I have this faith coach I often mention in my post. His name is Jim Spivey, and our relationship at this point has evolved into as much friendship as anything. Oh when we are together it is teacher/student. But the vast majority of the time it is just a daily friendship. Yesterday, was a day that I very much needed that friendship. I needed Jim to be a reflection of Christ to me, and boy was he.
It is funny how God works. You may have an experience and learn some godly truth. Or you may learn some godly truth, thinking you will avoid the experience, and never the less the experience overtakes you. This is how it happened to me.
Jim says, "We collude with circumstances that force us to confront our false self and let it go."
Wow... that statement still gives me a headache, and I still wrestle with understanding it. But to explain it I would say that we uncounsously participate in, and find, circumstances and events that will inevitably makes us face the lies of our ego, only to let them go for the image of what God has made us to truly be. We will continue to collude uncounsciously until we become conscious of this fact. This is the truth I know... but it is also the truth that God was going to have me experience with full force yesterday.
Every morning Jim sends me a text around 5:30am. It is a snipit of his blog post that I read later in the day. Yesterday the text said, "'The winds sure are a blowin', while out on the water we be goin'!'" Here's to hearing the invitation and walking on the water." In that message was a restatement of what I am experiencing. God says to me that not only will He provide a house payment, but that He is going to pay my house off. And yet I for all practicle purposes do not have a job. God says to me that I am going to preach, but I do not have a pulpit. It all is God saying to me, this is your Peter moment. Get out of the boat and walk on water.
And yet, in the boat with me is my family and wife. My wife is paddling her ass off. Doing everything and beyond to be a support, to pay more than her share, to encourage another 10 applications for a job. She doesn't see that I am trying to get out of the boat and walk on water. She only sees that I need to get my butt paddling harder, and bailing water at the same time. She is absolutely frustrated, scared, and rightfully so. Our journey to Jesus started out together on the same boat. For me to get off the boat looks like an abandonment, but it really is the ultimate in calming of the seas. So do I embrace her feelings?
Oh heck no. I colluded with her fear to confront my false self. I began a whole reasoning that said, no I can't walk on water. This is too hard. I am going to fail. I am going to loose my wife if I keep going. I have to stop. My wife is going to make me fail. She is right. I must not be hearing God.... on and on and on all my thoughts took her very valid aprehension and twisted them into she does not love me. I twisted them into she does not appreciate what I am going through or my efforts. Why?
Because I am believing a lie that I am going to fail, that God is not telling the truth. I am believing a lie that I am unworthy and a failure. I am taking her very valid frustration, and allowing a lie to use it in collusion to attempt to validate the lie. I ignore the truth, and rather than fully give myself to my wife in love, I withdrawal, even confront her because I believe I am a failure. But I am not a failure. I am not the lie of my ego inflated soul. I am something much different.
Sad thing is I didn't get this until after venting my frustration in complete ugliness. But I had a choice. Continue in self pity, or walk in love. I could continue to believe the lie that I am a failure, or walk in the truth that I am a child of the Most High, and I can do all things through Christ Who strengthens me. My false self had to be confronted. My wife had to express her anxiety for that to happen. I could choose to collude with the circumstances and continue in the lie, or recognize the lie in myself creating the tension, allow it to die, so that I could walk in love.
I choose love. I love my wife, and she is free to vent, without opposition, all her fears and apprehensions to me. That is why we are partnered together. And I will do better next time.
I will close with a text I just got from Jim. CS Lewis was referring to a Lion. A type and shadow of Jesus. He said, "(Jesus) is not safe to be around, but He's good."
Love the CS Lewis quote!
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