Twilight

Is the sun coming up or going down?

To me, there’s something mysterious about the period of day we know as twilight. It doesn’t matter whether it’s the morning twilight or the evening twilight, because both represent hope to me. Something about having the sun below the horizon yet still radiating its light across the sky gives me assurance that there is still hope. It could be an analogy for how though I cannot see the sun, I can see evidences of its existence—kind of like Jesus’ illustration to Nicodemus about the Holy Spirit.

The evening twilight represents hope to me for the promise of nightfall and rest. The morning twilight represents hope to me for the promise of a new day and opportunity to actively pursue my passions. I don’t think I’d ever want to be stuck in twilight forever though. Stuck in the tension of a hope to come, yet not ready to be fulfilled. It would make my heart sick yearning for the coming of that hope. Yes, perhaps that’s why I’m enamored with the twilight right now. That’s my season of life: the tension of hope in a coming Savior, seeing His power at work in the world, yet not currently able to see His face.

Twilight is about trust: trust in the evening that morning will come, trust in the morning that rest will follow. In those precious few minutes of twilight, I learn again to hope. I learn again to trust that all my doing and all my resting has found fulfillment in Jesus. I learn to stay my mind on Christ and to expressly release control to Him over all of the situations and relationships that I cannot make right and look to Him for the restoration of all things. I learn to aspire to wonder at the marvelous power of God and expectantly wait for Him to show forth His goodness, His glory. In the twilight, my heart cries out to Jesus.

Greater

Here’s my latest attempt at writing poetry. You can find more of my poems in my books. You can also find my latest book in Apple’s iBookstore by searching for “Snapshots”.

Greater

I have no more to say.
You have come and overcome
my spirit with Yours,
my spiritual moors
are strengthened by Your presence.

O God, I ask for greater faith!
All I’ve seen and all I’ve heard
reignites my trust in You,
reignite my trust in Who
You have shown Yourself to be.

Greater God of greater worth
than lesser trust which I possess,
may my hope in You give birth
to such a faith as won’t regress.

Have Your way in me, O God.
All of You in all of me
will surely satisfy the hole,
the hands of the LORD make whole
and bind up what is broken.

Dear God, I Need Faith

Have you ever been in a place where you’re overwhelmed by a deluge of truth? It’s like the facts of life are rolling in today and I realize how much I just need to trust God. Thank You, Jesus for opening my eyes.

I feel like I have been given new information on my immediate future. It’s information that is hard to accept joyfully, because on the one hand, it reinforces the fact that I might not be coming back to school in the Fall. On the other hand, it is information that I do joyfully accept because it makes it so much easier for me to let go of the situation and trust that God has my back. He is my rearguard, defending me from the enemy behind me and tying up all of the loose ends in life situations where I feel things have been left unresolved. God is so good. Thank You, Jesus for protecting me.

So where does this leave me? I am free to live alive. I am free to pursue the gifts and abilities that God has given me. I am free to drink from the fountain of joy that bubbles up in this lowest place. Thank You, Jesus for giving me joy.

The expanse of the sky symbolizes freedom.

Random

I’ll be frank, I’m not sure what to say right now… I’ve been pretty tired this week. However, it’s been a joyful week as well. I’ve been learning contentment and honesty and surrender. I’ve been learning thankfulness.

In my copy of the devotional Jesus Calling, I read today that I should let thankfulness temper my thoughts. What a wonderful idea. Thankfulness keeps my attitude headed in a positive direction. Thankfulness keeps me from complaining.

Complaining is a dangerous sin. It fundamentally changes your attitude toward God. The Israelites complained in the wilderness and it drove God crazy. They didn’t trust Him even after all that He had done for them. God is looking for trusting hearts. Thankfulness sets us on the path of trust. Also, because God is faithful and does what He says, trust in Him results in joy.

Oh, so, I recently came across a study of water and how words, both spoken and written, affect its makeup. In this experiment, positive words would cause the water, when frozen, to form beautiful crystals under a microscope; whereas negative words would cause the water to freeze in random and disfigured patterns. One of the suggested applications of this experiment was that since our bodies are roughly 70% water, our words have a huge impact on our makeup as humans.

I feel like this ties together well with the idea of attitude—thankfulness leading to trust leading to joy. Joy starts with giving thanks. What we say has an impact on ourselves and other people, so let’s start giving thanks more often.

Okay, that just about sums up what I’ve been thinking about.