Perfect Conditions: Dried Up, Empty, Formless

One thing that I love about God is His power of resurrection, His power of creation.

In the beginning, He hovered over the unformed earth, undeterred by the chaos and darkness. In Ezekiel, He stood in a graveyard, unbothered by the dead and the decay.

God doesn’t stand far from what drives us crazy: the half-baked plans, the discarded dreams, the uncertainty, the unknown. He draws in close to the things we want to hide. God loves the mystery, the insecurities, the doubts because He knows the answer to all of these, including the fear.

He is the solution. God is the answer; it’s as simple as that.

It was never up to us alone to do what He has called us to do. The earth didn’t create light and divide night from day on its own, and neither did the Israelites revive themselves and shake off their grave clothes.

God did that.

Not once has He asked of anyone or anything to do something beyond their pay grade.

All He has asked was for us to believe Him to do what He said.

The new fledging planet could do nothing but receive His word, “Let there by light.” The cemetery had no clue that among the gravestones stood Life Himself, ready with the command that would invite living breath back into those dried bones.

In darkness, light shone through. In death, life came to reign. It didn’t make sense.

It still doesn’t have to make sense; if God’s promise did, then we wouldn’t need Him. We would just go ahead and accomplish it ourselves.

But what is hope if it’s something that we could see, if it’s something that we already have?

It is not hope, and it requires no faith. God is not in the business of building up a hopeless and faithless generation.

He’s never asked of us to do anything on our own. We have never had a desire, an expectation, a goal where He stood back to watch us struggle in our strength to completion.

He comes close to help, to set up His strength within our weaknesses.

Where are your dried bones?
God will raise them up again.
Where is your darkness?
God will light it up.
Where is your emptiness?
God will cause you to overflow in those places.

Where are you? Where are you with the resolutions of this year? Where are you in relation to your five year plan?

Wherever you may find yourself as we approach the seventh month of this year, know that God wants to pick up where you left off.

God wants to be the one to bring His word that resides in you to completion.

He can certainly do it. It doesn't matter how long your dream has been dormant. God is the God of resurrection.

It doesn't matter how fragile and shapeless your desire is. God is the God of creation.

All you have to do is believe. Trust Him and His Word.

He is both willing and able.

Burying Your Talent?

I just keep thinking about the servant who buried the talent that his master entrusted to him.

His excuses are on repeat in my mind:

1. Master is a hard man
2. Master reaps where he does not sow
3. Master gathers where he scattered no seed
4. Fear-- the servant was scared.

He hid that one talent under a heap of justification of why he did nothing with his master's talent.

I'm standing over the gravesite of the hidden talent, and I hear, "Even here, I can still do it."

God can still do it in the graveyard of broken dreams and forsaken goals.

He can, and He did.

Let's go through the list:

• Abraham was one-hundred years old when he had Isaac. We all know Sarah's womb was defunct at the age of ninety-nine. That alone should encourage us that impossibility is not an issue for God. He is able.
• Noah had no idea how to build an ark, but God instructed him-- God gave him the blueprints to make it happen.
• Gideon hid from the Philistines, but God called him a mighty warrior, who then led an army of 300 men that defeated forces more than ten times their size.
• Because of God's grace in his life, Joseph climbed the social ladder from the prison to the palace.
• The walls of Jericho, the most fortified town of that time, came down with shouts of praise from an otherwise ill-equipped people.
• John the Baptist had no Instagram, no Facebook live feed and no Twitter following. In the desert, he just had his voice to bring about repentance in Israel, and the masses came.

Now that's just about 0.000000000000000009% of God's resume. He did so much more with the outcast and the overlooked.

And He's willing to do greater with you.

It's not complicated. Yes, it's hard, but the excuses that are holding you back, the reasons you think God cannot do it, are the very reasons why He wants to do it through you.

There is nothing (inward or outward) that can disqualify you from God's calling over your life; if there was, that would mean the cross is useless: Jesus would have died for nothing then.

But that's not the truth. His blood covers everything-- a multitude of sins and excuses.

You are free to do what He assigned you.

Even in the graveyard, under all the dirt and mess you've placed above your talent, God can and will do it here and now.

And I know that the excuses don't disappear. If they do, they come back more sinister, more warped than before, but God is not intimidated by them. Neither should you be.

If the servant was willing to not just acknowledge his justifications, but challenge them as well, those lies would have fallen away.

Maybe the Master's goodness would have been revealed to him if he took that one step. Maybe the servant would have noticed his Master's hand in places that he thought were void of the Master's workings. Maybe the fear of upsetting the Master would have gave way with the realization that remaining stagnant, living stuck pissed Him off so much more than making a mistake.

Excuses are reality until they are not.

When you take that first step you realize, "It's not as bad as I made it out to be."

Yea, you don't have the funds, but that's not your forever.

Yea, you aren't good enough now, but that's not your forever if you choose to invest in it anyway.

Yea, you have five followers, but if you keep typing, keep speaking, keep going that number can grow.

But you'll never know if you keep the talent buried; if you hide the light He's placed inside of you, the circumstances that keep you timid will not change.

What are you waiting for?

You're in the most perfect position; yes, knee deep in dirt is perfect. Water that talent with the Word of God. Feed it with your dedication and discipline. Let His light shine through it, and watch it grow.

Here, Now

There is no other place than here, there is no other time than now that God wants to do a good work in you.

We love to believe that what God calls us to do couldn't possibly begin where we are right now. Compared side to side, God's vision for our lives supersede our resources, our budgets, our circumstances, and our qualifications. 

It's impossible from where we're standing, so we try to move ahead of God all in the name of helping God to get to a place where we are better able to handle His call.

But what we seem to forget is that where we stand is exactly the same place where God wants to begin the work in us.

In the bible, God met everyone exactly where they were and did wonderful things with them EXACTLY WHERE THEY WERE.

• Joseph, the favored son and hated brother, was forced into slavery but still came out on top
• David, the harp player for the king, was on the run as a fugitive from the king and still got the crown
• Moses, the Hebrew masquerading as the Egyptian prince, turned into a murderer but still became a deliverer 

All because God simply chose them. They had no resume that would get them hired in the earthly realm. If they would have run for their destined position, man would have told them no.

But God said yes because He knew what their resumes and budgets didn't show. He knew what their circumstances tried to keep quiet about. He knew what their resources lied about.

He knew that they were able because He was the one to place that gift inside of them in the first place.

God was the one to give Joseph his dreams.

God was the one to anoint David king.

God was the one to give Moses the burning desire to deliver Israel.

It didn't matter what anyone else said because God had already said yes to them before the foundations of the earth were laid down.

God doesn't need you to be anyone else but who you are, who He created you to be.

He knew your hang-ups, your insecurities, your fears, and He said yes to you.

God said yes to you in that dry place, in that quiet place, in that inactive place. He said yes to you as you. He wants no one else but you.

And if you would just trust in that, that He wants you, God will do amazing things through you because the world needs you just the way you are.

We're waiting for you.