...couscous...
Class is in session. I am being stretched and stressed and that’s when the party starts and the learning begins.
I will say that these ideas and concepts I’m learning are far from revolutionary. It is only that they have been packaged differently. It’s a “new twist on an old classic,” said the description I read at a restaurant about the PB&J sandwich.
I am in a place of inner tension and struggle. I find myself often trying to find that line between being focused and driven and hustling to make it and the other side of being open to what God has for me. Recently I was reading in a devotional book put together my Jim Branch (highly recommend the book…and Jim, for that matter) and I came to the theme of “letting go.” I thought, “o.k. whatever…let go, letting go…let’s just go.”
But in the pages of the excerpts and some of the scripture I have found new words and new ways to articulate what’s going on inside me and what NEEDS to go on.
For anyone who is an over-thinker, analyzer, planner and control freak (you know who you ar—others do too) the idea of being detached and letting go is about as enticing as walking up steep hills backwards pulling a boat—no doubt, soon to be a strong man competition event on ESPN. I’m sure it works for some people but it’s just not for me!
“St. John of the Cross lamented, ‘The desires weary and fatigue the soul; for they are like restless and discontented children, who are ever demanding this or that from their mother, and are never contented.’ Detachment is coming to the place where those demanding children are at peace.”—John Eldredge
Sometimes struggling isn’t so much the wrestling and push and pull that we normally think about but more so the struggle to float, let go, tumble and be led.
Can I trust God’s heart? Absolutely!
Enter stage left Genesis 22 (today’s scripture). Abraham is “tested by God” and told, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.”
Sooooo “Abraham rose early in the morning…” and got his son and went up to the mountain.
WHAT?! I refuse to believe Abraham just “rose” in the morning. Was there no struggle? Was there no, “was this God or bad couscous?” Was there no wrestling and pleading with God? How well did he sleep that night? I mean kill your son? That is crazy. God is crazy—meaning the absence of logic. That’s what makes truly following God a crazy endeavor.
Am I willing to work hard to be an actor (and honestly it’s hard work) and then have Him say, “O.k. that’s it. I want you to leave all your work and time and energy and painful uncertainty and do something else.” I would wonder if it were the couscous!
“ ‘An authentic spiritual understanding of detachment devalues neither desire nor the objects of desire.’ Instead, it ‘aims at correcting one’s own anxious grasping…’”
So that’s where I am. I am learning to let go in order to ease my anxious, restless inner-child from wrestling, struggling and just plain wearing myself out and trust God and only God. I think that’s what Paul was getting at in 1 Corinthians 2:2, “For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.”
Everything else is a variable. All I can KNOW and all I can be SURE of is “Christ and him crucified.”
That’s all.
I will say that these ideas and concepts I’m learning are far from revolutionary. It is only that they have been packaged differently. It’s a “new twist on an old classic,” said the description I read at a restaurant about the PB&J sandwich.
I am in a place of inner tension and struggle. I find myself often trying to find that line between being focused and driven and hustling to make it and the other side of being open to what God has for me. Recently I was reading in a devotional book put together my Jim Branch (highly recommend the book…and Jim, for that matter) and I came to the theme of “letting go.” I thought, “o.k. whatever…let go, letting go…let’s just go.”
But in the pages of the excerpts and some of the scripture I have found new words and new ways to articulate what’s going on inside me and what NEEDS to go on.
For anyone who is an over-thinker, analyzer, planner and control freak (you know who you ar—others do too) the idea of being detached and letting go is about as enticing as walking up steep hills backwards pulling a boat—no doubt, soon to be a strong man competition event on ESPN. I’m sure it works for some people but it’s just not for me!
“St. John of the Cross lamented, ‘The desires weary and fatigue the soul; for they are like restless and discontented children, who are ever demanding this or that from their mother, and are never contented.’ Detachment is coming to the place where those demanding children are at peace.”—John Eldredge
Sometimes struggling isn’t so much the wrestling and push and pull that we normally think about but more so the struggle to float, let go, tumble and be led.
Can I trust God’s heart? Absolutely!
Enter stage left Genesis 22 (today’s scripture). Abraham is “tested by God” and told, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.”
Sooooo “Abraham rose early in the morning…” and got his son and went up to the mountain.
WHAT?! I refuse to believe Abraham just “rose” in the morning. Was there no struggle? Was there no, “was this God or bad couscous?” Was there no wrestling and pleading with God? How well did he sleep that night? I mean kill your son? That is crazy. God is crazy—meaning the absence of logic. That’s what makes truly following God a crazy endeavor.
Am I willing to work hard to be an actor (and honestly it’s hard work) and then have Him say, “O.k. that’s it. I want you to leave all your work and time and energy and painful uncertainty and do something else.” I would wonder if it were the couscous!
“ ‘An authentic spiritual understanding of detachment devalues neither desire nor the objects of desire.’ Instead, it ‘aims at correcting one’s own anxious grasping…’”
So that’s where I am. I am learning to let go in order to ease my anxious, restless inner-child from wrestling, struggling and just plain wearing myself out and trust God and only God. I think that’s what Paul was getting at in 1 Corinthians 2:2, “For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.”
Everything else is a variable. All I can KNOW and all I can be SURE of is “Christ and him crucified.”
That’s all.
posted by Bradley Hasemeyer at 11:48:00 AM
5 Comments:
Bradley, or should I call you "A.W." (Tozer, that is). Thanks for the lessons shared/learned in a heart headed down the path of transformation. Journey on man, journey on.
See comment left earlier.
Holy mack Bradley.. yeah, i really needed to read this today. FOR ME (among many other i'm sure). Branch is the shiznit. I read him almost every day. (blue book?) I was IMing you about acting stuff.. not for me, but for you. Will explain later...
Bradley....I love that devotional (yes blue book!)!! Well put...your heart speaks a common theme. Patience and perseverance my friend.
I adore Jim Branch but let me just remind you also that no matter what you ate the night before, the whole of God's Word is always true.
Post a Comment
<< Home