consistency

ok so i've been doing a lot of reading lately. as i was reading earlier today i stumbled upon this lovely tidbit...

"In just a few chapters this book will come to a close. One of its important messages is that you can still believe God for something dramatic and something miraculous. Bt in between dramatic revelations, what's a believer to do? The day-in, day-out fundamentals, that's what.

Prayer. A daily time in God's Word. Praise and worship. Attending church. Serving a church body. Giving. These are the fundamentals, and they'll never change. We can make all the excuses in the world for not practicing this one or that, but they represent the backbone of obedience. We often want the mystical while God often insists on the practical. We may want a constant dose of dramatics, but God enjoys seeing the perseverance and proven faithfulness of simple daily devotion. Sometimes the greatest proof of God's miraculous power is when an attention-deficit seeker of instant-gratification denies himself, takes up his cross, and follows Christ... for the long haul....

Sometimes we lay a crucial request before God, perhaps a life-and-death matter, and we want something fast and spectacular. Instead, God often directs us to keep walking around that Jericho day after day, repeating the same old fundamental steps while nothing seems to happen. Oh, it will. We must never stop believing it will. But in the meantime, we've got to keep walking and keep circling no matter how many times we've done it before and no matter how many times we're yet to do it.

G.K. Chesterson wrote of a God who "strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, 'Do it again' to the sun, and every evening, 'Do it again' to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never gotten tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old."

Ours is a God who delights in a perfect concoction of creativity and order. Though He could have thought the entire cosmos into existence in a millisecond, instead He brought it about with great patience in six distinct increments. 

Then rested on the seventh.

Then later insisted that His children do the same.

God likes order. He like repetition. A God of fundamentals, He brings up the sun every morning and the moon every evening, but His creativity within that order is gorgeously displayed in the changing sunsets and sunrises surrounding them. The same is true for us. Faithfulness in out Christian walk requires order, some black-and-white fundamentals, but within that order is glorious room for color and creativity.

I have lived to much of my life in defeat to risk living in the gray zone. A long time ago I had to quit giving myself the option of whether or not to rise for prayer, spend time in the Word that day, or attend and serve my church consistently. These fundamentals are part of my life. They are His will, and to do otherwise -- no matter how I'd label it -- is disobedience. 

Within those fundamentals God gives me lots of leash to exercise my need for passion and drama. Though my morning almost always begins at the same table and chairs, it might end out in the yard under the morning stars or, better yet, on a walk. On a rare Saturday at home, I may have prayer time still tucked in my soft bed. Other times the beach is the perfect place, I take that back. Keep the beach and give me the mountains. My point is: I get up daily with the morning, but the sunrise surrounding my time with God could be any number of colors. Sometimes I jump up and down; sometimes I bow down, and sometimes I go prostrate to the ground. Sometimes I pray Scripture. Other times I pray moans and groans. But pray, I must. It's God's will even when I can't tell if it's changing a thing.

Though I may practice these disciplines in various ways, I do them virtually every day. Why? Because God seems to like them. Picture God nudging you and me awake before down because He can hardly wait to be with us. Then as we make our sleepy way to the usual meeting place, imagine Him saying something rather like Chesterson suggested. "Do it again, Child!"

Sometimes I feel like the phrases I habitually use in prayer and the topics I'm most burdened to teach are surely getting old to God. In reality, as long as He sees a genuine heart, He never gets tired of the same old words and practices the flow from it. "Say it again, Child! One more time!" God's mercies have existed through all of eternity, yet Scripture tells us they are new every morning. You see, a new day with all its fresh challenges gives an old practice new life. 

Day-in and day-out, the fundamentals are the way I march repeatedly around my Jerichos. 

Unlike Joshua and the Israelites, I never know when my present Jericho is going to fall. I just know that I'm to keep believing and keep marching. When the time is complete, the wall is going to collapse. When the Israelites marched around Jericho, their seventh trip around on the seventh day could not have seemed any different from the rest, with the exception that they were wearier. Why did God purpose for the wall to fall that particular round? Simply because it was time.

Beloved, God is not tired. Nor is God tired of you. He delights in your attentions even when you practice them much like you did yesterday. He waits for you to awaken, and he anticipates His time with you. When you or I ignore Him, He is disappointed. Somehow in His self-existent essence and omniscience, His foreknowledge does not cheat Him of reactive emotion. He laughs when you delight in Him. He listens when you speak to Him. he honors you when you persevere with Him. In all the changes He is making within you and me, He rejoices in the few things that call for blessed sameness. 

Let's stay faithful, you and I. "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up." (Gal. 6:9)"

it makes me think a lot differently about my quiet time. it also makes me think back to something that i heard a few weeks ago... sometimes we just need to do "it" (spend time reading the Word, worshiping, serving) out of obedience. it's our faith that is growing even if we're not getting anything out of it.