I've fallen and I can't get back up... Or so it seems

Just like you are right now is all, all that I need. Let's start over. Don't be afraid cause I won't keep track. Let's climb to the top. If you won't look down, I won't look back. 

Those words may be what gets me to sleep tonight. For months I've been lying to myself and they are truth echoing through the lies. 

I've been giving in to my desires and letting satan rule over my mind. He's convinced me that I am paralyzed by my situation. He's convinced me that I have control of my problems, I just can't overcome them yet. These convictions have led me to believe that I'm not good enough to be with God yet. I'm not good enough to get closer. I'm not good enough to deserve the top.  

I've never really grasped the seriousness of sin. I've seen it in the lives of others. I've witnessed how sin can destroy families, including my own. I've seen it ruin people and relationships. Despite it all, for some reason I find myself continually numb or immune to the power of sin. That's not to say I've never sinned, but more to say I've brushed off the consequences. I've taken advantage of grace.

That numbness has stolen from me the depth of God's love. 

Tonight, I refuse to be numb. I refuse to listen to satan's lies. The things I do hurt me. My sin outwardly effects me but inwardly effects others. It effects who I am and how I treat my relationships. I've mistreated Jesus. 

Tonight, I rebuke the lie that I have fallen and I can't get back up. I take back control of my mind from satan and return it to Papa. I'm starting over. He's not keeping track, He's not looking back, and I'm not looking down.

God wants me just as I am. He wants me. Broken. Messed up. Covered in mud. He wants me.

And the good news is... He wants you too.

Freedom isn't free.

Free adj  /frē/ 2 a: not determined by anything beyond its own nature or being: choosing or capable of choosing for itself

Miriam Webster online has 15 different definitions for free as an adjective with each also having sub definitions. It seems like such a simple word, such a simple concept. It's not. And it's a lot harder to actually be free than one might assume.

What am you talking about? We're in America. We are free. We have our rights and our liberties and the pursuit of happiness. Yeah... About that. There's these things called humans. They mess stuff up.

I had to touch on the obvious political side, but truth is, I hate politics. 

The freedom I'm seeking is a spiritual freedom, a way of life. The freedom I desire cannot be found in Webster's dictionary. It can't be defined. It lies deep with my soul and aches to be achieved. Every minute of every day.

Everything in me cries out to be more and have more. I don't want to be defined or confined by traditions or belief systems or parental consent or peer approval. I want to be capable of choosing for myself.

It's easy for us to let our lives get bogged down by all of these things. We carry the weight of the world on our shoulders, putting things aside to figure out later, repressing emotions because the time isn't right to deal with them, picking up other people's burdens because it breaks our heart to see them carry it on their own. That is not freedom. 

Everyone has a belief system. We are a part of a faith community. These communities develop a norm and find comfort in this norm. We have this need to define things so that they are not beyond our understanding. When we don't understand something, we don't have control of it and that scares us. Where there is control, there is comfort. That is not freedom. 

We don't get to choose our family. Well, in a way we do. We choose our friends and they often become our second family, or sometimes our first family. But you don't pick your bloodline and most of the time you can't get away from them. With family comes more expectations and burdens and traditions. That is not freedom.

My heart desires more because the Holy Spirit lives in me. The Holy Spirit lives in you and I and He cannot be defined or confined. I'm keeping Him locked up and in line with the rules and He can't take it any more. The lion wants to be set free.

Jesus said his yoke is easy and his burden is light. I want to reclaim that.

What is your cage? How are you keeping the Holy Spirit tucked away? How can we set Him free? What would it look like if we did?

Stop trying to breathe under water. Break the surface. Fill your lungs with fresh air. See what it feels like to be free. I bet you won't turn back. 

Today, I want to be in heaven.

There are some days that I just don't want to get out of bed in the morning. Most days actually. I like to blame it on this thing they call "depression." You've never heard of it, I'm sure. Many people have probably been there. You've got a test and you didn't study, so you would rather stay in bed. You're fighting with your best friend and you couldn't stand to see her face, so you just want to close your eyes and go back to sleep. Every day at work is the same, so what's the point... just. go. back. to. bed.

With all of this, I think there is a deeper struggle. A struggle that involves forces and desires that are beyond us. Because when I think about it, my issue isn't with my job, or my co-workers, or the dreaded train commute. I don't hate copying and pasting numbers and watching Charmed all day. What I hate is that I'm not a part of something bigger. Yes, I am a part of a huge cable company that brings smiles and tears and laughter and all these wonderful things to the people who watch TV. But who cares? What I hate is that I'm conforming to this world and going through my day to day life without doing anything that shouts Jesus died for you!

I want to be a part of something real. I want to be the voice for a people who don't have a voice. I want to do something that matters. I want to be the hands and feet of Jesus. And if I can't do that today, then I would rather stay in bed.

The struggle between my flesh and my soul is too strong. I'm tired of fighting. I want easy. So on days like today, easy would be to stop trying to make it in this world, and just be with Jesus. I could say I would like to die... which sounds dramatic and makes some people scared for my sanity or whatever, but I mean really, wouldn't you rather just be done and see Jesus? Yeah we all would, but that doesn't mean I should waste this life away wishing I were in heaven.

Even if all I do is smile at someone, it's something. It's a start. Being in this world makes not being of this world awfully difficult. So while I have a plan and a hope for my future, one that paints a picture of life spent in worship, I'm not there yet. Rip away the emotion and just take this for what it is, on days like today, I find no meaning in my life.

I could go on some rant about how everything we do matters, and we can take Jesus wherever we go and blah blah blah. That just doesn't seem real and today, in my doubts, it doesn't true. It's not enough. But I will leave with this... For me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain.


We can't push through life trying to get to heaven, we need to bring heaven here. We need to be Christ. I need to bring heaven here. I need to be Christ.

It's all in our heads.

It never ceases to amaze me how complex and powerful our minds are. I guess really it's not our minds that are powerful but rather, it's the spirit of Christ in us that gives us that power.

"For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us... The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, for, “Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ." -1 Corinthians 2:11-12, 15-16

And yet with all of this power we have, the power that rose Christ from the dead is living in us, we still manage to deem ourselves powerless against such things as sin. It's all in our heads. All of it.

"For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but a spirit of power and love and a sound mind." -2 Timothy 1:7

We can't live our lives in fear of what may be but we need to live our lives in the power of what has already been done. Yes, there are grey areas, but it doesn't matter because grace covers it all. We are not supposed to live in fear of sin, but in the freedom of grace. That's what the new covenant is all about.

The beauty of grace is that it makes life not fair...

And the thing I find most amazing in amazing grace is the chance to give it out. Maybe thats what love is all about...