(*) We can die anytime! Regrets? Anxieties? Self-Obsessions?

 

 

“You can make many plans, but the LORD’s purpose will prevail.”  -Proverbs 19:21

Job 38,40
² “Who is this that questions my wisdom with such ignorant words? ³ Brace yourself like a man, because I have some questions for you, and you must answer them.”
⁴ Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?
⁸ Who kept the sea inside its boundaries, this far and no farther will you come.
⁴¹ Who provides food for the ravens when their young cry out to God in hunger?

² “Do you still want to argue with the Almighty?
You are God’s critic, but do you have the answers?”
⁸ Will you discredit my justice and condemn me just to prove you are right?
⁹ Are you as strong as God? Can you thunder with a voice like his?

¹⁴ How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning fog—it’s here a little while, then it’s gone. ¹⁵ What you ought to say is, “If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that.” ¹⁶ Otherwise you are boasting about your own plans, and all such boasting is evil. ¹⁷ Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it.  –James 4:13-17

As I start this chapter, I’m thinking, life is too busy.  Too many things.  Too overwhelming.  There is no time to work, study, learn, and plan where God wants me to be and really think about what He’s will is for my life.  Busy-ness makes me ignore life.  Sweep everything under the rug to deal with them later.  I live like I know I have another day to deal with unresolved business and unconfronted transgressions. 

I realized that even if I do my best to plan life well, experiences tell me that God ALWAYS change my plans.  Though I don’t get what I ask for, He somehow makes things more beautiful than what I can ever ask for or achieve on my strength alone… 

If my desire is to be the ‘apple of God’s eyes,’ am I spending enough time in front of God’s face enough to see myself in His eyes?

As I sip my cup of hot Aztec spicy mocha espresso latte from the Flying Goat Café in downtown Santa Rosa, I am struggling to wrap my mind around how apparently complex life is, and at the same time, how paradoxically simple life is…

Is God really the center of my life?  Is He the apple of my eye?  Well, OF COURSE NOT IF I’M SO SELF ABSORBED!  I think about myself all the time.  I worry about my future.  I worry about my relationships.  I worry about what people think of me.  I worry about my debts.  I worry about my performance at work.  I worry about EVERYTHING!  My mind won’t let me go.  My guilt won’t let me go.  My shame won’t let me go.  My own unforgiveness won’t let me go!  SELF-OBSESSION… 

Self-obsession makes me speed-walk unconsciously through crowds, splitting groups of people, with my head buried between my shoulders and my eyes piercing through the ground…  consciously, attentively, focusedly… lost… marinated in my own thoughts that swirled around a soupy existence of cosmic conglomeration of thoughts.  Thoughts that integrate at the same time disintegrate.  Grasping the fog…  Head in the cloud or in the concrete? Ying-Yang? 

Ironic, I don’t think about things that are going right. 
Just like my mind don’t tend to highlight areas in life that are functioning healthily and correctly,
I don’t think about my body, the wonder of it all, the miracle that it is self sustaining and self healing.  What kind of creative wisdom God must have put into it… it is incredible!
I don’t think about people around me.  The masses are like props or extras on a movie set. 
I don’t think about how my actions right now is impacting or changing the future of myself, my family or the world.
I don’t think about my age.
What is on my mind?
To become debt free
Incongruence of various life compartments
Most of all:
I fear being made ineffective and unable to accomplish God’s will and His purpose for my life!
Desperate,  I need solutions for my paralysis.

We all have worries… I think it really reflect a basic trust issue I have for God.  Same principle applies when anyone reads the Bible or approach any topic of discussion that is worth pondering… the root of the issue at hand is ALWAYS SPIRITUAL.  The apparent and surface issues may be physical, it may be relational, it may be unacceptable expectations, it may be traumatic, it may be extremely sad or happy, it may be out of your control…  Stress… Anxiety… Depression… unhealthy compensations…But the deep: …SPIRITUAL…  Control issues?  …SPIRITUAL…

This has never come up to me before!  Today is the first day I realized that I have control and trust issues with God!  Once He has enlightened my heart, I have to address it now!  

REQUESTS:
God please give me strength and ability to release my control and stress and trust to you.  God show me what You want me to do today!  It takes effort to hear from God.  I must re-organize my life to put God first, rather than my own worries.  I have to die to the process of myself in this world.  May God increase as I decrease.  I have to let go of my job, family, relationships, and myself.  God, please remove my distractions that take place of You in my heart/mind/soul.  Please lift the thick veil that is covering my eyes and the eyes of those around me so that we can experience a truly fulfilled life and become the ‘Apple of Your Eye.’

(*) Crazy Love: Stop praying! Stop talking 'at' God.

Eccl 5:1-2 “Be not rash with your mouth, nor let your heart by hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth.  Therefore, let your words be few.”

“Men are not impressed with their insignificance until they contrast themselves with the majesty of God” -Sproul.

God didn’t have to create an intense diversity of the same things… but He did!

All creation worship God.  Psalm 19:1-4.  “Heaven declare Glory to God, skies proclaim works of His hands, Day after day, they pour forth speech…”

We don’t get to define God.  God is holy, all knowing, all powerful, eternal, fair and just

Heb 4:13 “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight.  Everything is uncovered and lay bare before Him…”

Col 1:16 “Everything is created by Him, for Him.”

Psalm 115:3, Daniel 4:35 “God does what He pleases.”

Something to think about:
As I sat here in my favorite coffee shop, my mind churns and my heart is exploding.  I start thinking… why do I pray?  What is prayer?  Why do I talk to an invisible God?  How can I believe in the existence of God, a force invisible, love and just?  How do I know it is one God, not many gods… what does He offer or why does He need to exist?  Why is this God the “Truth” and others are not?!  My finite brain goes crazy! 

First of all, instead of going into apologetics and polemics and using multiple libraries of references to answer these questions… let’s just get simple. 

First we have to be honest with ourselves:

1.      We didn’t create the world

2.      We cannot explain exactly how we all get here and why everything exist

3.      Despite all of our theories, we still don’t have a grip on the explanation.  Theories continue to change and ‘evolve.’

4.      As much as we study the wonder and attention to detail of our world, we are limited by our existing technology, though we are making leaps and bounds, and we are limited by our ability to understand.  Aren’t you amazed?  In the history of the world, our capabilities just continue to get better and more advanced!  Even in our physical capabilities… how come the same body a few thousand years ago cannot do what we do today, cannot create out of the same conserved matter on this planet what we are making today, or to create data out of nothing, or to create other matter that are controlled by other matter, even thinking and processing the world by themselves… automation… all created by us?  We continue to explore the details of space and even the human body… how long have physicians been dissecting the body and looking at it?  How come we don’t have it all figured out?  How do we heal wounds?  We don’t!  We can do everything to encourage healing, but we cannot actually heal.  I am a physician and have seen many bodies fail and die despite the best care we offer…

Well, it seems to me, there are way too much we can’t explain without a “cause.”  Things this wonderful and complicated cannot just simply ‘exist’ or ‘evolve’ without a cause or have momentum for change and development.  What gave the first push?  What started the life?  If the world is just in a continuum of motion and now it is just continued to be in motion… What started the first motion?  What about the 2^nd law of thermodynamics, entropy, where everything tends to go from order to disorder.  This world is continually degrading, not constructing…  The world gets older, all life dies at some point and birth happens at some point… this testifies to an incomprehensive and wonderful ability for body to heal, at the same time, an inability to regenerate and to repair damages to our bodies fast enough to keep us from getting old.  How does the first life know to evolve a particular process to repair itself, nevertheless, millions of simultaneous needs in one body to repair itself every second… how does the first life know to repair one damage vs a million damages in the cellular level?  If God doesn’t exist, none of our theories comes close to offer a plausible explanation.  None.  Ironically, possibly creatively paradoxically, among all its mysteries, existence of God makes most sense and is the simplest idea to understand!  The youngest of child should be able to understand the simple truth of God, it shouldn’t take an intellectual to understand God.

If God exist, does He exist for us?  If that is true, then we are a necessity for God’s existence.  If that’s true, then we can make demands or requests to God and we would expect that God would listen to us.  If god is many, then which one should I get to know or to worship or to please?  Should I spend every second in life worrying about not be able to worship all of the gods or to please them? Or, to abide by all the rules of each individual diety?  What are their boundaries or expectations?  Too much to know even for one God, why would you want more than one?  Enough wonders and headaches comes from having one spouse, why would anyone want more than one to cherish?  Wouldn’t you want to be loved by ONE and to give your whole heart to ONE, rather than giving part of your heart to many and to know that you are not the only one THEY love?  To know the absolute standard of holiness and justice and love… absolute defines one God, one standard, to which everything else gets compared to.  Ironically, possibly creatively paradoxically, oneness of God makes most sense and is again the simplest idea to understand! 

Now, if there is a One Holy Absolute God… why do I drop off my “laundry list” when I pray to Him?!  I wonder why God hasn’t strike me mute for constantly annoying Him like a dripping faucet with the way I pray.  We show so much contempt, so much irreverence, so much arrogance, so much pride, so much disrespect to our LORD and King.  Why do I pray to God with a ‘pre-fabricated prayer,’ like a fixed prayer that I pray everytime before meals or needing a parking space…  Does He not know my needs before I see it?  Does He not know where I am going or what my troubles are before I am there?  With His splendor and indescribable majesty, how can I think that offering my best in exchange for some of His graces is good enough for Him?  How can I think that my best, or the labors of my blood, is worth anything to purchase anything from God?  God is not impressed with my offerings or what I can give Him.  My best looks worst than dust in comparison to His glory!  Imagine you approaching the king in all His majesty with your head bowed to the ground… Now, say one of the prayers that you say every day… Imagine that?!  Will you be ashamed?  Will you be mute?  Does that sound preposterous?

Imagine a king in all his majesty inviting the lowliest of his kingdom to dine with him and to offer love and life for them… unimaginable!  But, that is our God!

It is precisely this simple truth that showed me that everything good comes from God.  Everything I have comes from God (job, money, possession, friends, family, even my ability to love God, even my desire to want to spend time with Him, even my desire for the knowledge and understand of Him comes from Him!)  It is God’s choice alone to create us.  It is God’ choice alone to want to redeem us back into heaven.  It is God’s choice alone to want to restore our sinfulness to His glory and holiness.  It is God’s choice alone to want to bless us so we can bless others.  It is God’s choice alone to give us desire for Him.  It is not based on anything we can do for God or what we are doing right in our lives to make us thing that we are closer to God than other people.  God’s love and blessing in our lives come only from Him!  We cannot earn it.  We cannot deserve it.  We are completely useless in comparison to Him.  Yet, the holy God of the universe decided to love us and to give us life and to instruct us to share His love, His story, and His gifts and blessings with everyone around us.  Amazing… speechless…. What else can I say?

Have you ever been amazed at those other humanoids around you?  What impressed you about them?  How long will your amazement last?  Will you remember them for ages and ages to come?  Or even for 10 min until you meet another amazing humanoid?  God never ceases to amaze me!

The world has no desire for Him.  The world has intense desire to fill a void that they cannot fill, because, the void is actually God Himself.  In fact, as much as the world tries to fill the void in their heart, oxymoronically, it also has an intense hatred for God!  Yes, the world hates God.  God is judgment to them.  God is hell to them.  God makes them feel guilty and ashamed and uncomfortable.  They don’t see how God can be loving or enjoyable.  They don’t care about God.  They won’t do anything for those who are suffering, though they won’t stop talking about it.  They see children and women being killed and trafficked but they won’t do anything to help.  They only put up a front, a façade, and actions of love are not part of their reality.  They only dream and debate and argue… but never put it into action.  They live in their minds and not in their bodies… or live completely in their body and not in their hearts.  They are ‘faith’ without ‘action’… and/or ‘action’ without ‘faith.’  They are impotent.  They are paralyzed by fear.  They are ineffective.  They are just fake. 

It is like there is a thick veil that covers their eyes between the 'windows of their soul' to the holy presence of God.  Like the curtain that covered the Holy of Holys in the temple, which in the hour of Jesus, it was torn apart... so that forever in eternity, we are no longer separated from His presence... but, His presence fills us and enables us and completes us.

The indicator of God in your life is that you will have a desire to pursue after God, to want to spend time with Him, to make His concerns your concerns, and that your heart will break for what breaks His heart.  If you don’t have this, God is probably not at the center of your heart.  If you have any desire for God at all, you need to re-evaluate yourself and ask God to help you make Him the center of your life!  The desire to love God is supernatural, not natural! 

Request: 
God would you please create a whole new worship experience for me?  God please forgive me.  Forgive my transgressions.  I am at fault of many of the things you have revealed to me in the above passage.  Please draw me into your heart.  Please allow my heart to be overwhelmed by You.  Please don’t let me out of Your presence, even with all of my faults and disobediences.  Please heal my wounds.  Please wrap Your arms of refuge around me.  I want to dwell in Your presence forever.   www.crazylovebook.com