Looking back is always an adventure.
While I have many recorded words beginning from my junior high years - and can I just say some of them cause me to laugh, cry, and cringe all in the same paragraph - the other night I powered up my time machine with plutonium that created the magical 1.21 gigawatts of energy in the flux capacitor and slammed on the accelerator. When the speedometer hit 88 mph - Great Scott! - I found myself tucked away into November 14, 2005. (Not November 5, 1955...just to clarify. And if you don't know what I'm referencing here, I'm sorry for the confusion but I suggest you just move on. And when you're done reading this blog entry, add "Back to the Future" to your Netflix que.)
I could write thousands of words about what happened as I sifted through the years 2005-2007. But tonight I'm going to share just a tiny glimpse of one of the themes that arose.
It has to do with something that God has been showing me again in the recent months and it's something we prayed together tonight at the end of class.
Part of the prayer went a little something like this:
Yada yada yada...
Yep. Seriously. I think that was the first time ever I heard the words "yada yada yada" used in a prayer. But it made total sense. And I LOVED it.
Yada, in Hebrew, means "to know." I sensed the heart behind praying these words was a cry out to God to grow in our relationship with Him in intimate ways as we know Him and are known by Him.
One of the themes threaded throughout my time travels the other night was God persistently sharing the Truth that He knows me.
Intimately.
And that He wants me to know Him.
Intimately.
This is from June 7, 2007:
There is not another person who could look into my eyes and know every depth within me - not my best friends, my family, or one day, even my husband. They each know or will know pieces, but the only one who can and does know me completely is God himself. To be so transparent before another...to be known and understood by someone more than I know and understand myself...God is AMAZING.
Sometimes it just hits me in a new and deeper way how much God knows me.
He knows you, too. He longs to be near you. His love is greater than anything we can fathom. It's true.
We were created to know Him and be known by Him. But we rejected God by choosing to walk the opposite direction and seek satisfaction and to know and be known by things or people instead of God Himself. God wanted our affections. We threw them away to selfishness, lust, pride, other people, success...to name a few. This brought about death and utter separation from that intimate relationship with our perfect and Holy Creator. Our imperfections couldn't stand in His presence. (Perfect and imperfect can't mesh together.) All this brought a whole lot of brokenness, sickness, and darkness into this world as it gave power to the enemy (satan).
But Good News - the story didn't end there...
God made a way to be made new again...to give us a second chance at all of this. He sent Jesus straight into the brokenness, sickness, and darkness in our world as the perfect sacrifice to win us back to God. When Jesus died on the cross and then rose again, he defeated death and the enemy's power over us! He satisfied the wrath of God. Jesus stood in our place, taking on the death we deserved for our running away from God and rejecting the One who made us. And Jesus took back the power and authority of God's Kingdom and made it possible for us to be healed in every way and enter back into intimate relationship as Sons and Daughters of the Living God...so that we can partner with Him to bring Life and Hope into all the messed up-ness of our lives and in this world so it will ALL be restored back to it's original design...
to know God and be known by God.
Intimately.
Yada yada yada...
He knows and loves you. Will you give God your everything to know and love Him back and join the army of people bringing restoration in our world...walking in His power, authority, and goodness?
I'll let this song wrap this up. The first time I heard it, I about melted into a puddle of Suzanne on the floor in my room...
May His presence heal and restore you...
(You Know Me, Bethel - The Loft Sessions)
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