Into-Me-See, Part II
A word to the reader before getting into this article; this is for serious Christians only. It also helps if you’re familiar with the writings of Brennan Manning and Bill Johnson. However, if you haven’t taken the plunge yet and are wondering about what this stuff is all about, you’re in the right place! If you don’t understand any of the terms and clichés here, contact me and I’ll explain. My heart is for you have a true encounter with the King of the universe and I hope you can see Him through what I write.
It’s been about eight months since my New Years resolution – and what a trip it’s been! I thought I would let you in on how my experiment went and the consequences I came upon as a result. If you haven’t read “Into-me-see”, go back and read it before reading this article.
At the beginning of this year I set out to:
- Learn extravagant love.
- Allow the charity of God to extend to my secret place, and
- Do everything except that which I would regret.
Sounds good, eh? It was good. But it turned out the motives behind those resolutions weren’t exactly the best ones. I thought that if I could cold-cut my persona into what I perceived as reality, life would become more meaningful and fulfilling. The thought was basically “This world sucks, my boring life sucks and God feels too familiar. I need excitement.” Wham! Real life demolish my naive outlook of many things in two short months. I literally walked out what’s called “abstract occurrence” in the psychology field. The openness I enjoy in relationships became an endless drudgery of heroic efforts by my inner imposter to keep up the façade of togetherness. I slid into pretense and lame excuses, skipped over momentous events and lost precious God-time in the pursuit of what I thought was truth. Instead of shedding the biggest earth-suit of them all, Pride; I unknowingly embraced what every human should spurn: the essence of theoretical arm-chair moralizing. I found that reality in the worldly sense of the word is still fantasy.
No, I haven’t learned extravagant love. In fact, I think I’ve realized the exact opposite: extreme selfishness. And by no means have I totally allowed the charity of God in to my inner sanctum. Ever the scheming fellow, the inner imposter plots new mazes to block the Sonlight out and keep intimacy at bay. No, I’m afraid that one failed too. And to do everything except that which I would regret? C’mon, Solomon tried that 3,000 years ago and it didn’t work then either. So what now? What about all those nice resolutions that sounded so good? I thought for sure I was on to something there!
I was; I just had the wrong veracity.
Jesus is reality. The Holy Spirit is reality. The FATHER is reality. The FATHER is extravagant love! To hell with all our puny earthling mindsets and sickening self righteousness! Blessings to all those things that keep us from Him; for without them we’d be boorish slops and lazy spectators! HE is the reason we breathe and exist. This whole world was created solely for us to reach the end of our journey and for that end to be in His House with all those who were redeemed because of our life.
God’s Kingdom is much more real than we can imagine. It’s here, right now, all around us. When we praise Him, He comes and listens. When we pray for a blind man to be healed, a new set of eyes are right there waiting for us to grab and install! He makes legions of angels available to those who are locked in a struggle with the evil in their lives, gives the dove of peace to those who long for comfort and touches the wounded and abused and they’re restored. You want reality? Tap into this Kingdom and let these heavenly realities transcend your earthly castle-in-the-sand and see what happens!
I think we’ve been duped by our intellectualism into assuming life can be reasoned out by rational thinking. This walk we live is truly a mystery and only a Divine revelation (which is easier to get than you think, but not that easy) can disclose what’s really in our hearts and bring us into a new era. How blind we’ve been to be living in the yellowish glow of the first heaven when the crystal clear weather in the third heaven above is beckoning us to alight on God’s favor and live the real life! I stand corrected in my assessment of humanity. Without the renewing of our minds we are annoying fog horns in the middle of
The good part of this story? We can be jovial again! And satisfaction is starting to sink deep down inside this man, too. It’s real, unassuming and straightforward. We can release our facades now and be real! This is where true life happens; I like it, I want to live it and I’m never going back.
My conclusion:
If you claim to be a Christian and aren’t satisfied with the end product of your life, maybe it’s time to let go of yourself. Let the weight of imitational performance slip from your shoulders. Quit trying to prove how good you are! How can one live a life of success when their whole persona is built on pharisaical sham and artificial conquests? Take a step into the heavenly realities and try God’s Kingdom on for size.
The first time I was obedient to a prompting from the Holy Spirit from my heart and not external pretense was the happiest day of my life; and I want to continue that way. This walk is about love/passion, it’s not a discipline. The discipline you hear about so much is to protect that passion, not vice versa - and you know what? This life of sanctified reality is crazy fun when you let yourself live it!
