Intimacy, Simplicty, and a Lot of Trash

So recently I've been just trying to understand intimacy with God. Not the cliche, run of the mill use of the word intimacy but the kind that stops you and causes your life as you once knew it to come to a halt. The kind of intimacy with God that reveals parts of your character that you thought were only other people's problems. Then you can't believe you even thought such a horrifying thing as you are able to admit how hodge-podge, cluttered and inconsistent your life actually is. Or the kind of intimacy that by real grace allows you to feel and know and see and hear and smell God in a way where words just won't do and you realize that the previous kind of intimacy is OK too and just as valid.

Rest and attention to Sabbath has caused intimacy with God to grow way beyond what I would have ever conceived. That has caused me to see the clutter and frankly the absurd parts of my life. The book The Rest of God catalyzed this too. Buchanan argues that as Christians we have lost “the rest of God—the rest God bestows.” “In a culture where busyness is a fetish and
stillness is laziness, rest is sloth....Sabbath is both a day and an attitude to nurture such stillness. It is both a time on the calendar and a disposition of the heart. It is a day we enter, but just as much a way we see. Sabbath imparts the rest of God—the things of God’s nature and presence we miss in our busyness.”

As I began to catch on that my life is still to cluttered, I'm consuming WAY too much, intimacy is possibly much more simple than I've thought and Sabbath still hard to protect... I heard these two ways of life contrasted:

The American Way
Risk early
Find groove
Settle and establish
Earn and save
Consolidate and maintain speed
Retire and coast
Die

God's Way
Follow me with abandonment at every age with eager expectation that I can use your life for my purposes.
Risk always
Never completely settle
Be different
Be mine
Die glorious

As I watch my generation figure out life with Jesus and Church/church I am hopeful that there are people whose lives really will look more like God's way rather than the American Way. Granted, we're all in the "risk early" stage so the jury is still out to some degree... but I see evidence of simple, and thick and textured fabric being woven into us. Fabric that will weather storms and be able to carry people to be feet of Jesus. This thick, rich, textured fabric is character and mission. God's character is what weaves strong chords of texture in our lives. The journey of what it takes to build character possibly adds the colors.

Mission is what is driving the whole thing...the speed in the needle I guess. "Jesus, undeterred, went right ahead and gave his charge: 'God authorized and commanded me to commission you: Go out and train everyone you meet, far and near, in this way of life, marking them by baptism in the threefold name: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Then instruct them in all the practice of all I have commanded you. I'll be with you as you do this, day after day, right up to the end of the age.'" Matthew 28:18-20

But we must stay closely connected to intimacy and mission. I heard it said well last Sunday that you must be "absolutely resolute in his delight for you....unless we're really able to live in the reality that we are loved and absolutely desired by a God who loves you, it will be really hard to trust him. He has ideas about you that you don't yet know about. There is a story built into the fabric of your life that God is absolutely determined to tell if we'll let him. We have not been made for just the America thing."

So what's the result? What am I doing? What changed? I am starting where I am, not where I am not. So far....

I cleaned out my room.

The pictures are my desk before and after (you can't see the other 2 crates of books and 2 of files...but you get the idea.) And today I filled up another trash bag of clothes to give away.

I'm reclaiming Sabbath, pursuing intimacy, and simplifying.

(It occured I gave no credit where it was due. The following people contributed whether they know it or not: Louie Giglio via Isaac Anderson, Shelley Winkler, Tom Brawner, Mark Buchanan)

Powered by ScribeFire.