Sunday, January 14, 2018

BREATHE

A new year inspires most of us to try and view our lives with new hope. We often think that we need to look for that hope in self improvement, self fulfillment, or self discovery.  We make new goals or new boundaries for ourselves, believing that only by achieving our goals or maintaining our boundaries, can we be successful. We often neglect to ask God what his goals or boundaries might be for us. Or we do ask Him, but with the idea that if what He desires for us looks different from what we desire for ourselves, that we will be unfulfilled. But that way of thinking is a deception, designed to turn us from choosing to obey God, when all along, there is nothing that could possibly bring us more joy...

“You will show me the way of life, granting me the joy of your presence and the pleasures of living with you forever.” -Psalms‬ ‭16:11‬ ‭NLT‬‬

I’m usually just as guilty of self focus as anyone else when it comes to planning my new year... Who am I kidding? I’m usually guilty of self focus when it comes to planning my whole life! But over and over again, I find that  trying to have things my own way, for my own comfort, and for my own gain leaves me in a pit of selfishness. Selfishness is never satisfying for me. In fact, it usually leaves me feeling irritated or lonely or even angry. I know that I am most content when I am God-focused. I see the things that God is pointing me towards this year, and they are challenging things - things that I would probably not have chosen on my own. I’m tempted to choose what I think is easier or more appealing. But I’ve been down this road before, and I’ve learned to trust not only that God knows best, but that God wants the best for me... that I will feel the best about my life when I am following Him. 

One of the things God keeps asking me to do lately that I usually don’t want to do is to publish my poetry on my blog. My “self” tells me that most people don’t really like to read poetry, that it doesn’t speak to the majority of people’s hearts or interests. But God keeps putting words in my mind that come out in poem, regardless of what my “self” believes. So here it is again...

BREATHE
I allow my heart to steal my breath 
knowing that it seals my death. 
How foolish of my heart to dwell 
on words that can’t give life, make well. 
To worship words of men is folly. 
It serves a cadence melancholy. 
It’s truth and light 
I yearn to know. 
My heart deceives my path to go 
on tangents dark without a light 
to guide direction’s journey right. 
My mind 
my heart 
my strength 
my soul 
must breathe the air with constant flow 
that never fails nor will deceive 
does not abandon, never leaves 
that fills me with the breath that gives 
the joy to love 
the will to live 
the strength to stay 
to try, endure 
the mind to grow the thoughts assured 
of peace to know both truth and light, 
know first by faith -then follows sight.

LS 1/18


“Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being...”
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭51:6‬a ESV‬‬

“Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’”
‭‭John‬ ‭14:6‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”
‭‭Mark‬ ‭12:30‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“For the word of the Lord is upright, and all his work is done in faithfulness... By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host.”
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭33:4, 6‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”
‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭13:7‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“The king is not saved by his great army; a warrior is not delivered by his great strength... Our soul waits for the Lord; he is our help and our shield. For our heart is glad in him, because we trust in his holy name. Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us, even as we hope in you.”
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭33:16, 20-22‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.”
‭‭John‬ ‭14:27‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”
‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭11:1‬ ‭ESV‬‬