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So much of life is waiting. . .

As a Christian, I am waiting for a lot--for God to do His refining work in me, for Jesus to return, for me to GET how much God loves me and for me to see what He is doing . . .

What to do in the meantime? I have learned much about what the Lord is trying to teach me, tell me and show me through the discipline of daily time spent reading the Bible. So often we make this time harder than it has to be.

This blog was born out of wanting to share what God is showing me and wanting to be an example that daily time with God is not a deep or mysterious thing (well, every once in a while it can be), but simply a time to read scripture and note what jumps out at you that day. We don't have to be scholars or super-holy or ministry leaders to do this. Some days I hit the jackpot and others I come up empty--but only by persevering do I give God the space in which to speak and myself the stillness in which to hear and obey.

Saturday, October 23, 2010

Loincloth Lessons

Yes, I'm still here, still reading, still listening for the voice of God. I read something in Jeremiah a few weeks ago that I have had stuck in the back of my mind, and, driving home tonight praying and worshipping, I think I see what the Lord is wanting to show me.

The Lord often told His prophets to do some crazy things to be a picture or example to His watching people. In Jeremiah 13: 1-11, the Lord has specific instructions about a loincloth:

1Thus says the LORD to me, "Go and buy a linen loincloth and put it around your waist, and do not dip it in water." 2So I bought a loincloth according to the word of the LORD, and put it around my waist. 3And the word of the LORD came to me a second time, 4"Take the loincloth that you have bought, which is around your waist, and arise, go to the Euphrates and hide it there in a cleft of the rock." 5So I went and hid it by the Euphrates, as the LORD commanded me. 6And after many days the LORD said to me, "Arise, go to the Euphrates, and take from there the loincloth that I commanded you to hide there." 7Then I went to the Euphrates, and dug, and I took the loincloth from the place where I had hidden it. And behold, the loincloth was spoiled; it was good for nothing.

8Then the word of the LORD came to me: 9"Thus says the LORD: Even so will I spoil the pride of Judah and the great pride of Jerusalem. 10This evil people, who refuse to hear my words, who stubbornly follow their own heart and have gone after other gods to serve them and worship them, shall be like this loincloth, which is good for nothing. 11For as the loincloth clings to the waist of a man, so I made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to me, declares the LORD, that they might be for me a people, a name, a praise, and a glory, but they would not listen.

The idea that has been pursuing me for the past weeks is the image of the Lord wanting us to be as close to Him as an intimate undergarment. We all desire intimacy, yet we can't "cling" to other people or we will suffocate them. No one can successfully provide perfect, secure relationship at all times. Only the Lord can meet that need. What made verse eleven so important to me, the idea I've been trying to wrap my brain around for these weeks, is that the Lord WANTS us to cling to Him. He DESIRES us to be intimately close to Him, and is humble enough in His glory to use the image of the whole house of Israel (which here, I think, can be a metaphor for us, as well) clinging to Him like a loincloth.

Yet I still doubt His intent toward me, and during my drive I repented of that and prayed that He would help me cling to Him that closely. How amazing that, thousands of years later, the obedience of Jeremiah and the Word of the Lord is still used to touch my hard human heart.

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