I’m an internal processor. You may not think that’s true for me since I’m known to be an outgoing, extroverted person. But when it’s time to organize the things in my mind and heart, the vast experiences I’ve been blessed to have, the amazing words and teachings of mentors and coaches… I need to get away and do that.
Here’s the bad news… I rarely take the time to get away and bring organization to these things. I just don’t take advantage of the time I have. It’s easier to claim I need “to rest my mind” and dive into another world via the TV, a book, or even into the lives of my friends.
In my most recent and meager attempts to process through my crazy life, I’ve seen that my pursuit of God isn’t what it should be. People talk about “being romanced” by Him. If I’m honest I’m not there, but I want to be.
I’m reading A.W. Tozer’s The Pursuit of God. Everything he writes is amazing, and while I’ve read this particular book before, it’s certainly speaking to the deep places of my heart right now. Tozer talks about how “things have beocme necessary to us, a development never orginally intended. God’s gifts now take the place of God, and the whole course of nature is upset by the monstrous substitution.”
I’ve been on the World Race twice. Abandonment happened. I think it has since un-happened. (Yes, I know that’s not a word.)
“It would seem that there is within each of us an enemy which we tolerate at our peril.”
“Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” – Matt. 5:3
I want the Kingdom of Heaven so the time has come for some painful extractions to take place in my heart. This ironically is something else the Lord keeps bringing up. This kind of “cleansing” or “healing” often hurts really bad. I just read a blog by another contemporary author that I enjoy, Mark Batterson. In the blog he talks about how, “the Lord often has to hurt us to heal us.”
Tozer gives the example of Abraham and Issac. With time running out in Abraham’s long life, the promised blessing of a son finally comes. I imagine that there was instantly a love for that son which I can’t fully describe or have yet to understand in it’s fullness. If it was me, and God asked for the sacrifice of my promised blessing… the love of my life… I wonder what I would have thought? I wonder what I would have said? I wonder what my response would have been?
These “things” in my life that seem to take up my time and take precedent over my pursuit of God aren’t even as valuable or meaningful as Issac surely was to Abraham. I grieve as I realize this fact.
In the midst of that grieving I rejoice in the knowledge that it is time for something to change and God’s heart is that I “would no longer be a slave to the tyranny of things.” (Tozer) This is where I believe the “has to hurt us to heal us” part comes into play. So as I redirect my pursuit of God I wonder what He’s about to ask me to take to the altar of sacrifice. Like Abraham, I wonder if I will consider it “an act of worship?” (Gen. 22:5)
Tozer imagines that once Abraham put his son on the altar to sacrifice, and was at the point of no return, God might have said, “I never intended that you should actually slay the lad. I only wanted to remove him from the temple of your heart that I might reign unchallenged there. I wanted to correct the perversion that existed in your love.” This is God hurting us so that He might heal us.
It’s time that God corrects the perversion that exists in my love for him. I want the habit of clinging to possessions, security, relationships, and anything that’s not Him, to be stripped away.
I want to live like I believe that I must lose my life to find it.
You know, before The World Race I believe that possessions and things were important and could have been described as an idol in my life. Now, I see that it’s not necessarily possessions taking the place of the Lord in my life. I don’t have much. These days it just comes down to the fact that my priorities and decisions don’t always reflect that He is my all in all.
I’m seeking the blessing of a deeper love and knowledge of Him than I’ve ever known. Even though I’m just at the beginning of this process, I know it’s bound to hurt. This is how Tozer describes it:
“The ancient curse will not go out painlessly; the tough old miser within us will not lie down and die in obedience to our command. HE must be torn out of our heart like a plant from the soil; he must be extracted in agaony and blood like a tooth from the jaw. He must be expelled from our soul by violence, as Christ expelled the money changers form the temple.”
I believe it’s a defining moment where I get to choose Him first. These moments happen every once in awhile, and sometimes I recognize them and sometimes I don’t. I’m asking for a deep cleansing that will probably hurt, but it’s time. I bring this before anybody who reads this blog and I ask that you take some time to personally reflect and dig into your own heart. Ask yourself one question:
Does God reign unchallenged in the temple of your heart?
It’s time He did in my heart.
