Keeping in Step

Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit's leading in every part of our lives. 

-- Galatians 5:25

He woke me up early. God did. I knew it was him because why else would I be awake an hour earlier than usual? My kid was still sleeping and I knew that was a gift in itself.

I sat down in the loveseat with a blanket over my knees, eyes closed, head filled with white noise of beating heart and faithful ticking clock.

The quiet soaked into me, mind and body still soft from sleep. A steaming cup of coffee stood by. Lord this time is a gift, help me to hear your voice and be attentive to your word. Show me your heart, God.

Presently my thoughts bumbled along, chasing dreams just awoken. My thoughts replayed a conversation with a friend who had begun taking ballet. I recalled my doctor's instructions to begin getting more exercise, like walking. My mind's eye swept up to the main road just above our neighborhood, the one I enjoy traversing because of the view of our town. The valley bellow leading to a far horizon of rolling wild grasses, untouched by progress. I imagined myself running along the upper road overlooking that view.

He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along (Psalm 40:2b).

The lens of my vision shifted, and I stood posing at a ballet bar, feet in first position, knees dipping into a grand plie then releve en demi pointe. I jolted back to alertness, shaking off sleep. Folded hands prayed while ticking hands advanced.

My hand clasped the book on my lap. Walking fingers through pages to find my place I landed on words that danced off the page: 

"Stay on the high road with me...I have called you to walk ever so closely with me...What I require of you is to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God [Micah 6:8]--wherever I lead."
(Sarah Young, Jesus Calling)

I have heard it said that even all the good things can keep us from doing God things. So often we pull against his lead and try to step in our own way. But we can get so busy with striving to keep in step that we stumble over our own two feet. It's not about what we do or don't do so much as it is about the attitude of the heart.

For we walk by faith, not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7).

In ballet, the position of the leg is important in preparing the body to move in a certain way. A leg in attitude is slightly bent at a particular angle. It displays beauty and form, posture and poise. Whereas a bent working leg may be ready to move the dancer into a graceful pirouette. So it is with the heart.

What is my heart's attitude? Is my heart positioned to move wherever God leads? Am I ready to step into what he has prepared for me? Am I available to be used by God to love on my family? Or minister to others whom he brings into my path?

My little girl just completed another year of dance classes. At this level it is fun to see the kids learning to develop motor skills and discipline (like standing in one place for more than like 2 seconds). They learn about rhythm and movement and how to follow simple choreography. It is not about being precise--goodness, my little one can barely walk from point A to point B without ping-ponging off of everything--but it is about the sheer delight of the dance.

As I learn to tune-in to God's gentle nudges, I must be willing to let go of control and trust him to take the lead. I must be able to relax my shoulders and take delight in his process. By stepping in with joy and thanksgiving I can say yes to God when he asks for my hand and allow him to sweep me into his choreography of grace.

My dreamlike prayer that early morning had been a vision of God's purpose: to walk closely with him, trust him above all circumstances. And when exercising faith there's walking and there's dancing. Let him lead in this dance of faith and he will enable you to do beautiful things. 

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. --Ephesians 2:10

Holy Photosynthesis

And the Lord--who is the Spirit--makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image.

2 Corinthians 3:18 NLT

Words hit the wall of the mind spinning like a clothes dryer, tumbling thoughts. I grow irritable by the distractions and chaos. It is the incessant beeping of a car alarm. The barking dog in the yard. The constant chatter in the media. The child's tantrum in a clash of wills. Toys strewn all over the floor.

The noises of the world clatter together in a torrent of sound, drowning peace, blocking the whisper of that still, small voice (1 Kings 19:11-13).

I am looking for a muse, inspiration, motivation to keep on with what is set before me today. The Greeks spoke of a muse who would provide inspiration for higher thought or a divine purpose. However, the muse often accompanied seduction/deception, illicit substances, or summoning supernatural powers that sometimes lured the hero into destruction.

...But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace (Romans 8:6).

Irritability mounts and swells in the chest and it catches my breath. The demands of the day, all the needs – the little person at my feet and the tall man walking through the door hungry for dinner – strapped to the shoulders and I am a tug boat. I keep pulling up river these beautiful vessels with the weight of their loads. In my own strength the tension pulls heavy on my small frame as I chuff against the rippling waves.

Sometimes on these hard days, the ones stacked with both treasures and burdens alike, even all the good things can feel like heavy things.

Have you ever tried to hide from them? The responsibilities? The tasks? The people? I have.

There was this one day, I hid myself in the bathroom – the one place in the house assumed to be a private sanctuary -- sitting alone on the floor I tried to clear my mind. Outside the door were giggles of mischief and I knew she was tormenting the dog again.

I shook my head as it rested in my hands to support the weight of a tired mind, elbows propped up on my knees, with my back against the cupboard. Looking up with a sigh...my eyes caught the words on the print hanging on the wall: The Fruit of the Spirit

love

joy

peace

patience

kindness

goodness

gentleness

self-control

At that moment? Right there sitting on the bathroom floor hiding from my three-foot tyrant of a toddler? I was not any of those things.

As my eyes scanned over that list of what I perceived as personal failings, that Still-Small-Voice broke through: “I am all those things.”

I AM.

All the things.

God is. Not me.

All that I want to be for the people that I love I cannot be. Not well anyway. If I am doing one, or any of these, then I am probably neglecting another. Because I am a fallible human.

The love that I long to display to my husband, my daughter, my family, my friends, those whom I serve in ministry, wouldn't come from my effort but from my surrender.

The peace that I was desperate to find by hiding myself away, closing myself off in isolation and quiet, would not find me until I could be open and receive (John 20:19-23).

The patience needed to bear the burdens of others, whom God had placed strategically in my care, would not be supplied in my own strength but in the handing over.

And there it was. Boldly printed at the top: the Fruit. Of. the Spirit.

All that I long to be for others, do for others, give to others? They don't really come from me. It is the Holy Spirit in me that allows me to do the good works he designed for me before I was.

For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him (Philippians 2:13).

He is the only source that we need turn to in order to find the inspiration to do and to be.

Inspiration. As in “immediate influence of God”.

The Latin root spirare, meaning to breath.

Inspire. In-spire. Breath in Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is my muse.

For we are God's masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago (Ephesians 2:10).

Friends? As we walk through the seasons of our faith, being planted in the truth, taking root in Christ, growing in grace, flourishing in the Spirit, and bearing forth all the good things, remember you began as one seed.

You are not all things to all people all of the time. You can not even expect to be some things to some people some of the time. You may count on being only one thing for one person one moment at an appointed time in order to do a good work, which God has prepared for you in advance. And be assured that he equips you with the thing that you need at that time to do it well.

Breath Him in.

Exhale grace.

Aren't you glad our God is omniscient? He is all-powerful. Only He is all things to all people all of the time. He is. He was. He is to come. That takes all the weight of my small shoulders.

I am not God. But He is.

Be still. And know.

So it has become my constant prayer:

Lord, here are the things. These are my burdens. Take them up and bear them as you did on the cross. Fill me with your Spirit each moment so that I can walk in the ways you have planned for me today. Help me be so overflowing with your Spirit that all the things I long to be would actually be You pouring over the rim of my glass onto the lives of others. And let it be sweet to the taste and satisfying to the soul. Let the words of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart bless your name, Jesus. Let the deeds of the day, and the truth in my ways speak of you, Jesus* (Psalm 19:14).

*(Inspired by lyrics written by Tim Hughes)