"We need more and more risky things and the joy becomes more pronounced..."
-- Shane Hipps

"For the grateful man knows that God is good, not by hearsay, but by experience. And that is what makes all the difference."
-- Thomas Merton

"We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us... There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love."
--1 John 4



In order to be refashioned, we must first be taken apart. In order to be filled with the fullness of our Maker, we must be totally emptied of ourselves. I am wondering these days how far I can be pushed-- how far I will be pushed-- how much farther I must walk t0 be taken clear to the edge. Most days, I want to believe that I have reached the last stone on the side of the ledge, but somehow, I seem to continue to be pushed. There is more ground to cover.

I first read these words from Thomas Merton a week or two ago:

"Real self-conquest is the conquest of ourselves not by ourselves by but the holy spirit.. self-conquest is really self- surrender.
Yet before we can surrender ourselves, we must become ourselves. For no one can give up what he does not possess.
More precisely-- we have to have enough mastery of ourselves to renounce our own will into the hands of Christ-- so that he may conquer what we cannot reach by our own efforts."

I remember writing this down in my journal, thinking, I do not fully understand what this means, but I think it is important and there is something I need to learn here. I revisited this wisdom this morning, caught by the last statement-- this mastery in us acheived by a Christ who knows us deeper than we know ourselves. I think there is a space in me that is beyond my own knowing, beyond my full comprehension. And as I walk further into the wilderness with God, he is pulling these things out.

I awoke this morning with a song in my head, a song reminding me just how deep the love of the father is for me in the midst of my hurt and brokenness. I've been thinking a lot these days about the love of a Father that does not allow us to stay where we are, but pushes us beyond ourselves to make something new in us-- somehow this morning, the contemplation of that reality led me to a vivid image of Abraham climbing the mountain to sacrifice his son Isaac, his only son, his promised gift from the Lord.

"Then God said, 'Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region on Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.' ...When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then, he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. But the angel of the Lord called out from heaven, 'Abraham! Abraham!'
'Here I am,' he replied.
'Do not lay a hand on the boy,' he said. 'Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.'
... So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide...
'Because you jave done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you and make your descendetns as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore... and through your offspring, all nations oan earth will be blessed because you have obeyed me.' "
-- Genesis 22

I imagine Abraham, climing that mountain, each step asking why, wondering what the Lord could possibly have in mind, wondering if the Lord had changed his mind about the stars in the sky, the grains of sand on the seashore. Can you imagine him saying under his breath,"This is all I have... I only have this one... Are you sure?" And I imagine, young Isaac asking a thousand questions of his own-- and Abraham, his father, only able to answer in his own questions-- yet without a falter he aswers "the Lord will provide," and he tells his servants "We will worship and the Lord and then we will return to you."

Even in the midst of what must have been unspeakable doubt, wonder, question, Abraham continued to climb, one foot in front of the other He went so far as to place the child upon the altar, to raise the knife---

The Lord waited until the last possible moment--- as if to ask, "Will you truly give me everything?" He does not allow us to hold anything back, he pushes us all the way to the edge because if there is any part of us left over, he cannot fill us to brim-- we rob him of the opportunity to fill us completely. And the Lord will not be robbed.

I imagine Jesus there on the beach, asking Peter three times, "Do you love me?" I see myself in Peter, becomming frustrated, answering, "Lord you know that I love you," impatient with the continual testing. Yet, even as we may be impatient with the extent to which the Lord goes to refine us, it is only so that we will be so emptied of ourselves that there is no possible shred of death left in us to take up the space meant for the life he wants to give. With each passing day that I wonder where my mountain of The Lord Will Provide is, with each passing step that I ask, "are we there yet?" he is growing in me a reliance upon his love that surpasses even the thought of fear. Each step up the mountain makes it easier to say "We will worhsip and then we will come back to you," as Abraham told his servants. With each passing moment it becomes easier to believe that "God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering," as Abraham reassured his son.

The thing that strikes me about this story is that the Lord allows Abraham to go so far as to raise up the knife. How strange that Abraham would say to his servants that they will return after worshipping the Lord, and yet he follows through to the point of nearly peircing the flesh of his one and only son, the son that the Lord promised and delivered. And so, even as I become impatient, wondering how far, how deep, how long the Lord will press himself upon me, I see how the Lord spares nothing-- he does not stop short of wholeness. He leaves no stone unturned. And even as I think I've worked everything out, the Father who knows our hearts in ways far beyond our own understanding continues to plunge deeper, cleaning out messes we have not even known.

And I see in Abraham an understanding of a God who is not constrained by our human understanding or timing or control nor is he limited by our circumstances. Abraham knows that ultimately, it is not Isaac who will provide these thousand generations promised by the Creator-- it is only through Isaac that the Lord will act. I am learning to love a God who can be trusted through my trust in those that he provides. No longer is he simply asking me to lean on him, but he is calling me to put my full weight into those he has created, even in their broken reflection of his image. And I know that this is the Lord's call because it is quite terrifying and risky-- just far enough beyond me to only leave room for his life to be revealed in new and deeper ways. What if I put my trust in someone that may only leave me wounded? Can I continue to forgive someone that has already wounded me too many times to count?

However-- as I climb this mountain of risk, each step teaches me that even if I give myself fully to someone who fails me, I am not beyond the reach of the Father's hand. Without a doubt, in our human frailty, we are daily inflicting wounds upon one another as we touch each other with our broken shards. Yet, it is this very life of connection and relational entrance the Lord calls us to risk. This risk of putting our trust in one another is the very act of trust in the Father as we prove our assurance that he will fill in the gaps, he will heal, and he will use even the deepest hurt for our good and his glory. If grace is an ocean, we're all sinking. We know that even as we lay our very hearts upon the altar, as we raise the knife, he will provide all that we need, we will worship together, and we will return.