Lost in our age is a
boundless abandonment to much of anything.
We have grown so accustomed to instant messaging and continual
entertainment that we grow weary when any vision or mission crosses our
perseverance threshold. Profit margins
are now measured by level of effort and degree of boredom. If anything requires too much of us or does
not make us happy, we give up on it. A
holy life is superficially regarded as unattainable, unreasonable. Given the volume of meta-messages bombarding
our conscious thinking, we cannot make heads or tails of what is important to
us. It all is a blur of instantaneous
provocations and titillations. Is it any
wonder that some just jump ship; the drowned life a welcome relief to the
bombarded one? Contemptuous humanists
mock the Christian who waits upon the Lord because she seems so mediocre, so
juvenile. The contemplation of the
scriptures extended past intellectual stimulation is absurdly dissolute for the
mind absent of any real hunger for God.
Depravity is now flipped around on its head; faith and purity are the
new perversion. The corrupted soul is
the one waiting upon the Lord . The cost
of waiting upon Christ seems monstrous.
To walk in the Spirit is not a moment of exalted rapture but rather a
day in and day out communion with the Lord who does speak and certainly
leads. We read the scriptures not to get
something out of them but to be given up to them. We pray, not to attain but to be with God in
His very presence. We sing songs of
praise not to be entertained but to live within the mercy and joy of the Living
God. Who has really abandoned himself to
Christ? Who has become accustomed to the
voice of God and fallen in love with the One who speaks? Who has made his life holy in the wash of the
Living Word? Who has gained the treasure
of being consecrated and filled with the joy of true Christian living? Who has been given The Gift and loved the
hand that held it? Are you too callous
to be aware of what great love awaits you if you would just wait for God a moment longer? Do you have the patience needed to stay where
you are so that Jesus Christ might meet you?
Does it seem the greatest good to be with Jesus and give yourself over
to Him? Would it make you happy to gain just
one more bit of God in you? Have you
discovered the sweet perfume of holy abandonment?
Peter said to
him, "We have left all we had to follow you!" Luke 18:28 NIV
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