Turning 30

It's official.  I'm 30.

It's been a date looming over my head through my mid-late 20's (27-29).  I look at it like I'm in my late 20's now.  But honestly, I look forward to my 30's, I think it's time I became a man and what better time than to leave the decade that the beginning of my walk with Christ began.  He's been faithful to beginning the maturing process in me and I look forward to walking down that road more with him in the next decade.  I really desire to let him mold me into a man that desires to follow him and him only.

It's been interesting the last month how some epiphanies have really struck home.  The main one has been meditating on obedience to Jesus.  He doesn't command us to make any grand oaths or whatnot, just to simply let our yes be yes and our no be no.  I've gotten caught in the web of oaths and there's no substance to them.  There is a lot of power in saying yes or no in the moment.  Maybe power is not quite the word, perhaps pressure is a better word.  As much as we all have convictions, we still have to choose in that moment to be faithful to them.  I've been warned in many cases by the Spirit to choose rightly, but unfortunately for much of my time following Jesus I've chosen what I want over what's best for me.

I love the idea of obeying Jesus.  It will bring me more joy than anything else.  It's not a legalistic thing, or that I have to follow the 'rules', but that Jesus wants me to obey him and that's how I can really show him that I love him.  It's me listening to him, loving him, and following him, even when my wicked heart desires something more.  The object is always cheaper than the trade off when I'm disobedient.  Finding joy and contentment in the Lord is the only path for joy and contentment for the soul and I've often been without peace.  I want to be clear that it's not a one-to-one ratio where I do something for God and he does something for me.  That's ridiculous and not biblical.  He's already done it all for me and he wants me to rejoice in that through making him my all.  If he isn't he has a funny way of destroying our idols (which often hurts at the time but is much better after).

I'm walking through a time of patience on him and I'm so thankful for it.  I don't need more idols in my life but to be seeking him only.  Psalm 62 says a lot to me right now.

For God alone my soul waits in silence;
   from him comes my salvation.
He only is my rock and my salvation,
   my fortress; I shall not be greatly shaken.

Being patient and obedient with the Lord is where he had me on this occasion of me turning 30.  It's a good place and I'm very blessed and thankful for his faithfulness.

Contentment

Heavenly Father,


If I should suffer need, and go unclothed,
      and be in poverty,
   make my heart prize thy love,
   know it, be constrained by it,
   though I be denied all blessings.
It is thy mercy to afflict and try me with wants,
   for by these trials I see my sins,
   and desire severance from them.
Let me willingly accept misery, sorrows, temptations,
   if I can thereby feel sin as the greatest evil,
   and be delivered from it with gratitude to thee,
   acknowledging this as the highest testimony of thy love.
When thy Son, Jesus, came into my soul
   instead of sin, he became more dear to me
   than sin had formerly been;
 his kindly rule replaced sin's tyranny.
Teach me to believe that if ever I would have any
      sin subdued
   I must not only labour to overcome it,
   but must invite Christ to abide in the place of it,
   and he must become to me more than
      vile lust had been;
   that his sweetness, power, life may be there.
Thus I must seek a grace from him contrary to sin,
   but must not claim it apart from himself.
When I am afraid of evils to come,
   comfort me by showing me
      that in myself I am a dying, condemned wretch,
         but in Christ I am reconciled and live;
      that in my self I find insufficiency and no rest,
         but in Christ there is satisfaction and peace;
      that in myself I am feeble and unable to do good,
         but in Christ I have ability to do all things.
Though now I have his graces in part,
   I shall shortly have them perfectly
   in that state where thou wilt show thyself
      fully reconciled,
   and alone sufficient, efficient,
      and loving me completely,
   with sin abolished.
O Lord, hasten that day.

Election

Holy Trinity,

All praise to thee for electing me to salvation,
   by foreknowledge of God the Father,
   through sanctification of the Spirit,
   unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus;
I adore the wonders of thy condescending love,
   marvel at the true believer's high privilege
   within whom all heaven comes to dwell,
   abiding in God and God in him;
I believe it, help me experience it to the full.
Continue to teach me that Christ's righteousness
   satisfies justice and evidences thy love;
Help me to make use of it by faith as the ground of my peace
   and of thy favour and acceptance,
   so that I may live always near the cross.
It is not feeling the Spirit that proves
   my saved state but the truth of what
   Christ did perfectly for me;
All holiness in him is by faith made mine,
   as if I had done it;
Therefore I see the use of his righteousness,
   for satisfaction to divine justice and making me righteous.
It is not inner sensation that makes Christ's death mine
   for that may be delusion, being without the Word,
   but his death apprehended by my faith,
   and so testified by Word and Spirit.
I bless thee for these lively exercises of faith,
   for the righteousness that is mine in Jesus,
   for grace to resign my will to thee;
 I rejoice to think that all things are at thy disposal,
   and I love to leave them there.
Then prayer turns wholly into praise,
   and all I can do is adore and love thee.
I want not the favour of man to lean upon,
   for I know that thy electing grace is infinitely better.

What I won't always be

Do not love the work or the things in the world.  If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.  For all that is in the world – the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions – is not from the Father but is from the world.  And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.

-1 John 2:15-17

I read this passage this morning and it reminded of me what Chandler was saying in a sermon a few weeks ago.  He was saying how he wasn't going to be a pastor forever, so he couldn't make that his identity.  I think at the time it was profound, but has since rolled off me until this morning.  

I will not always be a musician, so I can't make that my identity.  I've know for a long time that I can't make my music my identity, but the idea that when I die I will no longer be a musician never occurred to me.  I love music, don't get me wrong.  I also work really hard at it.  But I also know the futility of it.  That no matter how much I work that I can't take it with me.  

This is actually very comforting to me.  I don't have to pretend that all of this matters to me as much as it seems to everyone else.  It gives me licence to fail.  Not that I like to fail and I totally do care about my work and its quality.  But it's not what makes me.  I could write total junk music the rest of my life and Jesus will still love me as if I were Mozart.  I mean look at the Christian music industry...most of it is trite junk but that doesn't mean that they aren't believers.

Anyways, this is a comforting thought, especially this morning when I'm trying to complete my paper on the theme and variations from Webern's Symphonie Op. 21.  I again waited too long to finish it and find myself at Zera at 6 am to write all day until it's due at 6.  

Regardless of this paper, my program, my music, or my circumstances, my sufficiency is in Christ.

Testimony

I gave my testimony at recovery on Tuesday.  It's been a date I've wanted to avoid since September when I found out I was giving it.  It's not that I'm not comfortable in front of a room, I mean I am kind of chicken and I get nervous almost all the time when in front of people, but the Lord has given me calm whenever I get up there.  I think it's more like I didn't want to share the gritty with everyone.  That's my fear of man coming out again when the truth of a giving a testimony is that it's not about you (me).  It's about God's way of capturing me.  It's a chance to show all the times where I was unfaithful, He was faithful.  That is a good thing.

Testimonies give hope to people that struggle the same (or different really) way you do.  Joel was absolutely right after when in prayer with our group of guys, that my story is all our story.  We fall, God saves.  I love hearing a lot of short testimonies in a row, different stories, same ending.  God wins (so do we).

As much as I didn't really enjoy writing the testimony, it confronted me with many things.  Bitterness and unforgiveness that I still felt in my heart, seeing patterns of my failure, seeing God repeatedly love me.  I wrote about my relationships and how I continually let them get in the way of God in my life.  I don't blame any of the girls, but myself for putting them on a pedestal or for making them my source of happiness (they are doomed to fail b/c they are not God).  Through this writing process I realized that I never, never submitted my relationships to Jesus, not fully.  I didn't make him my happiness, joy, and contentment first.  I never obeyed.

That word, obey.  What a dirty word in our culture.  It shows you are weak, a fool, not a free thinker, and a sheep.  Wait, a sheep?  But I am a sheep and Jesus is the shepherd.  Unfortunately, in today's society to obey seems to be borderline dictatorship.  But the Bible has a different take on it.

1 John 5:  By this we know that we love the Children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments.  For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome.

I had this love of Jesus that had everything to do with me, and nothing to do with him.  I loved him, and would sing it all day, but when confronted with a situation where I had to obey a teaching (mind you because I'm sure what I was about to do was wrong or selfish) I would do what I wanted.  I never showed Jesus that I loved him in my actions, that he was worth more to me than anything else.  I've been dwelling on that a lot, as a matter of fact I wrote on my bathroom mirror, "obey Jesus because you love him".  I do love him and it's time I lived that way.