a little obsessed ...

with blogging ... can you tell?  Two entries in one day.  But let's just let one of them count for yesterday.  I was just too tired to write when the evening was over last night!

REALLY, I should get up and run on the treadmill, but I'm tired and thinking, reading and writing right here wrapped up in this warm blanket seems oh so much better!!  :0)

It was so much fun to be able to share this weekend out of the overflow of a heart that is so much enjoying a relationship with Christ!!  So much fun to be able to talk about letting yourself be YOU in that relationship with Christ ... and even though last week was insane and I am really looking forward to NOT working til 11 pm every night this week .... some of those hours "working" also included reading, thinking, planning, praying about what I would be sharing this weekend ... so it was also refeshing!

Finished Ecclesiastes today and wanted to spend some time thinking about it again before I move on (got to get a plan tonight, cause I'm not great at thinking on my feet come Monday morning). 

I got pretty excited yesteday in my reading of Eccl. 11 ... mostly because Tommy Nelson got on one of my soapboxes ... and to be honest, I think he's the only person I've ever heard really join me on it.  It was centered around Eccl 11:5 which says,

As you do not know the path of the wind,

or how the body is formed in a mother's womb,

so you cannot understand the work of God,

the Maker of all things.

Tommy had said, "If you spend your life trying to outguess God, you're wasting your time.  Life will never give you a perfect set of circumstances.  You're going to marry a fallen person.  You're going to have fallen children.  You're going to get a job with a fallen employer.  And along the way you're going to get hurt."  Amen!  Can't say I don't wish it wasn't so, but if it is gonna be that way, let's call it like it is and move on!

And what do we move on to?  TN says, "Live boldly and let God be the God of grace."  But, do we tend to do that?  Live boldly?  Take risks?  Enjoy life?  Nope!  We freeze up and just stop ... and sit .. waiting for God to tell us it's our turn to go!  Remember how you hated your parents telling you what to do when you were young ... but don't you remember MORE the time you went to them, practically begging them to tell you what to do and they wouldn't??!!  It's part of growing up.  They teach you how to be wise when you are young by making decisions for you and putting restrictions around you so you learn ... and then one day, they decide its time for you to put that all into practice.  Man, that was hard.  I can so remember saying, "Well, then, tell me what you'd do."  And that's exactly what we do with God!  We ask Him what to do ... and we get the "you can do what you want" answer and that scares the beejeebies out of us cause deep down we are all still afraid that there's only one right or best thing and that everything's a test to see if we "guess" right!  Nope, we'd never say it just like that ... but our actions betray our beliefs EVERY time!

I have been singing this song to my college kids for a few years now when they come to be stuck, as I like to call it.  There is a decision to be made and they are gonna just sit there at the stop sign of their own making until God sends the email with His plans nice and neatly detailed.  But I don't believe that's how God operates.  I remember right after college being encouraged that Psalm 37:4 really gives us the freedom to do what we want when we are delighting ourself in the Lord.  YIKES!  Really?  Do what we want?  My biggest question at that time in my life was, "Is this God or me?"  Never occurred to me that it could be BOTH ... and the stronger I wanted to do something, the more I doubted it could possibly be God.  Until someone said, "Look!  When you are delighting yourself in the Lord, His desires BECOME your desires ... so what you want to do, He wants you to do!"  I know, I know ... we still can make that complicated because could someone please define, "delighting" in the Lord?  I think it means we are seeking Him, walking in relationship with Him.  Usually the questions I ask are: "Is there sin in my life that would keep me from hearing God?"  and "Does anything about this decision run contrary to God's stated will?"  ... I mean, pretty sure I don't have to ask God if it's cool if I sleep around, slander someone's character, eat a whole chocolate cake ...  Then, if the answer to those two questions is "no" ... then I can go for it!!  I have a green light!!  So, then why so often do we stop at the green light (you know how frustrated that makes people around you!  They HONK!) ... because we still lack confidence in God and in God in us.  We are so afraid we're gonna make a colossial mistake!  I contend, that my God is much bigger than my ability to make a mistake!  And He can put a stop to something real quick!!

Think of it this way.  Do you know when God is telling you "no"????  I DO!!  Boy, do I ever!  I get that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach ... I even get that when God is telling me to do something I don't necessarily WANT to do!  I soooo know when God is saying, "stop," "wait," or "no."  No doubts there, baby!  So, if I am confident in my ability to discern that and He is not saying any of those three to me ... if I have a desire and open doors ... then shouldn't I take that to be a "go for it"??  I finally have conceded that sometimes we have options and God can take either of those paths and bless them!  I know at other times He makes it abundantly clear that He is leading more in one direction ... and even though I may not understand at the moment, there is a purpose to what He is doing!  

And it just made my day when I heard Tommy Nelson say the same thing!!  He says Christians suffer from a "paralysis of analysis" ... love it, gonna steal it!  Sooo true!  He goes on to say there is a difference in "right and wrong" decisions and "right and left" decisions.  Love this, too ... probably gonna steal it as well! 

"In the Bible, the will of God always refers to moral choices - decisions where one path leads to sin and the other to righteousness.  For those right or wrong decisions, we can know the will of God. It's found in the Bible.  For right or left decisions, God is under no obligation to reveal His plan to us. More than likely, He will not.  That is why in Ecclesiates, Solomon says you just have to be bold and act.  Too often, Christians are looking for a no-fault deal.  We try to do insider trading with God that will show us which choice is best for us.  But God doesn't do insider trading. 
He does not reveal His plan to men."

One last TN gem,

"You have to venture our boldly and let the sovereignty of God be your comfort, not your excuse!"

WOW!  WOW!  WOW!  How wrapped up do we get in "playing it safe" when we serve not a safe God, but a good one!  We miss out on so many opportunities and adventures because we are waiting at a green light for someone to honk from the rear and push us out into the intersection!  Obviously I'm not talking about going outside of the righteous parameters God places around our lives ... but I am talking about the restrictive safety fences we errect for ourselves.  We are often much more restrictive than God!

So, tonight I'm thinking about my life.  What areas am I trying to play it safe?  Where might I be stopped at a green light?  Where do I need to be bold and act??  And what study am I gonna dive into in the morning ... new week, new month ... so much fun!!

Things that make you go, hmmmmmmm ...