God has been teaching me of the beauty in vulnerability, and the joy of being loved as I am without the pressure to impress Him. Psalm 51 says that God doesn’t delight in sacrifice. He doesn’t delight in my efforts to impress Him or redeem my own mess. It’s His nature to want me in every state I’m in because He loves to love me and nothing I do will keep Him from doing what He loves. In the midst of my sinful nature, He whispers the sweet secret to attracting His heart, and its not perfection.
Its abandonment. Its whole heartedness. It seems peculiar that an invitation to execution could sound appealing, but Jesus woos us with His words “Deny yourself; take up your cross.” There is a sense of divine romance and superior pleasure of giving everything and holding nothing back. We are created for it. We’re created for it because we’re in His image, and it’s exactly what He did. The Scripture says that for this reason He left His Father’s house…He left it all. He’s the most abandoned of them all! And we meet Him in the abandonment. We meet Him in the whole heartedness. We meet Him in the “all.”
I am reminded of Mary of Bethany as she breaks her alabaster jar of oil at Jesus’ feet- her entire inheritance “wasted” to honor one man who called Himself the Messiah. She had faith that He was her inheritance- more guaranteed than a vile of perfume. She believed that she was fully redeemed and forgiven through Him…and she poured out a love offering as an act of worship at His feet because she saw Him to be worthy of it.
I want to be like her. I want to give that which is scary to give- that which leaves me with nothing and makes me trust Him fully. I want to be like the man who sold everything to buy the field (Matthew 13:44). Could you imagine how irresponsible and senseless he must have looked to his neighbors and friends and family? Yet it says in his joy he sold everything just for the field. I want to be like that. I want to be like the woman at the well who ran into town and told everyone about her remarkable encounter.
We’ve all been invited to these deeper waters and I just wonder what would happen if we just stopped trying to be good enough and started asking for more of Him…I bet you a revival would happen- I want to see it…Jesus let the change start in me- let it start in my vulnerability. Let it flourish in the bravery it takes to say “This is me. And I’m not perfect, but I am enough because I am His creation.”
Thirst is all it takes for more of God’s presence in my life. Thirst is all it takes to have all of the Holy Spirit permeate my soul. Thirst is all it takes to be consumed and captivated and wooed out of this world and into eternity. Thirst is all it takes for God to capture my vision and seal it upward into His courts.
The best part is I don’t need to clean myself up, get my act together, accomplish x, y, and z, or make sure I check “quiet time” off my list for 7 consecutive days in a row. I just need to say “Dad, I’m so thirsty for You.” And He comes like the rain. And He gives generously. And then the fruit of my heart is produced. Fruit doesn’t grow before being watered, but only after. He refines me. He teaches me. He reupholsters the seat of my desires. He whispers the true desires of my heart. He gives me the craving for more. Not my own effort to get there- only my request to be there. Wow…thank You, Yahweh.
