I daily forget how simple salvation is meant to be. I want to be sanctified, made holy so I can be satisfied. Yet I fail to realize that I am seeking to lay hold of a feeling that comes from me, and not God.
I am looking for self-affirmation, and delight that comes from taking stock in all that I am, and being able to say, without reservation, “This is what it’s all about! I am on the right track, I do the right things, and I am known and accepted for being all these things. Where is God? I need Him no more.”
I believe that I will be happy when I am sure that I am perfect — or at least when I am so distracted from all my petty imperfections (yes, that’s how I naturally see my sin!) that I can think I am safe; safe, from all reproach and anguish over any lack in me.
Without the reminder that my joy in beauty and majesty can rest upon me, though it rest not in me, I look for ways to prove that beauty can begin and end with me. I think that that will be all the comfort I need when I feel dull or empty inside. I will need only to pinch and wake myself up to the reality that I am more than I think.
Yet, the truth is, as much as I try over and over again to prove my theory, I grow disillusioned by it’s inability to satisfy my cravings for real beauty — Beauty that doesn’t depend on who I am or what I do; Beauty that just is; Beauty that invites me to sit down and enjoy it, or lose my breath as I get close to inspect it’s traces of the unseen and untainted.
I can only hold beauty to the extent that I hold fast to Him who is Beauty and grace. If I am wrapped up in myself, and what I want to be, I miss it. Beauty has passed me by, or rather, I have missed Beauty because I never thought to look about me.
In resigning myself to worshiping who I am rather than who I was made for, I have missed the point of who am: A vessel, with the privilege of possessing the living water, which is Christ; a temple, to be filled with the very Presence of the Spirit of God.
This afternoon God pointed out to me that I miss everything — and I do mean everything — when I don’t treat Him as the One He is.
In Him I have all the Beauty and Perfection I could want, all that my spirit craves, and yet I wander around, wondering why my spirit thirsts for more, when every where I look the emptiness remains, seemingly designed to convince me that I am misled about there being anything else.
But, turn around! Christ is; He never changes, and He does not cease to be interminable simply because I stop choosing to recognize it.
Salvation according to Christ really looks like Him, and not me. I am most aware of life and what it means when I am most aware of Him, and who He is.
Rather than being caught up in listless living, let me be caught up in Life and all that He declares Himself to be.
He says He is Light — then why do I keep praying like He might be darkness if I don’t continue to petition Him?
He says He is Salvation — where then do I get this idea that I will be lost or left alone because He may not be willing to rescue me?
He says He is Strength — how then, do I think it is possible for Him to be anything close to the weakness I see in myself?
He says He is Life — Oh, when will I forsake these lies that living and abiding in Him could somehow produce death that would not ultimately mean more life?
Let us therefore set our eyes on Him, who is all that we long to know and need to experience, by learning 1) to rejoice in who He proclaims Himself to be, and 2) forsake who Satan would proclaim Him to be. Having done these things, we will find ourselves overwhelmed by His love — the Truth that we have cast ourselves upon.
At Home with God 