drunkard's prayer.

drunkard's prayer, by over the rhine.

You're my water
You're my wine
You're my whiskey
From time to time

You're the hunger
On my bones
All the nights
I sleep alone

Sweet intoxication
When your words
Wash over me

Whether or not
Your lips move
You speak to me

Like an ocean
Without waves
You're the movement
That I crave

And in that motion
I long to drown
And be lost not to be found
You're my water
You're my wine
You're my whiskey
From time to time.

incredible song--check it out. i love the tone of redemption in it.

over the rhine has become a new favorite of mine this winter break, lots of good listening seshes :)

receive.

i went to a church service here in st. louis with a friend yesterday, and was kind of taken for a spin. the church was on it's 4th week of a word a week leading up to the christmas service (of which there was TEN--it was so packed) and this week was receive. i think throughout the service most of our thoughts consisted of asking questions as to when the meaty stuff was going to come, when is there going to be the christmas message, when is the story going to be told. but there wasn't really any of that, just simple explanation after simple explanation of what means to receive an incredible gift--namely the gift of Christ. grace was emphasized so much that there wasn't much else to the sermon.

while there are reasons why this will never really be my "home" church, it forced us to step back from analyzing all the components that went into this service and just reflect on this core reality of Christianity. this gift of God making himself fully man--for us--is something that i need to keep coming back to. God is a God we can and should worship. and doing that, really letting our soul rest in the worship, receiving the grace that is continually poured out on us, is so important.

i think sometimes i can get so caught up in all the forward progress that i need to be making, doing all of these things for God and trying to be culturally relevant and focusing on all of these other things. during our drive home, we had some good talk time about how it is good and "successful" in itself to worship, to rest in grace truly, and to do that before anything else. it is such a simple thing, yet the difficulty comes when we lost sight of what a true gift it is. everything in us wants to say "what's next," or "ok, now what," but it's ok to be just be; it just is.


on another note, what would i do without all of these amazing friends i have? i have been so blessed, and i am so grateful for that.


merry christmas!

idolatry in worship.

read this blog post(s) about worship on sunday mornings. there's multiple parts to it, so check those out too, because that's where the meaty stuff is :)

here's an excerpt:

What is our greatest hindrance in worshipping God? We could come up with a number of potential answers.

“Our worship leader isn’t very experienced.”
“The services are too planned/spontaneous.”
“The songs are too complex/simple.”
“The band/orchestra/organist/guitarist sounds bad.”
“There are too many new/old songs.”
“Our church is too big/small.”

Ignoring for a moment that all these statements refer to a meeting context, they reveal a profound misconception about the hindrances to true worship. Contrary to what we might think, our greatest problem doesn’t lie outside us, but within our own hearts. It’s the problem of idolatry.

for the sake of obedience.

i've been thinking about obedience a lot lately, namely how hard it is and the reasons we are supposed to obey. obedience to God parallels the reasons why kids obey their parents--they don't obey out of sheer fear of their parents, or because they have been yelled at without love, essentially being degraded, or because they will be rewarded. kids obey their parents because they love them and don't want to disappoint them. it comes from a deeper relationship with their parents than kids who don't obey experience.

i can see this so closely in my own view of obedience with the Lord. my obedience must be grounded in love, not out of fear of something God will do to me if i don't have a quiet time, not so that i will be rewarded with the american dream sometime in my life.

i think this can relate a lot to how we see church. we kind of try to "trick" people into obedience by using fear, or telling people how miserable they will be if they don't obey God. or maybe obedience is the "cool" thing to do, being a christian is "cool." so we see church as needing to be cool and fun, and making all the bible studies cool and fun. but if someone truly needs change, they need an encounter with Jesus, not anything else. everything we teach about Jesus needs to be first and foremost rooted in a foundation of a love for him.

i want to pray, not that someone, or myself even, would stop doing something, or start doing something else, but that they would encounter this love of Jesus with such immense clarity that they have no choice but to obey; that they will be blinded by love for him and this is what will change their lives.

i want to stop working so much out of actions and putting so much weight on what i am doing, on my "successes," and bring it back to what God is doing or isn't doing. i want to be faithful to God alone, and not to what looks like success to this world.

ESV bibles -- 45% off

justin taylor just posted a blog with the link to 45% off of ESV bibles everyday... check it out: http://theologica.blogspot.com/2007/12/wts-books-all-esvs-45-off.html

that's a pretty great deal :)

whose kingdom am i building?

i’m so sick of my self-righteousness, so sick of how my life so easily becomes all about me. so much of my life is taken up in “building my own kingdom”; so many things that i do have more to do with my own pride than my desire to build God’s kingdom here on earth.

Jesus teaches that in seeking God’s priorities, i can be free from this burden that i place upon myself—matthew 6:25-33 talks about this. verse 33 says, “but seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you…”

i want all my activities and standards that i place upon myself and others to be centered on the advancement of God’s kingdom and not my own. he’s already promised to supply all of my needs.

also check out matthew 13:44-46 and john 6:27: “do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. for on him God the Father has set his seal.”

i want to be praying, “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done..” and mean it.

believe: to accept as true, genuine, or real (v).

"to believe God is to look at what God has said and to let that define reality for you." -- tim keller.

this has been my constant prayer, but what does this really look like, how does this define my life? here's some practical things i've been learning, thanks to mr. keller:

1. believing God means to not go on feelings or appearances. it is going on something despite our weakness and despite our feelings and perceptions; ultimately a death to self-trust. look at abraham: "he did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of sarah's womb" (romans 4:19). i mean, his body was completely hopeless. abraham heard what God said and simply believed him. sometimes it is so easy to make things more than they are--to hear what God is saying but to question it, to doubt it, to let other factors get in the way. but when He has spoken He has spoken.

2. when you are truly believing God, you will focus on facts about Him. how often do we just sit and think about God, to really consider his power? do we really know what his power entails? all through isaiah, we are shown of his might. he holds the waters in the hollow of his hand and encloses the dust of the earth in a measure. he weighs the mountains in a scale; the earth's inhabitants are like grasshoppers. there is no limit to his power--our lives should reflect this. "faith is not the absence of thinking, but rather is a profound insistence on acting out of measured reflection, instead of just reacting to circumstances."

3. trust the bare word of God. even when there is nothing else to go on, we need to take God at his word--and we need to know his word. if we reason on the basis of what we know about God, it's easier to deal with things and easier to overcome any struggles of weakness. we are called to act on God's promises and word even when it is hard--faith is living as if these promises are true. it's doing things because they please the Lord, because we believe him even when circumstances are saying otherwise.

faith looks at God--not itself--and holds on to the faithfulness of God.

i need to be knowing who God is more and more so that i can be believing him more and more. i desire to live in this reality because i know it is the best for me; he has made these promises to me and they are true, every moment of my life.

newfound obsession.

seriously, i love blogs/blogging. i might be getting addicted, but they are taking over the world. or at least my computer time.

surburban church kids.

i just read one of anthony bradley's [from covenant seminary] blog entries and thought it was really interesting. he titled it: "the suburban church: ushering kids into counseling in their 20s and 30s." is this just a generational thing, or is it something that affects multitudes, in different eras of the history of our country? is this article being too hard on our parents? it's scary to think about just how much our parents have really affected us, and how much someday... when we have kids, we will be affecting them. i don't really know where i'm going with this, but just some thoughts. if you read the blog, make sure to read the comments on it too.

"doing theology."

i just read an article which talked a lot about learning to do theology as a "tapestry," and how this applies to the Church--that we must continually pursue a right theology. this process is ongoing and intersects with our culture and all areas of our life. if you get a chance, read it and let me know your thoughts.

by his blood alone.

"the doctrine of propitiation is precisely this--that God loved the objects of his wrath so much that he gave his own son to the end that he by his blood should make provision for the removal of his wrath." -- john murray.

sometimes this can be just too much to think about. propitiation (according to merriam-webster) literally means to appease or pacify the anger or agitation of, or to regain the favor or good will of. Jesus' death pacified the wrath of God toward our sin, but the glory of it is that he gave his son to remove his own wrath... therefore, there is no opportunity to call God an injust God or to call him a "blood-thirsty" God (as I've heard recently). God's own action propitiates his own wrath.

sometimes i think it can be easy to see God as one or the other -- a father who loves us or the judge and king of the universe -- one who is just by also one who is justifier. this can be so dangerous, because unless our God is a God "of both holy anger and sacrificial love," our view of the gospel and of God himself becomes so distorted. if we see God as simply one who is pouring his wrath out on us, we don't see his grace or his love and have no motivation to live a decent life. we cannot measure up to his standards and righteousness, we are never able to live up to what he has called us to be or who he has told us we are. but on the other hand, if we see God who is wholly and completely love without any aspect of wrath at all, then we live our life with a certain liberation yet have nothing to rely on. you can compare it to a parent who is completely permissive to their child, setting no limits and giving no guidance, never confronting their children--and this is so destructive. this "loving" view of God makes us feel like orphans.

we need both of these views of God because he is both. that is the wonder of the cross--that in one stroke statisfies fully both the love of God and the justice of God which demands punishment for our sin.


*tim keller's romans study made me think a lot of this, not myself.

living in reality.

this post came from an e-mail i sent a couple days ago, just a culmination of some things that i've been learning about lately and where my heart's been.

"i've been learning so much about prayer lately and what that looks like to really be faithful to the Lord and what is looks like for the Lord himself to be faithful. i for sure do not pray enough, yet i want to live in this reality of a holy God who is continually present in my life and in my actions. to live in this reality means that i must be praying continually, living moment by moment in the supernatural, believing that there truly is this living God that who is always at work.

1 thessalonians 5:16-19 says: "rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. do not quench the Spirit." (ESV)
to do this means that i really am acting as if God is always present in my life, always present in every moment, not just in my morning quiet time or in my quick prayer before i head to bed. and he is present because i need him to be present always, an hour in the morning can't and won't sustain me all day.

be encouraged: "for to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people," (1 timothy 4:10). guys, we are working because we believe that God is going to use that work, because he is a living God and He is working in all of our actions. that is our hope, and that is what keeps us going. we can go on because we know that God is active and is busy at work.

this weekend i started and am almost finished with a book called "L'abri" by edith schaeffer. it is FANTASTIC and i really recommend it to you because it will challenge you so much, and you will be AMAZED at the power of God. here's an excerpt that i really like near the beginning of the book:

"One morning at Chalet Bijou's breakfast table, Fran (Francis Schaeffer) had said to me, "Supposing we had awakened today to find everything concerning the Holy Spirit and prayer removed from the Bible--that is, not removed the way liberals would remove it, but that God has somehow really removed everything about prayer and the Holy Spirit from the Bible. What difference would it make practically between the way we worked yesterday and the way we would work today, and tomorrow? What difference would it make in the majority of Christians' practical work and plans? Aren't most plans laid out ahead of time? Isn't much work done by human talent, energy and clever ideas? Where does the supernatural power of God have a real place?" Challenged by this, we began to think and look over our own lives and work...and, we asked God to give us something more real in our work of the future.""

something beyond ourself.

i love how eugene peterson says this:

“[Imagination] catapults us into mystery. Imagination seems to be the thing least valued in our present culture. There is a lot of attention given to fantasy, but the difference between fantasy and imagination is that in fantasy, the story has us at the center of it, indulging us. Imagination takes us beyond ourselves. There’s not enough of that happening today... Throughout civilization we have lived by stories. Stories draw us into worlds bigger than ourselves. They help us live. Wallace Stegner says that we live by forms and patterns, and if the patterns are wrong, we live badly. Good stories—good fiction, in particular—provide us with good patterns. Every time someone tells a story well, the Gospel is served. Stories invite us to participate, to identify with the characters, to get caught up in the emotion of them.”

it's time for planting.

so plans for the summer are underway. so exciting! we'll see what happens, but it is really is so cool to think about and plan and pray for where God wants me.

i'm excited for this semester and for everything that i can feel God is going to do. i need to get my head on straight and stop living like it's summer, which is so hard to do sometimes. i think it was a hard transition to go right from summer to school since i was in Columbia the whole time... i never came back, never left anywhere, never really got in a different "school" mindset. so that's what i'm trying to do. i'm so ready for princess academy starting up with granny's house. i've been praying lately that God gives me a clearer vision for what he wants me to do with some of the girls this semester. i feel like the relationships that have been formed can go to a whole new level. it's kind of overwhelming; God is making me so uncomfortable with some things which hopefully will be really great for me.

"i have great faith in a seed. convince me that you have a seed there, and i am prepared to expect wonders." -- thoreau.