Experiencing the Miracle of Gratefulness...Some Sort of Perfect Storm...Clinging

I have hesitated to write this post...knowing the minute I speak of this publicly, I open myself up for spiritual attack or to fall miserably on my face. Probably both.

But, I'm too encouraged...

invigorated...

full of peace and joy...

strengthened...

in awe...

and grateful...

...not to share this.

Over the past few weeks, something miraculous has occurred in my heart. God is changing me, and I am in awe. I'm not sure if it's an answer to prayers being lifted up on my behalf....or if it's the miracle of learning eucharisteo as I read Ann Voskamp's One Thousand Gifts...the simplicity of offering a steady stream of thanksgiving directly to the Lord, in everything, watching my own list growing each day...embracing the gift of right now. Gratefulness is a powerful thing. How could something so simple bring such unlimited joy and cover our lives with such grace?

It could also be the fact that my friend Dinah seems to have left behind pieces of her legacy within me and others who love her...inspiring me to be more, to be free, to be the person He created me to be. I can see her now, among the "cloud of witnesses", encouraging us from heaven, cheering the loudest. Strange how in the midst of the missing, something else has risen....inspiration, strength, courage, grace, freedom. How can that even be?

Perhaps it's the perfect storm of all of the above. After all, He makes all things beautiful in His time. Perhaps it's all coming together just as He planned it.

All I know is that, while the circumstances of this imperfect life have remained the same, I am changing.

A heavy burden is lifting. Granted, it's only been a recent change. But for right now...I'm going to embrace this gift and give thanks for it.

I am sleeping at night and have all week (This hasn't happened much in the past four years). Good sleep. Enough sleep.

I am resisting the temptation to eat unhealthy foods, and not complaining about it.

The gratefulness is replacing all desire to complain and wallow. It's taking away the attitude of "I don't wanna" and replacing it with "I get to"...taking away the desire to resist what I know I should be doing, replacing it with a big "Cowboy up, Chicken Little, and do the next thing!" (In case this message wasn't clear enough, my pastor threw in a bit in last week's message about how we look like two year olds throwing a temper tantrum when we whine and don't do what we know we should do...and God looks down and says, "Get over it!" Don't get me wrong...I love me some grace and mercy...and God gives both generously. But there is a time when a loving Father says...Let's move on...it will do no good to stay here and wallow. In other words, "Get over it!") I'm not speaking about grief. That's a different thing all together. I am talking about the things I make excuses for...not giving Him all of me, not doing my devotions, having wrong attitudes, going to other things, like food, for comfort.

I didn't even consider how powerful simply focusing on the gifts God has given in each moment would be in every area of my life. In high school, I had an Algebra teacher who used to always say, "It's a great day! You get to do Algebra! You don't have to...you get to." When I was a teenager, it was a bit annoying. That man, a lover of Jesus, who was also my pastor back in my baby Christian days, knew the gift of gratefulness. He had the right attitude. I feel that same fervor for life seeping into my heart, renewing me. When I feel tempted to say, "I don't wanna"...it is quickly replaced with "I get to...live this day, go to my job, cook for this family, help this child with his homework, listen to that child play his guitar, wash these dishes, settle into this bed at the end of the day beside this man that I love." I get to!

Another day...really?

Is being transformed to...

Another day! Really!! What a gift!

Crazy, huh?

I'm embracing it.

--------------------

One more thing...on the subject of "clinging"...

Have you ever considered the word "cling" in The Old Rugged Cross? I never had...until the day we stood side by side, singing at Dinah's funeral. Tim's guitar music gently guided, and I sang the words. And, when I reached the chorus, my voice quivered for a moment as I sang,

So I’ll cherish the old rugged cross,
Till my trophies at last I lay down;
I will cling to the old rugged cross,
And exchange it some day for a crown.


"I will cling to the old rugged cross...and exchange it some day
                                             for a crown."

A crown which I will lay at His feet. I remember when Dinah and I talked about how He will turn our struggles, and our clinging to Him into crowns one day. Crowns we can lay at His feet in an act of worship. She had just gone Home, and I stood in  her church, singing about the crowns and the clinging. And..He met me there.

You know, He always meets us there. Where ever He asks us to go, He is faithful to meet us there.

And, He's here, right now...in the laying down of my trophies, in the learning to cling to the cross ever closer.

In all of it, He is there.

A New WWY...a Picture of Grief and Why He Told me to Cling

There's a new Walking With You post up on that blog...a post where I get honest about grief. God choosing the word cling for me this year is making even more sense as I reflect this morning.

Turn your eyes upon Jesus...look full in His wonderful face. And the things of this earth will grow strangely dim...in the light of His glory and grace...

Cling

I'm always late to the party.

And, this time is no exception.

When 2011 dawned, many people were writing about choosing a word that would encompass this year for them. Maybe it's a word that God had whispered to their hearts...a word holding a promise of what was to come...or a word that held a special meaning, a message just for them.

I don't know who started this practice, and truth be told, I just heard of it this year. As a lover of words, myself, I'm not sure how I've missed out on this for so long. Even after reading about other people's inspiring words for 2011, I didn't choose one for myself. Not right away. I'm a procrastinator like that. Hence...the always being late to the party...or where ever else I happen to be going.

Besides...there was a stirring in my heart that the word needed to choose me....

You know...if there was even going to be a word at all...

I put it aside like a faithful procrastinator...too busy to contemplate the perfect word. I'm the type of person who can't choose a restaurant to have lunch, and I almost always regret what I choose to eat...wishing I would have chosen something else. It's hard enough to make decisions and commitments that I have to make. I certainly wasn't going to seek one out. And, especially not such a weighty decision as what word would encompass and define this entire year. No, thank you.

But, when something seeks you...

When God tugs at your heart, stirring in your depths, pursuing your wandering gaze, demanding your attention with a persistence that is both relentless and full of gentle speaking grace...

Well, now...that's a different thing entirely....

A word began to form, deep inside my depths. Such a quiet whisper, I'm not sure how I even heard it. It resonated, barely a thought, but already part of me. Small and still, but clear and resolutely there all at the same time...

Cling...

I tried to shake it away. Cling? That's going to be the word...my word?? What does that even mean? Even as I asked, I knew. The word had already staked it's claim. My spirit knew. Even in the knowing, I resisted.

But, when He pursues you...

With one word....

With one breath...one thought...one look of His eyes...

Sometime in January, my in real life friend, Lynette, called. My little prayer warrior friend, the tiny woman with four boys who prays mighty prayers. Lynette had heard a teaching on the radio about the concept of choosing a word to focus on for the year. Allowing God to speak to your heart and mull it over, chewing on what He has to say about that particular concept in your life.

I smiled knowingly....in awe of His pursuit, but not surprised. He is faithful like that...

Again, the word Cling sprang immediately to my heart...but I didn't speak it with my lips. I heard myself say instead that some blogger friends had been talking about this very thing. She and I committed to pray about the word God would have us focus on for the coming year. We would then share the word with each other and encourage one another with what God had to show us.

I did pray...

But, each time I came to Him, the bold whisper....His answer...was there before I could make the request. Even as I prayed about other things, it was there...bubbling up...piercing through. How can a whisper be so certain, so full of authority, so unrelenting?

Really?

That's the word?

Finally, as I drove in the car alone one day last week, listening to JJ Heller's hauntingly beautiful, naked-hearted voice, pondering all the anxieties that plague our hearts...all the weighty things of this world that entangle us, stealing our joy, stifling and choking the very life from our lungs, all the broken places that keep us from being the people we were created to be...His word...the word He was offering to me...nay the word He had bestowed upon me...the word that had chosen me...pierced through my thoughts again, with it's attention-demanding whisper.

Cling...

I yielded, allowing the word to claim me with it's embrace, washing over me as I embraced it right back.

What would I cling to as I flail through the coming year with all my imperfections? For comfort, for peace, for joy, for wisdom....would I cling to my stinky onion layers, or would I reach for Him? Would I cling to the hem of His garment as if my life depended on it? There is a lot of letting go involved in the act of clinging to Him.

Not wanting my own thoughts to pollute the truth He wanted to speak into my life, I typed the word cling into the bible gateway search....

He spoke...

Deuteronomy 30:19-20 (New King James Version)

I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live; that you may love the LORD your God, that you may obey His voice, and that you may cling to Him, for He is your life and the length of your days; and that you may dwell in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give them.”
(emphasis and italics mine)

If there were nothing else said, that would be enough. The above words are enough for my heart to ponder for a lifetime. Scripture to base not only this year on...but the length of my days...being led by those words.

Yet...there is more...

A loving warning should we choose to cling to something else...

Joshua 23:11-13 (New King James Version)
Therefore take careful heed to yourselves, that you love the LORD your God. Or else, if indeed you do go back, and cling to the remnant of these nations—these that remain among you—and make marriages with them, and go in to them and they to you, know for certain that the LORD your God will no longer drive out these nations from before you. But they shall be snares and traps to you, and scourges on your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from this good land which the LORD your God has given you.

Instead, may this be the cry of my heart...

Psalm 101:3 (New King James Version)

I will set nothing wicked before my eyes;
I hate the work of those who fall away;
It shall not cling to me.

And, may this be my daily prayer...


Psalm 63 (New International Version, ©2010)

You, God, are my God,
earnestly I seek you;
I thirst for you,
my whole being longs for you,
in a dry and parched land
where there is no water.

I have seen you in the sanctuary
and beheld your power and your glory.
Because your love is better than life,
my lips will glorify you.

I will praise you as long as I live,
and in your name I will lift up my hands.
I will be fully satisfied as with the richest of foods;
with singing lips my mouth will praise you.

On my bed I remember you;
I think of you through the watches of the night.
Because you are my help,
I sing in the shadow of your wings.
I cling to you; your right hand upholds me.

If I'm not clinging to Him, what am I clinging to? One brings life, and the other death. Much to ponder in the coming year, and for the length of my days.

And, yet...such beautiful simplicity.

One, whispered word....

Cling...