Last year I started this side blog as a way to try and keep myself accountable with spending at least a few minutes with God every day. Despite growing up in church and always hearing how The Morning Devotion™ was the “best possible” thing you could do as a christian, I never got into it.
And seriously I cannot tell you how. many. sermons. I’ve heard about The Morning Devotion™ and how important, necessary, required, [insert similar adjective], it is.
It was in my 20s that I decided to screw feeling guilty about not having The Morning Devotion™ and just live - live in christian community, attend church, serve when I could, etc. And it was good. Now I’m in my 30s and I still refuse to feel guilty about not having The Morning Devotion™.
However, after the fucked-up and shitty events of the past few months, I have found myself searching far more frequently for those quiet, away-from-people moments with God that would give me just a little bit more sustenance for the pain, heart-break, anger, hurt, etc -filled walking-around life I’m currently moving through.
I’ve always known that God is Good, and I believe that with all I am. I can give you example after example of how He’s provided and sustained, of how my church and faith community has prayed for me and rallied around me, of how I’ve grown as a person and christian.
But that does not change that times of pain, hurt, self-doubt, questioning, (and everything else that goes with) are hard. difficult. trying. devastating. You walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death. You stumble forward because you can’t go back. And sometimes you have to sit down and stay there for a while cause you can’t move. at. all.
You put one foot in front of the other.
I found myself moving forward in those one-on-one times with God - where there were tears and groanings and acceptance and love. Now I understand better what Christ must have felt as He hung on the cross and said, “My God, why have you forsaken me?”
I also now truly understand the story doesn’t end there.
There is an “it is finished” and then there is Resurrection.
And that’s what I’m doing this year - Moving Forward. Into new and unknown. Into being okay with the mysteries and uncertainties. Into the quiet moments that bring something like peace, but knowing peace is still coming.
I’m not sure if I’ll be adding to Daily Invites this year, but there’s always the possibility. Always feel free to check in, ask questions, reblog past items, etc.
I’ll leave you all with this Colossians passage, which is also my anchor point for the 2020 year:
You were once at odds with God, wicked in your ways and evil in your minds; but now He has reconciled you in His body—in His flesh through His death—so that He can present you to God holy, blameless, and totally free of imperfection as long as you stay planted in the faith. So don’t venture away from what you have heard and taken to heart: the living hope of the good news that has been announced to all creation under heaven and has captured me, Paul, as its servant.
Now I rejoice in what I’ve suffered on your behalf, but even more suffering is ahead for me as I take on and complete what remains of the Anointed’s suffering for the sake of His body, the church. I am a servant appointed by God to preach the Word of God until it is known to you and all over—what I am talking about is nothing less than the mystery of the ages! What was hidden for ages, generations and generations, is now being revealed to His holy ones. He decided to make known to them His blessing to the nations; the glorious riches of this mystery is the indwelling of the Anointed in you! The very hope of glory.
We are preaching Him—spreading the Word to all with equal amounts of wise warning and instruction—so that, at the final judgment, we will be able to present everyone to the Creator fully mature because of what Jesus the Anointed, our Liberating King, has done. This is why I continue to toil and struggle—because His amazing power and energy surge within me.
- Colossians 1:21-29 (VOICE)
May the Shalom of God be with you -
In all ways and at all times.
