Wednesday, July 18, 2012

God Lays the Way of Abiding Before You

Monroe

Today, as has been my habit for many years, I am going to go alone to a "lonely place" to meet with God. I'll take my spiritual journal and my Bible. My cell phone will be on vibrate. I won't answer it unless it is Linda, Stella (Redeemer's Office Manager), or one of my sons.

I will pray.

Prayer is talking with God about what he and I are doing together. Prayer is missional activity. I am in the Jesus Movement. I am expecting to be moved by God's Spirit today. I have expectation now. Not only for tomorrow. Less and less am I living in the past.

Today I am conferencing with God. That's not just a theory for me; it is an experiential reality. Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation. (2 Corinthians 6:2) Sozoing is a process, and I am being processed by God.

I will take a portion of Scripture and meditate on it. I will chew on it so that, by the Spirit, it gets assimilated to my body and soul. Until it becomes me. God's Spirit-empowered Word sustains me. This is, again, experiential. It is born out of decades of Word-chewing. This is beyond-theoretical at this stage of my life. Experience, not theory, breeds conviction. I have much God-experience; therefore I am deeply convicted. I am one of God's "convicts," arrested by his presence.

Today, when God speaks to me, I will write it down in my journal. "When," not "if." "When" indicates the level of expectation I now have when it comes to experiencing God. My life has become a God-filled, God-saturated life. Many years ago God laid out the Way of Abiding before me, and I chose to walk on it. There is a narrow way that leads to life. (Matthew 7:14)

This morning I look around and see that, by God's grace, I am still on this way. It feels more solid and true than ever.

Step onto the Road of Abiding today and never look back.