Have you read Ecclesiastes lately?  I just finished reading through much of it this morning for my Bible reading.  I’m using The Message right now for my Bible reading and the wording in it is stark.  I’ve always known this book to be sobering but this morning it was not only sobering but it also sucks the life right out of me.  The preface to the book states that Solomon leaves to the other 65 books of the Bible to give Godly direction.  Its conclusion is that man’s life is meaningless on its own.  I’ve been, as I’ve already stated, journaling to Father God of late.  This has been its own sobering piece for me and in a good way.  However, as I stated yesterday, the ministry of Aslan Christian Academy is seemingly stuck and no matter what man (the board) does, it just stays stuck.  One member prayed yesterday for us to see this time as God preparing us for the next step.  There is simply a longer wait between the steps.  For me it feels like I’m in quicksand.  This is why Ecclesiastes is so striking this morning.  Man’s ways are just so futile when they are not completing God’s Kingdom work.  Even when they are doing just that there are these moments when man wants to move it along to his timetable–that’s me right now.  I’ve got to surrender myself and wait to see what God is doing.

I am also finding that I do this too with my relationships.  When things aren’t going as planned (in my head but not stated) I can get frustrated.  This is true whether with my children or my grandkids.  The choices being made when we get to our teen years aren’t always the best.  Boy, would I like to help out here–yet I know better.  I know that I must be reliant on God’s leadership and respond with wisdom, not quick reaction.  This ties right into what Solomon also says in Ecclesiastes.

The last thing about times like these is that I fall prey to temptation and that old belief that I can’t move forward because I’m not worthy to do so.  I also surely can’t be helping anyone with their own life for the same reason.  The old temptations to “flee to the cave” return with a vengeance.  I know better than to stay here, but the tempter is never going to give up his chance in taking advantage of these times.  I’ll be glad when more light is shed on some items, but in the meantime, I’m going to be faithful one day at a time, one moment at a time.

This morning I am simply wishing I didn’t have to write.  It seems that anything I’m working with or addressing has skid marks all around it.  Nothing is moving forward.  God has already told me to trust Him and His timing.  It just awakens in me how much I need to learn about fully trusting.  It is so easy to trust when all is falling into sync.  This morning I have a meeting of the board for the Aslan Christian Academy–the boarding facility for juvenile girls who have been removed from the streets for prostitution.  We have looked at so many pieces of property and had two that were most promising declined due to the community not wanting it for fear of unknowns, etc.  All of us would like to see this project turned loose, but God is having us wait.

Have you ever tried to marginalize sin?  I have.  You take what you know is sin and try to just do some of it but not all so that it won’t be sin unless all is done–right?  Well, God is also pointing out to me that sin is sin–Earnie trying to take pieces of it and making it OK is not going to be OK.  I’ve never done this a lot, but I have done it thinking it is better than what I saw my dad do or my brother do–as though that would make my sin less than theirs.  God is awakening in me the severity of sin.  The most severe is its dulling of God’s voice, presence, His Spirit’s sensitivity within me.  These consequences are not what I want–in fact, I want just the opposite of these.  When God makes us a new creation by accepting His Son Jesus into our hearts, we have to daily remain in this new creation or we slip back into the old ways of behavior.  My journey is not done in this arena.  I suppose I’ll be saying this until my human days are done.  Now, I need to step into this day trusting.

Yesterday had some disturbing portions to it starting with the early morning one I mentioned yesterday.  That didn’t change as the day wore on.  Satan is alive and well with his deception.  The ministries that are making a difference in the lives of man are needing us to be on guard and on our knees for the ones working to overcome their hurts, hang-ups and habits.  I was visited by one of these guys yesterday.  God’s power is becoming his power and we need to “keep up the good fight.”  The tough reminder is that when we keep up the good fight it can’t be of our own human power–we lose every time.  God’s power is accessed as we surrender the battle and rely on “the prayers of the righteous man” as we confess temptation ahead of acting on it and let God do His miraculous work.  We men are stubborn about this and I say this humbly.

I think I mentioned a week or so ago about a book I was given to read which turned out to be one written about a person’s severe childhood abuse.  It went on to describe her struggle restoring her life to God who had never abandoned her.  When I first started it I put it down and told Kathy I didn’t think I could read it.  However, this book came into my hands at the same time God had me begin to journal to Him instead of to Jesus.  I finished that book last night.  I found myself so many times in her struggles and in God’s overcoming help He provided for her.  What started as an intense struggle has proven to be a miracle provider.  I do know that if I’d tried to read it a couple years ago it would have given me more bondage.  God’s timing is always perfect and I was ready to face some demons still lingering and cast them to God’s overcoming power.  I well up with tears as I write this.  God is so faithful and He does all this for each one of us as we let Him.  I thank Him so much!  To God be all Glory!

There are times when daily living gets halted, like to a screeching HALT.  I had finished my devotions and opened the blog site for today’s entry.  At that point I was interrupted with something that just makes me want to stop in my tracks.  In fact, at this moment all I can hear in my head is Earnie’s voice wanting to TAKE CHARGE.  The issues aren’t mine to organize, but they impact ones I love.  I write this knowing what happened is a good thing.  It is a chip in a huge iceberg that needs to get thawed.  I didn’t know it was there–but then that’s what happens when only man is involved and man is not communicating and trusting.

When I was journaling this morning I was sharing with God about my thanks for opening the door for me to come to Him.  All of my life I’ve been driven to take a problem to its source no matter who is involved in it.  I’ve known somehow that if we don’t get to the foundation of a problem, it won’t get fully resolved.  Little had I known how much I needed to have this door open for God and me. I feel fully at rest now that I can freely go to my Heavenly Father knowing He has always wanted me doing this.  The issue I state above but don’t state in detail needs the key players at the table.  This hasn’t happened and it likely won’t for some time.  I know that God’s ways are only put in place when man seeks His ways.  The good in this however is that the key player has stated the iceberg.  Now some of us can be praying openly about it to the very One who will bring the healing results as man softens his human heart and listens more fully to God’s Spirit.

It seems odd trying to articulate something that I can’t find words for.  So, I’m going to leave this in the state it is in and come back to it when I can.  This day has things in it that I know need to be done unrelated to anything I’ve stated above.  I’ll take care of them because I know what I need to do with them.  I’ll let this other go and do what I know to do–pray to the Almighty God who has given us the perfect pathway to Him–Jesus Christ and has placed the perfect Gift within us–The Holy Spirit.

This morning as I wrote today’s date I realized it is the anniversary of my first marriage.  Today, it would have been 44 years.  However, that is all in the past.  I started to lament a moment and then I was quickly reminded by my Heavenly Father that my life has moved on and I should too.  My scripture reading in Proverbs had stated that praise and thanksgiving are due to God our Father.  My lamenting didn’t include any praise and it would have taken me down a path that led once again to guilt and shame which I now recognize as Satan’s tools in moments like this and not God’s.  I thank God ever so much for His abundant mercy and patience over these years.  It has been 37 years since that divorce and I am a new creation today–thank you Father.

Last night was our weekly step study.  The lesson was about the purposes of daily journaling in order to recognize the good and bad of a day and to make quick amends when things were pointed out as bad.  We were to respond to  a question about what a particular verse meant to us and how it can help us.  The verse is Mark 14:38:  “Watch with me and pray lest the Tempter overpower you.  For though the spirit is willing enough, the body is weak.”  My response to this verse has always been that this verse is a nemesis to me.  I have never been good at knowing the power of God during intense temptation.  This question was followed by the next question which is:  “What is your daily action plan for Step 10?”  It was here that I told the group about my recent journaling to God the Father rather than to Jesus His Son.  I opened up regarding how much God was showing me about His desire to have the intimacy with me I longed for.  Also, that the power to address the temptation in Mark 14: 38 was tied to this Almighty God that I avoided due to so many character defects in thinking about who I thought I was to God relating to what I’ve said earlier about God and dad.  I was feeling rather stupid and vulnerable telling all this to the guys.  What I wasn’t expecting was their outburst of recognition from their own relationships with Him.  Almost everyone began to open up about this.  One guy just broke down and left for the restroom to gain his composure.  I know his story and it is truly painful.  This Almighty God of ours is breaking down walls and destroying the chains that bind.  How grateful I am for this! He assures me that His Power is the one true power which overcomes the power to the tempter.  I’m anchoring into this.

God is Almighty, yet He is as intimate as the most loving Dad and Mom.  How can this be?  I am beginning to hear God say that only in man’s thinking is this a problem.  In His Spiritual world it is a given.  In our spiritual realm it is simply known.  I certainly don’t have a good handle on this yet, but I’m so glad to be awakening more and more to this it.  I’m also loving the journaling to Him.  Hearing His voice is humbling and (I’m trying to find a word here).  Hearing God’s message as I journal with Him is somewhat like a stark reality.  Let me give today’s example.

Last early evening I went to the juvenile correctional center in Nampa where I had spoken a couple weeks ago to 35 teenagers incarcerated there.  I was asked by one of the teens to talk with him so last night was that chance.  He asked me some startling questions, one was:  “When do you know God was taking you away?”  I asked what he meant by that.  He said he wondered when I felt God pulling me out of the sin.  I was able to only tell him that I had learned enough by being the 10th child to not go into the sin my older siblings had.  Other than that, I didn’t know until my more current years that God was taking me away.  I’m learning that being taken away from sin is started by not entering into it.  I did tell him that choice is the ugliest and kindest gift God gave us as humans.  When we fall into the choices of man in sinfulness it becomes the ugliest bondage there is.  Yet, God gave us the chance to choose Him and find loving kindness.  I had to also learn that the sin of my brother and dad was not mine–it was there’s.  He acknowledged all of this.

I left the center having prayed for this teen and talked briefly to the chaplain completing the paperwork necessary.  My mind was filled with the bondage children are given when man abuses rather than protects them.  I asked God this morning while journaling about this.  His Words were:  “You’re right Earnie–this is ugly and confusing.  You see hellish things done to you and your senses, your body by the very ones who should protect you.  You are right in wondering about this.  It is sin, Earnie–it is sin.  There is no freedom in sin–it is bondage.”  I then asked God where a child’s freedom is found?  His response was, “I’m sorry Earnie.  It is not there as you would like it to be.  It is there for you in choice as you can begin to choose for yourself.  These are hard realities but I use ones like you to show these kids of today who are hurt and abused that they can find a different path.”  He then asked me to join Him in this and of course, I told him yes.

This journey has hard realities in it.  For the first time I am seeing God within the picture rather than picking up the pieces afterwards.  This teen asked me last night why the people in our churches don’t reach out and help when they know these things are happening?  We did talk about this, but the reality we agreed upon is that almost all people are scared to death of this and don’t have a clue what to say or do when they find this out.

Well, today’s entry is a stark one (as I stated when I started it) but it is exactly what God wanted me to know and write.  I’m waking up and going to stay in this arena for a while.  God has an assignment here that may last the rest of my earthly life.

I am so amazed right now.  As I have begun to realize God my Father, I’m also realizing God my Dad.  I am also beginning to realize God the Almighty.  There are so many awakening moments that have begun to happen.

This morning I was asking God if He  would mind sharing with me what He wants me to know from Him.  He asked me if I see Him, if I hear Him, if I feel Him?  I said yes to all of these.  He then said that this is me responding to spiritual guidance.  God is Spirit and He wanted me to know I am equipped to know Him and His leadership in my life.  The human dominance of man’s thinking and feeling has overpowered this spiritual influence all these years.  God is awakening in me the very gift He has given me and each one of us upon creation.  He also pointed out something that really hit home.  He said that when His Spirit provides insight/wisdom, it is still to fit in His timetable.  Man (I) want to immediately think insight is for me and my timetable right now.  He told me that His insights fit His timetable and I am to trust and obey Him in completing it.  Trusting and obeying are human ways to respond to His spiritual leadership in my life.

This was some amazing and humbling to hear this morning.  I have many projects and people on my mind that I want to “help”.  God was kindly and directly pointing out that He is in control of them, not me.  I can be His helper if I remain in His timetable and not try to manipulate things into a man-made one.  I do want to fit into God’s very leadership in my life and live each day in its fullness.

There is one more thing I want to add here before I end today’s blog–I’ve been journaling for many years now.  I’ve tried journaling to God in times past, but felt I got no where.  Now I can see why I didn’t.  The GOD I was trying to communicate with was the one I was trying to please and earn significance.  GOD has loved me from the start just as He has loved each one of us.  I think that is my greatest awakening for the moment.  I do want to serve HIM well.

We are home, the Celebrate Recovery Summit couldn’t have been finer and our team attending it has a lengthy and aggressive plan for moving forward.  For all of this I am most grateful.  On a very personal note, however, I am most touched and humbled this morning as I write to you about the growth I’m finding in my relationship with God my Father.  As I write this I feel rather silly, but all that I write is most current and real.  This morning’s devotional said, “Within the heart of every man and woman there is a place that only God can fill.  We may try to satisfy our longings with different things; but until we come to a point of full surrender to Him, we will remain vulnerable to fearful thoughts, feelings of discontentment, and selfish desires, as well as pride and lust.”  It then goes on to say this:  “But when you fellowship with God, He….”  This is the part that hit me between the eyes–“when we fellowship with God, He”.

I’ve heard all my life how God created man to fellowship with us, I just didn’t realize He actually wanted to fellowship with me.  How hard I tried to earn the “fellowshiping” right with my dad but never made it.  I see so plainly now how this transferred to my belief about God my Father.  All this time I’ve been blinded to the truth about God’s desire to actually fellowship with me.  God gave us Jesus to show us what fellowship is like between Him and His Son but not to replace His fellowship with each of us.  For the first time I feel I now have access to the complete Triune God.  The devotional ended with this:  “Friend, the only relationship that can fill your longings, sustain you through difficulties, and bring you peace is the relationship you have with God.  Don’t hold Him back in any way.”  I want to take full opportunity to keep this in place from this day forward.

The Summit also left me with a keener interest in promoting the need to awaken the passion of the church to the hurting people silently sitting each Sunday in the chairs/pews.  Our church needs to be the same safe place people say they find at Celebrate Recovery.  The masks need to be removed for the sake of each one wearing them and for the person desperately needing to be reached out to.  I sense God asking me to speak this more boldly.

Tonight ends the Celebrate Recovery Summit.  It was a most remarkable experience.  I knew well what to expect, but no one can ever anticipate just how much God is going to move in a celebration experience like this.  There are no words to describe such a glorious experience.  I’m sure it is one of those moments which will resemble in part what the start of heaven will be–glorious, unending praise.

I won’t take much time to share tonight as we are leaving in the am for the airport at 5:30  so I’m soon headed to bed.  I just want to share a phrase I heard today that is worth keeping in the forefront of our thinking and actions.  In Celebrate Recovery we are taught and accountable to stay in touch with others who support us and for whom we support.  The phrase today was “call before you fall”.  No matter what we struggle with, we need to have support to overcome it.  So, before you fall prey to the struggle, call someone.  It is so simple, yet it is so difficult at the moment.  However, once one has experienced the outcome of calling, it is a most remarkable thing to find that after you call, the temptation to submit is gone.  With that–have a good night’s sleep!  I’ll be back on track Sunday morning.

Tonight has ended with the first day of the Celebrate Recovery Annual Summit.  It is the 25th anniversary of this ministry.  I am not going to write a lot but I did have something hit me today that I feel is profound and it relates so well with my own personal journey.  The quote was, “God doesn’t expect us to do the impossible;  He expects to do the impossible through us.”  I’m sure I’ve heard this similarly throughout my adult years, but now that I’m as far on my journey as I am, I truly heard it and it resonated today.  I hope it helps anyone reading it also.  My own strength has failed me so many times in the years gone by.  I’m so grateful to be learning now that it is God’s strength I rely on.  It is only my surrender that he needs along with my yes to whatever He is prompting me to do.

God is so good and so patience.

PS:  I started my journal this morning by writing Father God right off the bat!  I’m making progress.