God's Grace and Love

God's grace is totally awesome. I am truly amazed that He would love me. Truly amazed that, time after time, screw up after screw up, He would patiently pursue me. Even when I am against God, He still wants me, He still loves me. It brings tears to my eyes, when I truly let myself feel the absolute immensity of it, and I can't even imagine how much more it goes beyond my imagination. Words cannot even catch a glimpse of God, in fact as Steven Curtis Chapman puts it... words just get in the way of what I really want to say...

Isn't it funny that it's during the good times where we can get to the point where we feel like we don't need God. He is still there and He is closer than ever. We acknowledge Him with thanks that life is good, and together we share joy in the circumstances, but God kind of takes a side line and watches for a while. And then in the troughs of the waves of life, it is there, when everything is drained from our spirit, God feels so distant to us. Why is it so, that when I look back on the footprints in the sand, I see only one set? God is obviously there...He never leaves or forsakes us, but every little prayer every little intersession feels like it hits the wall and falls to the floor. It is here, in the depths of God's distance that we truly find that we are hungry for God...just as Jesus was in the wilderness for 40 days and nights, he was hungry, so we in our barrenness find a hunger for God that may not necessarily have been apparent in the good times.

I've been going through...a mess...simply put, for about a year now. Oh, it's had its highlights, but the lows have been much more in number as to make the highlights seem patchy at best. I've been learning, but I still have a long, long road ahead. A road of unlearning, of grieving over mistakes made, of digging up the past and dealing with it. My journey hasn't just barely begun, this time is a preparation... my journey comes later... How religious I can be! How legalistic! How absolutely full of myself can I get! I see someone going through a rough time and I automatically try to apply formula to fix the problem rather than simply grieving with them. I am no better than Job's friends, who brought death into the situation. How many wounds have I given in this way? How many hearts have I broken? I rage against myself every day as I see all the trash that has built up in my soul over the years. It is here, in this place, where everyone I love seem far away in spirit though near in body, it is here where nothing seems to be going right, it is here, in the loneliness and despair, where I have nothing, that God truly finds me, or rather I truly find God. God, I truly am nothing, change my heart and draw me to You...

Youth band is still awesome..it will always be awesome, as long as the focus continues to stay on God. I am increasingly aware of my faults, but this doesn't stop me from seeing particularly dangerous situations arising, which, if left unchecked, will be, I fear, fatal to those involved...not physically, but, yeah, not good. I have no idea what to do anymore. I can pray, and that's all I know. Hopefully it will be enough. I have begun to see that in reality, I am no better than anyone... it may come as a shock to everyone that I would actually think of myself as higher than some people...me being the guy spouting humble, humble, humble... but I did, and to some extent I still do...God is working on me. We all do it to some extent... ie. I'm not perfect, but I'm better than that guy who is definitely not doing the right thing, I mean look at my fruits! I'm worshiping God for God's sake, while he is only doing it to look good in front of everyone, oh and look, he is bringing division into my little coterie, how dare he! etc. etc., I want to say, what a absolute bunch of CRAP! I with my self-righteous attitudes are just as bad as they. What a Pharisee! Who am I to judge them? What gives me the right? Everyone is broken, everyone is hurting and God is working on us all where we are at.

Wowee this is a long blog...you could almost call it a blogathon...or a blogalong or something. Ok...I'll shut up now and leave you with two songs by Steven Curtis Chapman that really...are really awesome :)

When Love Takes You In
I know you've heard the stories
But they all sound too good to be true
You've heard about a place called home
But there doesn't seem to be one for you
So one more night you cry yourself to sleep
And drift off to a distant dream

When love takes you in and everything changes
A miracle starts with the beat of a heart
When love takes you home and says you belong here
The loneliness ends and a new life begins
When love takes you in

And somewhere while you're sleeping
Someone else is dreaming too
Counting down the days until
They hold you close and say I love you
And like the rain that falls into the sea
In a moment what has been is lost in what will be

When love takes you in everything changes
A miracle starts with the beat of a heart
And this love will never let you go
There is nothing that could ever
cause this love to lose its hold

When love takes you in everything changes
A miracle starts with the beat of a heart
When love takes you home and says you belong here
The loneliness ends and a new life begins
When love takes you in it takes you in for good
When love takes you in

What I Really Want to Say
I say I love you, I say I need you
I try so many ways to say how my heart beats for you
I say I'm always thinking about you
There's no way I'd want to face this life without you
And even though these words comes from deep inside me
There's so much more I don't have the words to say

'Coz what I really want to say
Is what the sun would say to the sky
For giving it a place to come alive
But my words get in the way
Of what I really want to say
Oh, what I really want to say

I know that sometimes my words can be as hard as stone
And sometimes my words have left you feeling so alone
So please forgive me and hear the words I'm saying now
I spend my whole life looking for a way somehow
To let you know just how precious you are to me
I'll use the best words I know but I still won't say it all
It's like a tale too great to be told
It's something that my heart can only show
I'm gonna take my whole life
Just to let you know

What I really want to say
Oh, what I really want to say
What I really want to say
Oh, what I really want to say

Cheerio, D-Man