HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!

Birthdays are a strange thing. This year I have made mine a big deal on purpose. Because every other year I am always disappointed for what ever reason, and my feelings get hurt. My birthday is the one day of the year, every year that I can feel the most rejection and pain. It’s amazing.

This year is different because I am taking a different stance on the whole thing. I am an adult now, it’s my job to make it what I want to make it. So I’m throwing myself a party (I don’t really want to do it again…hint, hint) I hope to God that I am not an emotional wreck tonight. As it seems that I get in this weird mood when people try to celebrate my life. It’s like I want it so bad, but when it happens I am so weirded out by it I shut down and get embarrassed and want to run way and hid in my closet. STRANGE!!! I am not going to be ruled by that anymore. I am grown up and can handle people loving me and enjoying me because THEY want to.

At least I secretly hope they want to.

I’ve been thinking about the primal need in humans (outside of the cloths, food, and shelter deal) to have impact and intimacy. I’ve been thinking about my life and the direction it will take in the future. Praying that I will become more alive as the years go by (a major reversal from what has been going on) and that my aliveness will rub off on the people around me and they will want to become alive as well. I think before that can happen I need to find where my fountain head is. He said “River’s of Living Water” right? It has been a long time since I felt that belly thing. I miss it to be honest. I miss His voice in my head, in my heart, the fire in my belly. I miss those to real feelings that I used to get when He would come close to me, or at least when I became aware of His presence (since He is always close). I miss my eager heart to do anything and go anywhere for Him. To speak any truth, to pray loud prayers unabashedly, to sing my guts out until I manifest and get so hot that the people around me feel the heat radiating in waves, I miss the lead blanket that I call His glory, talk about comfort. I know He isn’t in the earthquake, and that his voice isn’t in the storm, but that it is a still small whisper, but you know what! Sometimes I really liked hearing God so clearly that it shook me to my very core, to obedience, to awe.

Anyway, so I’ve been thinking about intimacy and impact. A core Master’s Commission theme, (thanks Lloyd and Michael) it has changed the way I think about my life and how it is suppose to look. I see that impact can best happen when you are in your ‘PLACE’, running your ‘RACE’. And that’s my big question these days. Where is my PLACE? What RACE am I suppose to be in? I have all the pat answers (I’ve been a Christian for a LOOOONG time) but they are not helping. I need real in your face answers about my life calling, vocation, blah, blah, blah. Of course the one pat answer that will really get me somewhere in this whole thing is found in Psalm 27,

1 The LORD is my light and my salvation—whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life—of whom shall I be afraid?
2 When evil men advance against me to devour my flesh, when my enemies and my foes attack me, they will stumble and fall.
3 Though an army besiege me, my heart will not fear; though war break out against me, even then will I be confident.
4 One thing I ask of the LORD, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple.
5 For in the day of trouble he will keep me safe in his dwelling; he will hide me in the shelter of his tabernacle and set me high upon a rock.
6 Then my head will be exalted above the enemies who surround me; at his tabernacle will I sacrifice with shouts of joy; I will sing and make music to the LORD.
7 Hear my voice when I call, O LORD; be merciful to me and answer me.
8 My heart says of you, "Seek his face!" Your face, LORD, I will seek.
9 Do not hide your face from me, do not turn your servant away in anger; you have been my helper. Do not reject me or forsake me, O God my Savior.
10 Though my father and mother forsake me, the LORD will receive me.
11 Teach me your way, O LORD; lead me in a straight path because of my oppressors.
12 Do not turn me over to the desire of my foes, for false witnesses rise up against me, breathing out violence.
13 I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living.
14 Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD.

The end says it all: Wait. Be strong, take heart, wait. So that’s what I’ll do. It’s what I’ve been trying to do. I’ll hear His voice again some day. I’ll feel the fire again someday, maybe not until I’m back in the place where I am from, his burning heart. I crave it so bad sometimes.
GOD!!! I CRAVE YOUR HEART!! I CRAVE ETERNITY!!! COME BACK SOON!!!!!! I WANT TO COME HOME FOR GOOD!!!

So how does that work? The craving for eternity and the reality of it to be ever present in my life, and the ashes and dust reality of life on earth?? Not that I hate living or anything, I actually enjoy it most of the time, but there are moments when I all of the sudden realize that I have forgotten about what I am really here for. I want to live in both places at the same time, can I do that?? People say you can, but I have such a hard time believing that I can do it. Maybe its all back at the fountain head. Maybe that is why He is gathering me from all my scattered places into one centralized throbbing place full of life so that I can remember who I was from before time began…while my residence was in the flame.

I hope that if you read this, you will realize that that place inside of you that aches uncontrollably sometimes is that craving for your eternal home and I hope you pay attention to it.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!! THANKS FOR LIFE JESUS! THANKS FOR BEING WITH ME THROUGH ALL OF IT!!

Yet You are He who brought me forth from the womb;
You made me trust when upon my mother's breasts.
Upon You I was cast from birth;
You have been my God from my mother's womb.