free

the Lord gave me a heart-check sunday night during worship. i'm pretty sure He arranged the set list Himself...

before the ring, my friends and i were trying to figure out what we each had planned for new year's eve (we're obviously the most organized bunch of people EVER...). to a person, we all just wanted to see the year gone - no celebration, no party, no midnight countdown... not even particularly looking forward to the new year, just glad that the old one was gone.

suffice it to say that it was a hard year... for a lot of us.

but then something crazy happened. as we began to worship, as we approached the throne room, God's presence was all around us. i mean, it was like He was sitting right there, with the train of His robe filling the room (see isaiah 6:1). my heart was open, my spirit soaring - and i realized that my attitude and comments about 2006 were so inaccurate, so unfaithful, so ungrateful, and so dishonoring to my Lord...

yes, circumstantially, 2006 was a tough year. just a quick glance over the posts on this blog will attest to that. however - and this is a huge however - spiritually, 2006 was one of the best years of my life. i don't know that i've drawn closer to Jesus, depended on Him more, learned more about Him, or fell in love with Him like i did this past year. He and i have been through some rough times together, but there was something different about 2006 - something intentional. He pursued me, stretched me, broke me, loved me - all the way through it.

and what's even crazier is that He continues on pursuing me. He hasn't stopped. i don't have a clue what 2007 holds... and that's ok with me. am i really called to seattle? should i just find a job? how do i make a career change? how do i learn to live from my heart, and learn how to offer that to others? i really don't know, and i really am ok with that... most of the time. yes, i get frustrated. yes, i get impatient. but at the end of the day, i still believe that i'm supposed to wait... on Him. as a friend told me tonight, she feels like i'm supposed to be waiting while the supporting cast gets into costume and on stage. that's as good as an analogy as any for this situation.

so, although i couldn't work up the courage to actually speak into a microphone to brag on Jesus, i hope i made up for it here. josh encouraged us to learn from the times where He has already proven His faithfulness, to embrace that Truth today - today - not the last time we saw it, not when a crisis hits - today. He is faithful... all the time. he used psalm 95 to point us to Jesus:

1 Come, let us sing for joy to the LORD;
let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation.
2 Let us come before him with thanksgiving
and extol him with music and song.
3 For the LORD is the great God,
the great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are the depths of the earth,
and the mountain peaks belong to him.
5 The sea is his, for he made it,
and his hands formed the dry land.
6 Come, let us bow down in worship,
let us kneel before the LORD our Maker;
for he is our God
and we are the people of his pasture,
the flock under his care.
Today, if you hear his voice,
8 do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah,
as you did that day at Massah in the desert,
9 where your fathers tested and tried me,
though they had seen what I did.
10 For forty years I was angry with that generation;
I said, "They are a people whose hearts go astray,
and they have not known my ways."
11 So I declared on oath in my anger,
"They shall never enter my rest."

i walked away from that night free again. there is a freedom that Christ came to give us, that He intends for us to live in. why is it that we so easily give that up? i had been slowly wilting under the weight of trying to make the right decisions about my life - as if the Lord can't fix what i screw up - all that He cares about is that i'm seeking His face, His voice, His will... HIM. it's not mine to fix. it's not up to me. it's all Him... and i'm all HIS. and THAT, my friends, is what counts. if, at the end of the day, i can look in the mirror and honestly say that i sought Him out that day, then i can most assuredly rest in His promise that declares us His flock, under His care.

HE will not fail US (joshua 1).