't going to be part of the crossing, but He said, "Let us cross over to the other side of the lake." When you get into the boat with Jesus, you are going to make it. It won't be easy, and if you read your Bible, you find out that He tells us that too many times! I don't know, y'all (that is whoever reads this), but you want to go it alone through the storms that life brings that only the One who controls them knows about and see how it turns out or would you rather get into His boat and let Him rebuke the wind and the raging of the water for you and know that what He commands must come to pass down to the last detail? Faith is not some arbitrary, intangible thing, as some say when they tell you, "Just have faith." Oh, baloney! That is not how that works or what that means. Stop ripping the Words of the Living God out of context and misapplying them by voiding Him out of His Own Words!
My faith is in Jesus. It's not random and being led and cared for by the Lord involves Him imputing His strength to me. I have to admit that whatever it is that I have, it's not strength at all when I compare it to His and what He has is so much better and more effective. What I have is a lack and need that He alone can fill. When I sit down in a chair, I know it will support me and I don't spend my time worrying about it collapsing underneath me. That is my relationship with Jesus as well. I know He is not going to collapse underneath my weight. He is able to hold me in His hands. And He is more than able to hold our struggling son as well and anyone else too and forever solve the question of who each of us is: His! And then the next quandry as well of what to do about all my needs and plans for my life. He will fill them and He has plans for us already (Ep 2:10).
My Jesus spoke His Word in my heart this morning as I slept and I woke up with Matthew 6 in my heart:
25 “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?
28 “So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; 29 and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
31 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble."
Verse 33 is the answer to the human condition of identity. Seek the kingdom of God first and His righteousness and all the other things that we need will be taken care of---note, not by us, but by the Lord Himself! He does the "added unto you" part.
Jesus, as John accounts, prayed for those who would become His;
"9 I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours. 10 And all Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine, and I am glorified in them. 11 Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me,[b] that they may be one as We are. 12 While I was with them in the world,[c] I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept;[d] and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. 13 But now I come to You, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves. 14 I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 15 I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 17 Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth. 18 As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. 19 And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth." Jn 17:9-19
I love this. Jesus prayed for me and for all those who are going to answer His call to come to Him for rest. Sanctify means to be set apart as holy or for a special purpose. The world has one way, and Jesus has one that is not only different, but that the world will never receive and is emnity to it, yet He prayed not that we would be taken out of it but keep us from Satan and set apart for the special purpose of God in Christ, which is to be a light set high up on a hill for Him making Him known, His holy name, not our own, His purposes which is salvation of souls from perishing, not our own which are selfish and glorify ourselves. The more you get to know Jesus, the more you realize how ridiculous the world is and how ridiculous you are when you follow after it. The way of the world is the broadway leading to hell, not to Heaven, and going the opposite direction of the Creator of all. The world isn't going to tell you that, by the way. They are apparently going to tell you to do it your way, that you can buy a pair of shoes that will make you think you can conquer the world (yes, that magazine actually wrote that!) or that couples that take Lexapro stay together (yes, there was an entire article espousing this as truth). No wonder our nation and our world are crumbling around us! Apparently, most are seeking this advice out and then following it to the letter!
Sigh. Really, this seems good and makes sense to millions? What can I say but tell you that surely you have a Creator who has something better for you than magical pumps and an antidepressant!
I will end with this: the Lord is amazing and when I finally humbled myself as I read His Word and understood that what was missing in my life was a contrite heart that would bow down only before the One who made me and repent (which means that I agree with Him and turn to Him and give Him control of things by His Spirit and follow His holy Words by the power of His Spirit) of my sins and receive the forgiveness He wants to give the one who asks, I will receive that and so much more, including an identity that makes me accepted in the Beloved as one of His sheep who dwells with Him eternally fed with the Bread of Life and given Living Water than eternally quenches my soul.
23 The Lord is my shepherd;
I shall not want.
2 He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside the still waters.
3 He restores my soul;
He leads me in the paths of righteousness
For His name’s sake.
4 Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil;
For You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
I will fear no evil;
For You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil;
My cup runs over.
6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
All the days of my life;
And I will dwell[a] in the house of the Lord
Forever.
You anoint my head with oil;
My cup runs over.
6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
All the days of my life;
And I will dwell[a] in the house of the Lord
Forever.
Amen!
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