James.

Yep. James. The brother of Jesus.

Maybe it’s because I’ve never been big on empty words. Although I use them quite often. Maybe it’s because I sometimes, in my cynical mind, worry about “windbagging”. You know, when people start to talk (or write) just to hear themselves talk or see themselves write. I’m not saying any of the authors of a divine Word are doing that, but James has a way of being like,

Here it is. Point blank. Bottom line. Do with it what you will.

He also has a way of encouraging action. Because to James, faith without action is like a body without a spirit. Basically, walking dead. It’s not okay to James to merely believe. He says even the demons believe and tremble. They know what’s up. They’re aware of the truth. Does that change what they do? Nope. Because shallow awareness does not lead to change, or, as some Christians like to call it, fruit-bearing.

I think that’s become an issue with me. And in today’s society. We confuse “belief” with “faith”. If you believe something, you obviously live your life by it, right?

WRONG.

Just because you believe something to be true doesn’t mean it has any impact on your moment-to-moment decisions and the way you live your life. I believe that Subway sandwiches are the best sandwiches in the history of creation. Does that have ANY impact on how I live my life on a daily basis? Nope. It’s just something I believe.

Now, if I took that belief and used it to fuel a personal ad campaign about the superiority of Subway sandwiches and stood on street corners for hours distributing pamphlets about Subway and spoke through a megaphone about Subway and it’s superior sandwich product, I would be DOING SOMETHING with that belief. It would have an impact on my day-to-day life.

Lame analogy? Maybe. But what do you believe? Like, really believe? Does it have any impact on your life?

If not, then, according to James, it’s really rather worthless.

Because the grace of God, the salvation of Christ… it is life-altering. It cannot merely sit still. Authentic divinity produces authentic, unwavering, unapologizing results. Notice, I didn’t say “immediate”, (something I’ve been struggling with lately), but I did imply “permanent”. Permanence. When a life is ruined by grace, it is never the same. It can’t be. It has encountered the divine and that encounter leads to action which produces fruit. Results of a life rooted in Christ.

I love James because he speaks of patient endurance. Divine control over the enemy of emotion. Who DOESN’T battle their emotions? Who DOESN’T, at least from time to time, want to explode like a shaken soda pop bottle? And, if you’re anything like me, you allow yourself to be shaken easily. Self-control is a spiritual fruit, a result of being rooted in Christ, and with self-control, you start to find that being shaken isn’t so easily done. (Side note: It drives people crazy when they can’t shake you. Try it.) When you no longer root your sense of value or worth or identity in the words, actions, and approvals of others, and when, instead, that identity and sense of worth is rooted in Christ, you become like a bottle of water. People can shake and shake and shake, but when they twist the top off, you will remain as you ever were. Non-reactive. Neutral.

I’m not saying there aren’t things in this world that shouldn’t cause action. I’m talking of REACTION. There is, I’m finding, a difference. Righteous anger leads to righteous action. It is given through knowing God’s heart and knowing what breaks his heart and what lends itself to his wrath. Reaction is often a knee-jerk thing of the flesh. Of humanity. It’s not about what has angered God or is an injustice to the Kingdom, it’s about what has angered YOU and offended YOU. The self. And self apart from God is nothing good.

What I love about James is that he speaks of action based on and rooted in an unshakable faith. Not reactive. Action-oriented. Deeds are not the life blood of faith, faith is the life blood of deeds. That’s why I love James.

If you have an Android phone, only check this game out if you have time. I never got into games, really, not even Angry Birds. But I simply cannot stop playing this one. We all started getting high scores in the three different modes of the game, and my sister’s fiance, Cody, outdid all of us. I got absorbed into the Classic Mode of the game and kept playing and playing… until one night, I said, “Hey Cody, what’s your high score?” When I told him the score I had just gotten, he said, “That’s not possible.”

I don’t say any of this to boast. (Okay, well, I kinda say some of this to boast). But I do have a point.

In my nightly combings of the ever-wonderful website, Pinterest, I saw this phrase that said, “It always seems impossible… until it’s done.” That caught me off-guard with its truth. Much like my conquest of the Classic Mode in Fruit Ninja, it really seemed impossible. Until I did it. Until I just kept going and defeating and eventually, came out on top.

Now, I’m not saying that I naturally come by the strength to defeat and conquer on my own. But a phrase that’s been turning itself over and over in my head all night long, (simply won’t go away), is this: “But by the grace of God go I.” His grace and his grace alone are responsible for my comings and goings, and for my triumphs and victories. John the Baptist said, “As I decrease, he increases”. There’s something so wonderful about this statement. So simply wonderful. As I diminish, he is amplified. As the volume is turned down on ME, the volume is turned up on HIM. I really just love that.

It seems impossible some days. But if my countless fruitless hours (pun intended) playing that game have taught me anything, it’s that it always seems impossible until it starts being done. Until it starts happening. And then, all of a sudden, it’s not so impossible anymore. Audrey Hepburn, I think, (although I don’t know because you can’t ever trust the internet with quote sources. I’ve seen Eminem and Winston Churchill credited with a single saying), said, “Nothing is impossible. The word itself says ‘I’m possible’”.

And I, I’m desperate for you. And I, I’m lost without you.

It was tonight as I was journaling that, through my own decisions in the last two months and the ensuing situations, I have lost my desperation for Christ. I don’t feel desperate for him anymore, I feel indifferent. And that scares me. It scares me a lot. To be indifferent is to be cold… uncaring. And you can’t feel that way about a Christ you claim as your own. So what happens when you do?

Well… I’m not entirely certain yet. I have to be honest in saying that I cannot pretend to know the answer to that. Of course, I wish I did. Maybe it’s as simple as asking him with everything left in you to restore that desperate longing for him? Maybe I’m over-complicating things. (I tend to do that.)

I know that I will be truthful about where I am. I’m not going to pretend Jesus and I are all chummy when we’re obviously not, and it’s obvious to anyone who digs just past the surface of my life because of the -lack of- fruit produced. A fruitful life is one rooted in Christ, firmly planted there and watered by The Spirit. Right now, that is obviously not me. I think to pretend otherwise would just be absurd and pointless, really. But I think Christ can mold me into that person. For the first time, I’m not looking at what I have to DO to become better because I think maybe I’m finally starting to understand that nothing I do can make me worthy, that it has to be Christ in me and through me. Now if I can just get out of the way, maybe it’ll be time for this life to start being used to fulfill things again.

I want to be desperate for Christ. Longing after him with every breath in my body and every ounce of my strength. 

Being defiant in your sin.

I am, of course, talking to myself. A little over a month ago, I fell from grace in a way I never thought I would. When it happened, I felt defiant. See? I wasn’t broken. No, I was empowered. I was better because of what I had done, and I was sure that I was better because of what I had done. I felt like a woman, mature and strong.

Of course I felt that way… until God came looking for me. In a way I have never understood before, I now think I understand what Adam and Eve must have been feeling when God came tromping through the garden that night, calling them by name. You feel as though you have to run. You have to cover yourself in your shame because if he sees you… it will be the end of you. And that’s exactly how I’ve felt. If he sees me and sees what I’ve done, it will be the end of me.

When you finally decide to turn around and face it instead of running, you’re brought to your knees. I know in the deepest part of myself that grace covers me and that my Jesus has forgiven me. But make no mistake, I am also, for maybe the first time, keenly aware of the fact that he is not happy about what I’ve done. It doesn’t please him. In fact, it breaks his heart.

And so it breaks my heart.

I don’t want to take his forgiveness for granted. That is, perhaps, my biggest fear, if only because I’ve done it so many times before. It’s like, “Alright, I’ll just take this forgiveness and be on my way! Thanks, dad!” But that’s not how it’s supposed to work. I know that he doesn’t want me to soak in my shame and sit in my own brokenness. I know that. But I don’t want this to be yet another time where I say I accept his grace and his freedom, and then reach around, chain myself back to everything I’ve done, and be on my way.

I wish I knew how to change everything. But I have to admit… I haven’t got a clue.

She like, exudes the essence of cool.

How the hell is she so self-assured?

These are the kinds of thoughts that plague me on a daily basis. In a desperate nighttime conversation with my boyfriend, I was crying and trying to tell him that he had no idea the broken past that I come from, the one that I still attach myself to every day because I know no other way then to live from experience. But where is the separation in living from experience and being shackled to a past filled with regrets and mistakes?

So in this conversation, I kept repeating something. “You don’t know what I’ve done. You just don’t know.” And he, bless him, was desperately trying to understand where all of this emotion and angst was coming from. I don’t buy into the philosophy that a woman is “too much to handle”, (although I struggle with it like most women), however I can openly and freely admit that I am a lot of person stuffed into one body. And perhaps part of the reason I have such a big personality is because it has shielded and defended me at times that the little girl inside my spirit was too timid, frail, or weak to stand up and fight.

I have this horrible fear of not living every moment in my present mind, of not taking in every breath and being consumed by gratitude for it. Paradoxically, this fear paralyzes me and keeps me stuck inside my room and on a computer blogging about my feelings rather than getting out of this house and living the way I desperately want to. It’s an interesting circumstance, isn’t it? How someone who can seem so filled with zest for life, someone who longingly searches for beauty and learning and all this world has to offer can be a slave to her own fear.

I think the best part of those conversations with my already-long-suffering boyfriend is the self-realizations that I come to without being forced. Without anyone sitting me down and saying, “Look, Ash… this is the way it is.” And there’s nothing I love more than discovering something without another person’s help. (I’ve been that way my entire life. It’s not going to change now.)

I realized, through constantly repeating, “You don’t know what I’ve done,” that I was right… he didn’t know what I had done. No one did, apart from God and myself. Isn’t that true for everyone? No one can know the full details of a person’s life. It’s impossible. And so, of course, that got me thinking. What a perfect tool for isolation, right? I’m a big fan of the notion that isolation is the most effective weapon in the War of Worth. If I isolate myself and convince myself that I am alone in my suffering, then no one will ever be able to reach me. And because I’m alone, I’m the weakling of the herd whose easily picked off. Consumed in her own self-guilt.

So maybe they don’t know what you’ve done. (They is like “x” in an equation.) You’re right. They don’t know. But Jesus knows. And guess what? He offered you grace all the same. He reached down and saved you, anyway. Whatever you’ve done, whatever you did, and even whatever you’re doing… none of it nullifies the Cross. Nothing you can do, will do, have done… none of it nullifies the Blood. Nothing cancels out Jesus Christ. No action, no word, no thought. That’s the God I serve, so it’s really time for me to start living like it.

It takes 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 and asks you to replace the word “love” with your name. I’ll wait while you look up that verse and try it.

Still waiting.

Still waiting.

Still waiting.

So you did it?! Yeah, did you have as big a “WHOA.” moment as I did?

The first thing that Paul says love is… is patient.

My handy-dandy dictionary defines “patience” thusly: “The capacity to accept or tolerate delay, trouble, or suffering without getting angry or upset.”

Hmm.

I am so guilty of impatience, it should be a crime. When God says “Not yet, wait for awhile”, I always -always- get angry or frustrated. I want what I want NOW because I always seem to have this unshakable feeling that if I don’t get it now I won’t get it at all. Even when God has proven himself faithful, I still don’t trust him to attend to that which is best for me. I don’t trust him to provide or take care of me.

This, in essence, is robbing my Lord of his everlasting power and provision. My lack of faith renders me useless as a workman at best, at worst it leaves me entirely susceptible and vulnerable to spiritual attack. And, something that I have found recently for myself is that if I cannot have basic trust in the one who has shown himself to me over and over again, I will trust no one. 

Do you know how damaging it is to trust no one? To believe no one’s good intentions and to question anyone’s empathetic heart? It’s entirely damaging to a human soul. A soul which refuses to be comforted isolates itself. And what’s the first rule of any enemy in battle? Pick off the vulnerable ones, the weak ones… the isolated ones. There is strength in numbers, and what it all comes back to is that our Christ, our Lord, does everything and reveals everything and commands everything solely for our protection, for our good, and for our betterment.

When we fully live inside of this knowledge, it allows us to love others as Christ loved us, with pure patience. Asking nothing of us, but demanding our all. It’s a beautiful paradox of true love that it accepts as is but transforms entirely, all simultaneously. It’s the God we were called unto and the one we desperately seek who waits for us and asks us to extend this same forbearance to those who surround us.

I’m officially challenged.

That’s when I realized: I am a Spiritual Oprah.

No offense to Oprah, I love that woman and all that she does. But she’s made no secret of her yo-yo dieting and back-and-forth struggles with her weight. In a new series in 2008, her “Oprah’s Best Life” series, she began the first segment with a very powerful statement: “I can’t believe I’m still talking about my weight.” It was simple and not dramatic in the slightest, but it was poignant. She had gone through transformation after transformation and yet here she was, still discussing it. The case hadn’t been closed.

I can’t believe I’m still talking about making my way back to a life of faith.

You’d think that after four years of wrestling, struggling, pushing, pulling, questioning, wanting, and searching I would be set in my ways and pursuing Christ with reckless abandon, especially after he’s shown his power time and again, over and over, his mercy never fails me.

But I’m still talking about. Because I’m still wrestling. I’m still struggling. I still fight him with every breath in my lungs and every ounce of my strength. I cannot seem to gain a foothold of consistency even with the best of intentions. I think, though, that a part of growing up is realizing that intentions are a mere fraction of what is necessary to remain steady, stable, and consistent.

God knows I’m not making any promises. I have come to a place in my life that seems as though God is looking at me and saying, “Okay. You’ve talked for a long time. Now go do. Make it or break it.” I know that he never abandons me. But I am far, far different. I abandon him constantly. I am approaching a place where it is time for me to take a step forward and, rather than just merely talking about the woman I want to become, it is time for me to become her. No more trifling or delaying, in the words of the great Rafiki from The Lion King: It is time.

Can I do it? Only with the strength of Christ. Stay tuned!

I was raised between Indiana and Michigan. Mostly Michigan. When I was a little girl, my maternal grandparents lived just outside Chicago, Illinois in a little suburb called Hoffman Estates. Spending weeks in the summer with them was always fascinating, being able to experience Chicago and different kinds of living environments. I remember when I was young, my grandfather driving through parts of the city where homelessness and poverty run rampant. He told my sister and I, “We’re not staying here for long, but I want you girls to see that there are people in this world who live their lives in need. They don’t live like you and I. And they’re just as worthy of love as you or I.” I’ll always remember that. Always.

Other than my experiences -limited, authority-guided experiences- in Chicago, I haven’t seen much of the country. When I was a tween my dad candidated for a pastorate position in Ulysses, Kansas. (Don’t know where that is? Good, you’re with the rest of the population). We took a train instead of a plane and saw the Mississippi River from the windows and a bunch of different landscapes. The Great Plains were cool to see, as well. But I was young and didn’t know how to appreciate experiences for what they were yet.

Other than these two experiences, I haven’t been much outside Michigan, even. Just Northern Illinois, Indiana, and Western Ohio. I’ve always sworn, from the time I was a teenager, that one day I would take an epic road trip with not much cash. Do it the old-fashioned way in a car, driving everywhere to experience everything. I always assumed this road trip would be to California, a place I’ve always wanted to visit. I had never particularly wanted to live there, (only at one time when I wanted to live in San Francisco and work at the Haight-Ashbury Free Clinic, but that’s another story), and have always admired the South. For what seems like a very long time, I have wanted to live in North Carolina.

So imagine my shock and pleasant surprise when my dad’s girlfriend’s niece asked me to drive with her down to North Carolina to see off her husband, a Lance Corporal stationed at Camp Lejeune, a Marine Corps Base in Jacksonville, North Carolina. Of course I said yes and jumped at the chance. A little money for food and hotel, and I was in.

We left last Monday, on Independence Day, at nighttime after all of the festivities had occurred. On the drive down, we saw fireworks along the highway and a Pringles vending machine, (a vending machine JUST for Pringles! What?!), and… mountains. One of my favorite parts of the drive was through West Virginia. Just amazing. Breathtaking. I could’ve stayed all day looking at the skyline and wondering how people conquer these divinely-created giants.

But what has really gotten me, through everything new that I’ve seen the past week, (from learning Military speak on base to having the best sweet tea EVER), is the ocean. Jacksonville isn’t too far from the Southern Atlantic Coast, and we drove the twenty-five or so miles to a little town on the coast called Emerald Isle. I even have the surf-shop hoodie to prove it. This town is the cutest little beach town a la Jersey Shore with a LOT of vacationing twentysomethings. We never got the chance to make it to the beach in daytime, always arriving at the shore a few minutes before sunset.

But it made it all that more beautiful. Underneath the stars, the waters of the ocean take on this ominous but breathtaking mystery. You can see waves crest and foam for miles. Now, as a Michigan native, I do know something about large bodies of water. The Great Lakes, particularly Lake Michigan, is one of my favorite places to spend summer days and nights. There’s something that moves inside of a human being when they see such a sight. They can’t help but to think. To ponder their own existence.

But there’s something different about the ocean. Knowing that you are standing inside of something so uncontained and unfettered and wild. I couldn’t help but to sing. God was evident in every wave that crashed into me. The stars and the moon were so clear. The water was so salty and soothing. (I was promptly informed by a friend that you’re not supposed to DRINK sea water, to which I replied that sometimes, when a wave is big enough, you really can’t help it.) As the waves crashed, I began to think of Peter. I got jealous that a man had been able to walk on something like this.

And then I begin to think metaphorically. We would see these gigantic waves which, once they reached us, were nothing more than something one might see in a wave-pool. I got frustrated. I wanted to be IN the waves, as foolish as that was. I began to walk further out, and at one point, I said, “Is this the best you got?” It was as if God heard me right there, because the waves began growing in size and frequency. I tried to stand. With most of the waves, I could maintain my ground even if it was wobbly and uncertain. But about every fifth wave, one would roar in that completely knocked me off my feet. It had no regards to the barrier standing in its way, it was coming through and either you ran… or you got knocked off your feet.

Life is like that. The waves make me wobbly and uncertain. Through most of them, I can defiantly stand my ground and continue to push forward on a given path, no matter how wrong that path may be. But every so often, a wave comes that completely knocks me off of my feet and I succumb to the water underneath me. There’s a moment of dire uncertainty as these kinds of waves begin to make their way back to the ocean and the tide pulls you along with it. At some point, my friend, who kept getting knocked off of her feet, asked me, “How do you stay up so easily?” And I said,

“After awhile, you learn to just go with it.” I had learned when to dig my feet into the sand and brace myself… and when to allow the wave to sweep me away. And through the sweeping waves, I heard a voice I haven’t heard in a long time. I heard my Jesus. He speaks through his creation. He was speaking through the waves. Saying over and over again, “Surrender.”

There is a time to stand defiantly, feet dug into the sand, braced for the wave that you can see headed your way. And then there is a time to admit that the wave will obliterate you, and to surrender to the sweeping mercy of Jesus Christ. Oh, how I have forgotten. How I have been defiant when what my Jesus was asking for was nothing more and nothing less than total surrender to his waves of mercy and grace.

For such a thinker, I really do love when things are laid out plainly. I can take abstract concepts just as well as the next collegiate, and chew on them and try to digest them and debate and discuss them… but there’s this small thrill for me whenever you find a place in Scripture that just says, “Here. This is what you do.” It makes things very simple. For some of Scripture, we may able to claim misunderstanding, but with verses like this… we have no excuse.

Still, if these three things are requirements… that’s not a light word. It means it’s a demand. A necessity. These things have to happen. So if it’s a MUST, it’s best to really get down to the nitty gritty with it and make sure you understand it as thoroughly as humanly possible. That allows you to live it out in the most effective way possible. And since I need an excuse to use the new resources I’ve discovered lately, I’m going to define a few words in this passage from Easton’s 1897 Bible Dictionary.

Justice …is rendering to every one that which is his due. It has been distinguished from equity in this respect, that while justice means merely the doing what positive law demands, equity means the doing of what is fair and right in every separate case.

Mercy (translated in the ESV as ‘kindness) is… compassion for the miserable. Its object is misery. By the atoning sacrifice of Christ a way is open for the exercise of mercy towards the sons of men, in harmony with the demands of truth and righteousness (Gen. 19:19; Ex. 20:6; 34:6, 7; Ps. 85:10; 86:15, 16). In Christ mercy and truth meet together. Mercy is also a Christian grace (Matt. 5:7; 18:33-35).

Humility (referenced in this verse as ‘humbly’) is… a prominent Christian grace (Rom. 12:3; 15:17, 18; 1 Cor. 3:5-7; 2 Cor. 3:5; Phil. 4:11-13). It is a state of mind well pleasing to God (1 Pet. 3:4); it preserves the soul in tranquillity (Ps. 69:32, 33), and makes us patient under trials (Job 1:22). Christ has set us an example of humility (Phil. 2:6-8). We should be led thereto by a remembrance of our sins (Lam. 3:39), and by the thought that it is the way to honour (Prov. 16:18), and that the greatest promises are made to the humble (Ps. 147:6; Isa. 57:15; 66:2; 1 Pet. 5:5). It is a “great paradox in Christianity that it makes humility the avenue to glory.”

I urge you to look up some of the verses inserted in parentheses if you get the chance. Humility here is key. It opens doors in one’s walk with God that other qualities and attributes simply can’t. And trust me, it is not easily come by. Humility is a moment-to-moment decision to make yourself “less than” and, as stated, realize that in doing so, it paradoxically makes you great.

Humility comes from experience and encounters with the living God. I must believe that in my deepest soul. No amount of study or intellectuality or any other aloof method of research can provide a person with humility. And it’s quite possible to know what humility is theoretically, but to choose not to live it as a daily principle. As I said, it’s a moment-to-moment choice and usually, the hardest option in any given decision will also be the most humble.

There are three things my God requires of me. And it will take a lifetime of learning to truly “get them”. But that doesn’t mean I can’t start choosing, here and now, to do justice and to love mercy and to walk humbly.

Contentment. What a touchy subject. How many people would you say you know who are truly content in their lives? What about yourself? If I speak personally, I am not a content person. Not to blame it entirely on the world, but I have grown up in a day and age that preaches social climbing and ambition for self-serving purposes. Especially as young ladies, we’re taught that it’s good and right to do whatever you need to do to get to where you want to go. Step on people, stab people in the back, toss them in the trash like yesterday’s garbage… as long as you reach the goals YOU set for yourself, then you’re strong. You’re a conqueror.

As Christians, we must be radically opposed to this viewpoint.

Easton’s 1897 Bible Dictionary has this to say about contentment: …a state of mind in which one’s desires are confined to his lot whatever it may be (1 Tim. 6:6; 2 Cor. 9:8). It is opposed to envy (James 3:16), avarice (Heb. 13:5), ambition (Prov. 13:10), anxiety (Matt. 6:25, 34), and repining (1 Cor. 10:10). It arises from the inward disposition, and is the offspring of humility, and of an intelligent consideration of the rectitude and benignity of divine providence (Ps. 96:1, 2; 145), the greatness of the divine promises (2 Pet. 1:4), and our own unworthiness (Gen. 32:10); as well as from the view the gospel opens up to us of rest and peace hereafter (Rom. 5:2).

I love when it says it is “the offspring of humility”. Because much like sin being the root for weeds of a negative nature, the fruits of the Spirit produce more fruit, and those fruit in turn produce MORE good fruit! It’s exponential! Contentment springs forth from total submission to the providence of a God who is so much bigger than we could ever fathom.

Providence:  …literally means foresight, but is generally used to denote God’s preserving and governing all things by means of second causes (Ps. 18:35; 63:8; Acts 17:28; Col. 1:17; Heb. 1:3). God’s providence extends to the natural world (Ps. 104:14; 135:5-7; Acts 14:17), the brute creation (Ps. 104:21-29; Matt. 6:26; 10:29), and the affairs of men (1 Chr. 16:31; Ps. 47:7; Prov. 21:1; Job 12:23; Dan. 2:21; 4:25), and of individuals (1 Sam. 2:6; Ps. 18:30; Luke 1:53; James 4:13-15). It extends also to the free actions of men (Ex. 12:36; 1 Sam. 24:9-15; Ps. 33:14, 15; Prov. 16:1; 19:21; 20:24; 21:1), and things sinful (2 Sam. 16:10; 24:1; Rom. 11:32; Acts 4:27, 28), as well as to their good actions (Phil. 2:13; 4:13; 2 Cor. 12:9, 10; Eph. 2:10; Gal. 5:22-25). As regards sinful actions of men, they are represented as occurring by God’s permission (Gen. 45:5; 50:20. Comp. 1 Sam. 6:6; Ex. 7:13; 14:17; Acts 2:3; 3:18; 4:27, 28), and as controlled (Ps. 76:10) and overruled for good (Gen. 50:20; Acts 3:13). God does not cause or approve of sin, but only limits, restrains, overrules it for good. The mode of God’s providential government is altogether unexplained. We only know that it is a fact that God does govern all his creatures and all their actions; that this government is universal (Ps. 103:17-19), particular (Matt. 10:29-31), efficacious (Ps. 33:11; Job 23:13), embraces events apparently contingent (Prov. 16:9, 33; 19:21; 21:1), is consistent with his own perfection (2 Tim. 2:13), and to his own glory (Rom. 9:17; 11:36). -Easton’s 1897 Bible Dictionary.

That’s providence. Let me break it down for my own mind to comprehend. In the absolute simplest terms possible, it means that God is in control and that God knows what he’s doing! So that releases us from ever having to be in control and -quite literally- thank GOD for that! Have you ever tried being in control of your own life, as the theology of the world espouses? Did it work out very well for you? Yeah… me either.

So I propose an idea, more to myself than anyone. That TRUE strength is only found in total submission. Godly strength is the exact opposite of, “I will get myself to where I need to be.” Godly strength and Godly wisdom says, “Lord, you will guide me to where I need to be and I’m listening and trusting. You’re in control, here. You lead.”

I definitely bit off a lot to chew with this one, but I can’t wait to dig deep into some of the parenthetically quoted verses listed above! The “nitty gritty” is always the best part. It’s where you learn the most! But, as they say on Reading Rainbow, don’t take my word for it! Check this stuff out for yourself, and I’ll be doing the same!