Resist the Rush

Me too. I want this. Those closest to me can a test, this has been a challenge in my life. Can’t some of us relate to rushing through life on some level? “In a rush” seems more like a lifestyle nowadays. It’s like if you don’t have at least sixteen and a half projects going on, well you’d better pick up the pace! 

I admire the pace that Jesus set for His life here on earth. He took time to connect. This is still the way He communes with us. And it is still the way He works in and through our lives. This admiration compels me to look inward and ask, “whose or by what pace have I been setting mine? Is it set to His rhythm of compassion and can He work through it?”

This is serious business. It’s serious because this world is hurting. People are crossing our paths everyday at work, school, at the grocery store, in our social networks etc. They are hemorrhaging inside. They’re weary. And here is why Christ’s solution for the weary, won’t work in this alternate rush universe. In Matthew 11: 28-30 He tells us:

28 Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

His solution is His Yoke. Not just for the weary, but for when we are called on to help the weary. I hear Him clearly saying, "take your yoke off and put Mine on. And whatever you think you know about helping the weary, if you haven’t learned it from Me, it’s fruitless."

In a practical sense, a yoke is what you might see on two oxen when pulling something heavy. By definition, a yoke serves to couple two things together. In Matthew 11 it means a submission to authority, not simply imparted, but shared with Christ. God opened this up for me one day when He found me under the burden of a mess I created. It was the result of me rushing out in front of His lead to try and help...again. He said, “Rebecca, for the yoke to work in making the load light, the two have to step together and in synch with each other." So He gave me this visual of me under one side of a yoke and Him on the other. He was looking at me and I was looking at Him and He said, "watch for my cue, step with Me when I step and we'll pull this thing together. And whatever you do, don’t lose eye contact with Me. This is how my yoke is easy & my burden is light."

I'm learning that the moments of connection where compassion is most needed are not found in this alternate rush universe. And neither are the solutions. They are found in synch with Him. At His Pace. His Leading. Where the need is, He will be. My Pastor always says, "the only thing we can take with us to Heaven is people. It’s about people." You just don't know what someone might be going through, BUT God sure does. He has the solution, the word or kind gesture that can make the difference. And outside of a supernatural miracle, we really are His only way to get it to them. It really is hard to see the need or solution when we're in a rush. But I think if we set our pace to that of Christ's...wait for His cue, He will surely teach us.

God can do amazing through us when we master the art of simply slowing down. 

The ReSpelling of Beautiful

Has a word ever become old to you? You know a word you use or hear so much that sooner or later it begins to fade into the backdrop of your vocabulary. The meaning begins to lose authenticity and suddenly you find yourself in search of another word to convey its meaning. I think that's happened to the word "beautiful". We use the word beautiful to describe so many things these days. We are a marvelous creation, that we would all have such diverse opinions and perspectives as to what constitutes beauty. That in itself is beautiful. But I belive somewhere along the way, real beauty has lost its way. Beauty walking in and out of movies, books and media ads for lotions, make-up, and miracle pills all in hopes of finding its way back to the heart. The respelling of beautiful took on meaning one day when my husband sat up and said, "that's it, be-you-till-full!". I've been taking this word apart ever since then, asking God to redefine this word to me in the context He intended when He inspired the penned words "fearfully and wonderfully made". Is it possible? Could it really be as simple as "just be you".  Just Be You"...some ladies really have this figured out. Or maybe we think they do because sometimes it seems that everyone has it more together than we do in certain areas. But nobody’s immune to the journey it takes to get where they are. Sometimes being you is awkward and takes some fumbling around and most times it takes great courage, but tapping into the original blueprint of you, requires that you be bold and just be you. Faults, quirks, beauties and all. Every situation needs a response from you.  A fitting response that can only come from the many many layers that make up you. And it seems that every life season calls for another layer of you. The enemy’s voice tries to tell us that we must look outward to find out who we are or who we need to be in that process of that change. When all the while, the blueprint is inward. Embracing what God weaved together from the start can only be found in relation to Him in relationship with HIM. This is true fullness that reveals true beauty. Searching for beauty outside of that leads to a feelings of inferiority, stress and emptiness. Fullness is found in embracing what God designed. Everything else is counterfeit.

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart...Jere. 1:5

You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother's womb. Psa. 139:13

RP