Just when you think you've got it...

I'm trying to think of an image to describe my spiritual life. The best I can come up with is a spiral: from outside the spiral (God's perspective), it's fairly easy to see where on the path I am, how far from one end, and how near to the other. From my perspective (inside the spiral), I only see layers moving slowly upward and the layers I've already put behind me. I seem to be constantly doubling back on myself, making very little progress, and even covering the same territory over and over.


I'm always surprised and disappointed to wake up one morning to discover a thin shell of callous over my heart. Coincidentally (or not so coincidentally and perhaps more divinely), I often sense this hardening and indifference on Sunday mornings as I'm hurrying to church. Even more divinely, my Father knows the fears and reactions of my heart - He knows what causes my retreat from His arms, and He waits for me. It's usually a Sunday like that when the teachings line up as either a gentle reminder or a kick in the seat of my pants. This week was so kind - there was no guilt or fear. Just a weary sense of, "I've seen this in myself before. I thought we'd gotten rid of it, Father. Here we go again."


If the spiral picture is accurate, we don't really ever get rid of or lose sight of those past things in our lives. And that may be a good thing - while that does not give us liberty to beat ourselves up over them, they do serve as memorials, or milestones. That's where I was - here I am now. We are never in both places.


Welcome to 2011. Apparently I'm going to ramble a lot this year. My apologies in advance. If you'd like to hear the same teaching, check out Frank Ramseur's New Years inspiration: Calvary Chapel Chattanooga.

Always on the tip of my tongue.

I think this is one of the hardest phases of spirituality that we ever go through: maintaining. It comes after I've learned a significant lesson about my Father (or in my case, several significant lessons - why do they always come in multiples?). And He is so kind and gracious - He walks me through the learning, holding my hand, encouraging me with each step.

But then this learning process reaches a point where I feel a little more confident in my self, and like a good Daddy, my Father steps back, releases my fingers from His hand. It's not that He's gone - He's near enough to catch me if I stumble - it's just that I need to learn to walk on my own a little.

This whole thing is a weird paradox: we are reminded throughout Scripture to be like little children, to depend fully on our Father, to lean into His arms and let Him carry us, but then we are encouraged, too, to be strong, stand firm, be ready to defend your faith, to work out your salvation... It seems like we can't be both.

But our faith is full of paradox. And I've found that most of the paradoxes unravel themselves when you start into them. For instance, as we set out to be more childlike, to lean on our Father, we become more confident - we are children secure in our Daddy's unconditional love for us. And even though we may appear to be strong and standing on our own, our strength comes in admitting our weakness.

Right now, I'm maintaining. I've come to understand so many new aspects of my Father and my faith in Him during the past year that my heart is overflowing with it all. (For the record, the learning never ends - I'm being taught how lovely I am to my Father, how to reflect His love to those around me.) And now a lot of what I'm being asked to do is be vigilant: remember the lessons, remember the pain, remember the joy of doing the right thing. Keep it always before your eyes. Walk in it every day.

And this part is the hardest, driest, least palatable part, I think. It's difficult to sustain emotions, and difficult to create desire. But right actions lead to right thinking, my dad says. And I believe he's right.