Well, the halt is still present in this journey, but this morning I found something very unexpectedly.  I’m reading Ezekiel.  In the middle chapters of the book God takes Ezekiel in a dream to Jerusalem where He shows him the rebuilding of the temple.  Ezekiel gets to see what it will look like and he also gets to see God inhabit it once again.  Our pastor says there is nothing in the Bible written to just make it thicker but these detailed descriptions have never meant a great deal to a non-architectural mind like mine.  However, as I began to journal I started to see some things I hadn’t before.

When the temple was complete the sacrifices were explained in detail regarding which animal and how it was to be sacrificed.  In a split second I saw for a moment that God saw His people free from their sins due to the daily sacrifices.  It didn’t change their behaviors however, for they went right on sinning–enough so that He simply changed the entire plan so that it was no longer something man did–it is what He did.  He sent His own Son Jesus to become the once and for all sacrifice.  Now, when God sees us through the blood of His Own Son’s sacrifice, He sees us as whole–cleansed by the blood of His Own Son’s sacrifice.  If we accept Christ as our Savior, this work is done for us.

All of a sudden I could see that all the tormenting sins which I’ve thought tarnished me for life, are at that Cross of Christ–buried.  In fact, as I was journaling all of this I sensed Christ saying, “You should see yourself the way I see you.”  This makes me cry.  The lessons I’m doing in this workbook regarding Abuse are only outlining for me all that Christ has buried.  Now, He is asking me to let all of it be buried too.  I can see myself as He sees me if I choose, and I will be so much freer to do His Will without the weight of this past holding me back.  How many times will I need to let this past go?  I suppose until the day I die?  Maybe, but I sure feel grateful at this moment and so thankful for The GRACE of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!

As I remain in this “halted position” for another day, God is showing me why.  I was wondering why God had said yesterday that value came from helping “His kids”.  I felt as though I needed to help myself.  Then, I began to see.  Satan has a masterful way of taking whatever is in front of us and turning it inward–to selfishness.  God, on the other hand, takes whatever is before us and turns it into an opportunity for Him to be glorified by our using it to enlighten ourselves and helping others.

This morning as I began to journal I asked God about filling that hole in me left from surrendering all that I had been hiding.  It didn’t seem that I could fill something by giving away something.  God pointed me right to what I was doing at the moment.  In my mind I heard Him saying, “What are you doing right now?”  I was doing my devotions.  He pointed out that this was all done for me so I could know Him better and build my relationship with Him.  He reminded me then of so much I do.  I garden, sing, work in education, spend time with family and friends, work with recovery ministries.  All of which I do has a very selfish connection for me.  All of it I enjoy doing too.  I suddenly realized just how lucky I am!  How many people do I know that have this opportunity to do all they do and love it as much as I do? Very few to be honest.  What pulls me down in a day is when I let any of my past get the best of me.  God has been showing me that when I let all I get to do be intrinsically valuable, I then fill that empty hole in me called value.  I don’t need to use all I do to hide something keeping it on the outside of me.  I can now see that this is me–a big part of me.  I don’t need to hide behind it.  It really is an extension of me.  It seems I’ve gone off the deep end as I write this but it is important to me so I must put it here knowing there are likely others who have needed to work through this too.

When God tells us we can be “free indeed” (John 8:36) through Jesus Christ, He meant it.  Now I’m finally seeing and believing this freedom for myself.  It isn’t selfish in a sinful way, it is the freedom which empowers us to be free to share it with everyone around us in bondage similarly to what we’ve known all of our lives.  Don’t give up until the miracle happens!  God’s miracle is happening!  How much I praise HIM!

I want to change the heading for another day to–The Journey Halts.  Yesterday was a day of seeing, without denial entering into the picture, just how much I do struggle with believing value.  I had written in my journal that value starts with belief.  I’m not sure that’s true.  Somehow God gives us value from birth and we learn to connect value and belief to life from good parenting and how life is delivered to us from our environment.  My father use to tell me he had to “break that spirit” in me–kill it.  He would compare it to breaking a horse to ride.  He’d say one had to break the spirit of the horse to do what man wanted.  Somehow that “spirit” he wanted to break in me was a lot about value and belief.  Dad knew nothing about nurturing spirit into God’s purposes.  I don’t think mom understood it either.  She didn’t know how much this boy of hers needed a touch from her giving some type of reassurance that I was ok.  It was actually through certain teachers I had in my lifetime that showed me hope for value.

Today I can see the hole within me which I’ve hidden.  It is these insecurities which have driven me to do what I’d hope would give me purpose and value.  Instead, it would give me another reason to hide what I thought was what must be hidden so that value could be built.  As I wrote a couple days ago, I gave all of this to Jesus so He could bury it at the foot of the Cross.  Today I see the empty space within where I’d hidden the me I knew no one could trust.  He was the person who might abuse someone by touching them wrongly, might say something that destroyed one’s belief in themselves, might blow up and beat someone, etc.  They are now buried.  So, I asked God this morning what I’m to do with this empty room?  How can it be filled with something from Him?  Instantly to my mind came, “The good of what you are doing for my kids can now fill this room.”  It wasn’t that good isn’t being done, I just couldn’t accept any of it and in not being able to, I could not see any value.

I don’t know if any reader can understand what I’m writing this morning.  However, if any of this resonates within you, I pray right now that you will allow God to give you what He’s been trying to do throughout our lives–a meaningful purpose within this earthly kingdom.  Don’t let Satan sabotage God’s intent for us any longer.  We are created by the One and Only True God.  He has never made one mistake so lets quit believing those lies of Satan.  We can be FREE INDEED!

The message of yesterday’s journey entry still has me on the edge of the cliff.  I’ve always been deathly afraid of heights and it has never gotten any better as I’ve grown older.  I could tell many stories regarding me and heights and dreams of such.  They are haunting!  That’s  a lot like the feeling I have regarding yesterday’s entry.  Sins of omission are easy to commit for me just as I believe they were for my mom.  I think that must be exactly what my mom dealt with.  For mom to step into one of dad’s attacks would have been like me jumping off a cliff to skydive.  The fear would be so gripping there would be no way to do it!

This morning God has been outlining for me just how much trust I need to have in order to truly have His Son Jesus on the throne of my life.  In fact it all started when I was journaling.  I was pondering how Jesus could know God so well that He trusted Him to complete every task God gave Him to do?  Somehow from the very beginning of Christ’s birth, Mary and Joseph parented Him in such a way that He could believe in God as well as in the Creation God had given Him.  In my journaling God was asking me how much I believe in the creation He gave me?  On the surface, I believe I can complete assignments He gives me.  I have that natural instinct for lots of things–“Oh yeah, we can do that!”  I think.  But take the assignment to the inner me and I will have to admit, well, I can’t do it but I’m good at finding someone else you can trust who can help you.  I don’t believe in me very well.

This journey right now has me on a path along a cliff.  God is going deep into who I believe I am and He is asking me to peer over the cliff to see who He created me to be.  This is more fearful than exciting at the moment.  I recall when I was very young how excited I was to simply be me.  I didn’t consciously think this but I was happy being me.  Yet, I recall all too well, the ridicule and beatings for being who I am.  No one of my parents in my childhood ever told me who I am was valuable. I grew to believe I was a mistake and if I were to ever have value it would have to be outside of our family. But, God is trying to show me His purpose and love today.  I guess I’ll trust the path to see what it leads me to.  Actually, I think God is wanting me to halt on the path to see what I’m suppose to be seeing while at this particular point on it.  Right now, it is hard to look up, down or out.  However, today, I’m going to attempt to see what is out there that I’m missing.

It didn’t take long yesterday for me to know why I didn’t have any particular thing on my mind as I wrote the blog.  When I finished it I went immediately to the lesson completion for last night’s recovery class on Abuse.  The activities we were to complete were all about intimacy in our relationship with God ( including our belief of Who He is, how we see ourselves, etc.).  The questions and activities we were to complete ended up being grueling to do.  I had read these things a year ago when Kathy and I were in Charleston, SC and knew God wanted me to get this going in our church.  Now they are going and I’m caught in the midst of my own recovery doing them.

What was astounding to me was the unexpected part my mom had in this.  In my mind my mom has always been a saint.  It was easy to see it too because she was being compared to dad’s explosive, abusive physical beatings and verbal beatings.  Mom was never this way.  However, one of the questions that shed light on this stunning discovery was what influence did my parents have on my view of God?  I’ve always known God wasn’t like dad.  Good grief, how could a God be like him?  I just knew that wasn’t true.  What I’d never had revealed to me was the view I had of mom being like God.  Mom was wonderfully kind in taking care of us.  What she wasn’t good at doing was coming along side you to counter dad’s abuse or in my case, my brother’s abuse.  She simply was SILENT.  She knew, but she never responded.  Maybe she prayed (which I’m sure she did) but I definitely needed to hear from her.  This action is what solidified in me my belief about God.  I’ve said so many times that I always thought God was just like scripture describes Him–loving, kind, compassionate and so much more, BUT, He just didn’t care much for me.  How  could a God allow all of this to happen and never stop it or at least comfort you afterwards with words or a touch of support somehow?  This is what I longed for with my mom.

All day yesterday I was perplexed about the lesson and then having to process it with the men last night, hearing them and telling my own, gave me less emotional trauma and more ability to see it as it is–neglect.  The class identifies the different types of abuse–blatant, like dad’s and my brother’s, and neglect which is more like mom’s.  I’ve dealt forthrightly with all of dad’s and my brother’s, but I’ve done little to face the truth of mom’s neglect.  I never wanted to hurt this dear mom of mine!  Even if I felt hurt she didn’t deserve to be hurt by throwing something like this in her face.  This morning, however, I knew I needed to do this.  God, mom and I had our time together and I was able to give all of this absence of support to Christ so it can be buried at the foot of the Cross with the sins He’d already buried there.  Wow, do I feel raw right now!  However, I sense a love of God penetrating me like I’ve never known.  Thank you Father, Jesus Christ and The Holy Spirit!

Most days what I’m going to write at this time is right in the forefront of my mind.  Today is not that way.  I have a few things I want to get done and that is all that is there.  In my devotions Ezekiel is being told some ugly things to tell the people of Israel.  Yes, it is all about their judgment from poor choices and now their choices have caught up with them.  They have had many, many opportunities to turn back to God and His Ways, but they didn’t take heed to the ongoing warnings.

If nothing else, I do want this to be a lesson for me.  Following God, building a relationship with Him, His Son and Holy Spirit, is only as strong as my obedience to them and the time I spend with them.  If nothing else, this can be my lesson for today.  Our judgment day will come, no one gets to be without one.  I want to be awake to this fact and correct myself today.  This alone is a full time job!

Today I had a most interesting thing happen while I was having my devotions.  I’m now reading in Ezekiel.  God is having Ezekiel reinforce the message to the Israelites as to why they are now in captivity and Israel/Jerusalem is in ruins.  Ezekiel is charged over and over to give these messages.  I was admiring within myself the relationship God and Ezekiel had with one another.  It is like best friends.  They trust one another.

As I was journaling I told God I wished I had a best friend.  I have scores of friends but if I were to say I have a best friend I wouldn’t know for sure who it is and I wouldn’t even know how to differentiate him from the score of friends.  As I was writing this I was nudged by God saying this is what He wants with (us) me.  He doesn’t just want to be friends with man or to be God with man.  The reason He says in scripture He gave us a heart of flesh is so He would be at the core of us–our best friend.  All of a sudden as I was writing and processing this, I realized those 3 words–heart of flesh–represent God as HEART and flesh as man.  The “of” tells the heart is in flesh.  The heart is the core or essence of the flesh.  There is substance making up the flesh but the heart of the flesh is what gives it life.  God isn’t wanting to just be the leader of my life like a person in charge.  He wants to be leader of my life as my best Friend who I trust with all my being.

All this time I’ve been journaling to God (the past 2 years and 3 months) and now I finally realize the greatest message–He wants to be my BEST FRIEND.  He doesn’t just want to be my Lord and Master, but to be my FRIEND.  There is probably more to add to this message, but this is as far as my words will go in describing it for today.  I’m rather overwhelmed at this moment.  Taking what I’ve known in my head for years and now knowing it in my heart is a remarkable discovery!

This morning as I began my devotions my mind began to drift into areas of today and then quickly into the several days ahead.  As I did this I started to have all these questions arising about the different activities which are to take place in the near future: “Who is going to take care of this and that?”, “What is my role in it?”, and so much more.  All of a sudden I felt The Holy Spirit’s nudge.  He was saying I’m stepping right into what yesterday’s lesson was all about.  I suddenly became aware of how often I do this and just how much it represents my flesh.  It is going to take me some time to break this habit, but I do want to do this.  If Christ is going to be on the throne of my life 24/7, I want Him to be there in charge of me, not just when I think I need Him.  This behavior is a devious one for I’ve thought all these years that I was doing a good job planning.  Now I can see there is no planning taking place in my worry.  In it I eventually come to the place I need to set it aside and let God take control.  So, why not let Christ have the control from the start of this?  I’m going to work on it.

Today we have our monthly Celebrate Recovery Leadership meeting following the worship services.  After it the ministry leaders and I have our own meeting to address some issues which have arisen.  This is actually what started my mind jumping ahead earlier this morning.  Then I quickly went into all kinds of things coming up in the near future–things I can easily get lost in but can’t do anything about until the time is present.  That joy in life can only be real when I consciously keep Christ in my control seat.  I do want to stay in the surrender seat and let Christ stay in the control one.  I know this is what Christ is wanting me to learn as my assignment in today’s journey–one step at a time!

The dilemma I mentioned yesterday is something God is wanting me to address.  However, it is not so much in addressing it by deciding if I am doing too much or not enough or some other reason not thought through.  As I have been working through this in my devotions this morning I find Him saying, “This is all about a matter of trust.”

I have never heard anyone talk about God calling them into something for a defined period of time.  I have heard ones talk about what God called them to do came to an end but they never knew that upfront.  God calls us to do what He asks for the day.  I am finally seeing that when I move beyond the day I step right into fretting/worrying/anxiety.  The bible clearly calls them sins.  This is what God is wanting me to learn from this new awareness He is showing me.  I don’t talk a lot about what anxiousness I sense inside me, but it is usually present to some degree or to a large degree.  God is telling me to let this go.  The way I let it go is to TRUST HIM in the day and then trust Him for all the tomorrows.

As I was working through this in my devotional time this morning there was an unexpected outcome.  All of a sudden I began to sense JOY.  It was as though when I let go of worry I found joy.  JOY is waiting at the door for us when we stop worrying.  One can’t know joy and worry at the same time.  However, joy is hardwired in us when we take captive the option to worry.  God’s Word never says it is ok to worry about this or that and but not ok to worry about these things.  God’s Word says worry is a sin.  I can see clearly now that worry removes TRUST.

I’ve heard a lot about all of this in my life but God is wanting me to apply it to my daily living.  So, here goes day one of intentional living in TRUST rather than the opposite.  And my prize—-JOY!

God is simply AMAZING!  I say this because it is Friday and I just want to spend the day with Him.  I know whatever I do God is with me, but I want to be with Him rather than Him being with me.  It is all a huge mind shift.  Also, it is a fear-breaker and confidence builder.  I use to think confidence aligned with arrogance/ego as I saw in my dad, but the confidence God gives is not that at all.  It is far more about assurance that even though you don’t see all the steps as clearly as you’d like, you can trust God to lead you “one step at a time, one moment at a time….” as the Serenity Prayer states.

I write this first paragraph because I’m caught right now in an emotional/mental dilemma I said I wouldn’t do again.  It is about the amount of work I’d accept for this year from the consulting world.  More time is seemingly needed where I am presently working and one more district is needing an interim amount of time.  In times past I’d say yes because it felt good to be wanted and needed.  Today, however, it seems God is shedding Light on this telling me to do as He is asking.  I have all these questions come to mind quickly like:  “What about the time needed for recovery work?”, What about time for my family, grandkids, choir, Christmas rehearsal, quartet, garden clean-up, etc.?”  I then hear, “…one day at a time, one moment at a time, taking hardship as a pathway to peace.”

The journey God gives is quite amazing.  I don’t want to spend another minute on this journey with Him anyplace but in the Lead.  Learning to walk this way throughout each and every day is now my new lesson.  Join me?