10,000+
That’s how many notes I had in my phone last week, when I decided to hit the delete button and purge the pressure I had been building up on myself to do something with them. “Make them count.”
Almost all of them were prayer notes I had jotted down, though not a traditional prayer list format.
More like something would be on my heart and I’d type it out to God, and then sit still for a moment and let his Spirit flow through me in response,
and often He would flow so quickly, so freely, like a wave rolls onto a beach shore,
that I’d find myself jotting down His answers to me in real-time as they came, before the wave receded and I could forget what He had said.
Note upon note full of his goodness.
A document of our growing relationship for the past seven or eight years.
Like the notebook my husband and I used to pass back and forth when we were dating in high school.
God is so real. So relational. So personal.
So so good.
But over the years, as I’ve collected the notes – along with actual notebooks full of the same – I’ve noticed something else:
Part of that collecting didn’t feel good, and I didn’t know why. Until He told me this week, and He helped me to let our collection go.
What He whispered to my soul was something along the lines of this:
“It’s hard to embrace living forward, if you’re too weighed down with the looking-back.”
Not that there’s not value in the past.
There certainly is!
Memories give us both lessons and a bank of gratitude for his goodness to go to when we need faith for the future and present.
When we remember all He has brought us through, and how real our feelings and our problems were, but how much REALER and bigger our God was (and IS) – it helps us put current concerns into perspective.
But sometimes dwelling on the past TOO much, even in the ways He has spoken to us in the past, overfills our capacity and our reliance upon real-time Jesus. Not just the memory of Him, but the Him who is right here, right now, standing beside God and interceding for us, communicating with us through the Holy Spirit. Doing life with us!
The high-school season of my relationship with my husband was a sweet time.
There are many parts I’ll never forget.
Like the time he humored me and let us dress up as the king and queen of hearts for Halloween.
Or the time I got grounded from my car, but wanted to see him so badly that I rode my bicycle 7 miles out to his house. (I totally got in trouble for that, as my kids’ would absolutely be in trouble if they did the same, but at the time it felt worth it. 😉)
But as many of those beautiful memories as we have, if I spent more time reflecting on them than I did enjoying the current moment with my husband…
In the relationship we have NOW-
In this season of life
In this year, this season, this month, week, day…
I’d be missing out.
And dare I say- making something like an idol? Relishing an old image/old version of my husband more than loving him for who he currently is?
I loved high school Brett. The boy with tan skin and dark hair, and big brown eyes that made my stomach flutter.
But I love 35-year old Brett even more. The man with the marks on his hands, from years of working hard for our family. The man with touches of gray in his beard – “experience.” The man with a few lines by his eyes from decades of smiling and playing with our kids and being animated. When I look at my husband, I not only don’t care that he isn’t the version of himself that he was when we first fell in love- but I’m glad that he isn’t. I’m glad we have transformed together, aged together, enjoyed and gotten through so much life together. Nothing stays the same forever on this Earth. It wasn’t designed to.
And Jesus? Well He is my other lifelong love. The first that loved me, long before I even set my eyes upon Him. The one that laid His life down for me, before I was ever formed in my mother’s womb. Also the one who walked beside me – beside us as a couple, a family – through all life’s ups and downs. There is a rich history there. I cherish it.
But He’s also NOW.
He’s also the man that communicates with me on a daily basis, through the Holy Spirit.
The only one in the entire universe that I could never exhaust with my never-ending questions and needs for guidance, and love, and support.
The only one I can rely on to be there 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and PAST “death do us part” (because He already died, but he rose again, and He says that starting now and for ever and always – the communication between us never has to be broken, ended or paused!)
My love for Jesus, similar to my love for my husband, has much less to do with any physical appearance than it does with the connection of our hearts and our souls.
I think sometimes imagining an image of Him can almost be like creating an idol- in that if we let our focus be too much on what He might look like, we miss the point- that’s it’s not about appearance, it’s about transcendence.
We are all spiritual beings, who have souls and live in bodies.
God came to us in human form, not so that we could only focus on his body but moreso that we could observe his soul- mind, will, and emotions. So we could see the struggles and temptations he went through, and yet see how he thought about them and handled them differently than anyone else in the world. And then so we would KNOW that we need, and gladly receive, the Holy Spirit that He said He was sending us- so we could have EVERYTHING He came to give us:
The Bible, a document of God’s love over all time, and of Jesus’s life and examples and loads of wisdom.
But also HIMSELF- His very Spirit, dwelling with our spirits- and enough to be that for each of us.
He gave His physical life once. And that is mind-blowing that someone would do that for us.
But I think what some of us miss, is that He gives His spiritual life to us, day in and day out.
24/7/365 and for eternity.
Isn’t that’s something incredible to think about?
I believe that continuing to remain in love with Him requires both remembering our history together and also living in the present- aware and appreciative of His presence.
And just like any relationship, the longer it goes on, for the passion to remain- the more important it is that our focus on the former doesn’t exceed the latter!
We can’t be more grateful for the past than we are in the present, or we will always be looking back!
And Jesus says that no matter where we are in this life – there’s always more to look forward to in the future! (Which extends beyond the end of this world.)
“But forget all that— it is nothing compared to what I am going to do. For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness….Yes, I will make rivers in the dry wasteland so my chosen people can be refreshed. I have made Israel for myself, and they will someday honor me before the whole world.”
Isaiah 43:18-21 NLT
“I’m not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don’t get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I’ve got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I’m off and running, and I’m not turning back. So let’s keep focused on that goal, those of us who want everything God has for us. If any of you have something else in mind, something less than total commitment, God will clear your blurred vision—you’ll see it yet! Now that we’re on the right track, let’s stay on it. Stick with me, friends. Keep track of those you see running this same course, headed for this same goal. There are many out there taking other paths, choosing other goals, and trying to get you to go along with them. I’ve warned you of them many times; sadly, I’m having to do it again. All they want is easy street. They hate Christ’s Cross. But easy street is a dead-end street. …All they can think of is their appetites. But there’s far more to life for us. We’re citizens of high heaven! We’re waiting the arrival of the Savior, the Master, Jesus Christ, who will transform our earthy bodies into glorious bodies like his own. He’ll make us beautiful and whole with the same powerful skill by which he is putting everything as it should be, under and around him.”
Philippians 3:12-21 MSG
These verses encourage me to look forward more than I look back!
And the passage from Philippians- I believe hidden there lies the answer as to why I needed to purge my excessive personal documents of the past.
Because much of what Jesus does for me, is working me through all the struggles of my flesh.
Much of my writing, and journaling is about my battles with circumstances, fleshy mindsets, and temptation. And then the Spirit’s response to me, about those things, which is what has gotten me through.
But if I’m too focused on the past tests and pressuring myself to go back to them and “make them count more” by collecting and sharing every single one in a book, as if it could guide anyone else…I’m miserable. Which is what was happening.
I was feeling like a failure because the enemy would get me back into works-mode again, telling me that if I really appreciated the way God saved me, then I would show it by passing it on- and helping to save others from similar messes.
But guess what?
Jesus took that weight right back off.
He reminded me of the Truth – that it is ALWAYS Him who saves! Not us.
Our testimonies and encouragement are important and they have a place. But they should flow and keep flowing from a real-time fullness, from relationship with Him. Like waves endlessly washing over and smoothing and refreshing the sand on the shore.
And though sometimes I feel that compiling a coherent book would make me feel like I “had it together” (fully understood what He has been and was doing in me…)
He reminds me that I don’t have to have it all together…
I can’t fully understand Him…
I may never see the full picture of what He was doing in me, through me, or in this world that had nothing to do with me individually…
But my peace doesn’t depend on my understanding. It depends on my dwelling and abiding in Him.
And my desire to help anyone else achieve inner peace, has nothing to do with my ability to help others understand either…
Peace is a person and His name is Jesus.
He’s beyond understanding.
He’s beyond grasping intellectually.
But He’s RIGHT HERE, ready to be grabbed ahold of!
Ready for us to walk in REAL-TIME relationship with Him.
And day by day, moment by moment, that’s the message I desire to spend my life sharing — demonstrating this reality with my children, enjoying it as a couple with my husband, and passing along to anyone else who will listen.
The Holy Spirit helps us experience the GREAT STUFF!
And we don’t have to be afraid of running out of great moments, or milestones, because He never runs out! His rivers never run dry!
There’s ALWAYS more, where that came from.
What a pressure-release it is to purge the focus on the past, to live in the present, and to look forward to the future,
life with Him-
an always unfolding, forever unending love story!
From Full 