Beginnings

My arms brim over with so many blessings I can scarcely hold them all.  But in a twist of irony, I struggle to even remember to say thank you.  Like the song says, am I “building my kingdom just to watch it fade away from You”?

Jesus told the rich young ruler that it was easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.  Dare I assume that I am the exception to this rule?  The truth is that the likeness between us is greater than I care to admit. 

Ann Voskamp’s letter to the North American Church (http://www.aholyexperience.com/2013/06/a-letter-to-the-north-american-church-because-it-is-time/) brought me to my knees.  I am hungry.  Hungry for the uncomfortable.  And I am restless.   Because I know that as I offer my gift at the altar, indeed my brother does have something against me.  For I have hoarded the world’s wealth while he goes naked, hungry and in sickness.  And isn't my abundance really holding me back from something that’s better?  Haven’t I confused having abundance with “abundant living”?  Jesus’ call was never to a life of ease but to discipleship and sacrifice.  And if I am going to take on His Name, I also want to take on His yoke.  He bent down into our world and got dirty.

Honestly, the suffering and the lost seem so far away most of the time.  And when my heart starts to bleed, I band aid the little nick with a hastily written check.   But I no longer want to stop the bleed.  Not until this insidious disease of self is reigned in. 

This will be a war but in the silence I feel the nudge.  I know there is something greater and it won’t come from accumulation but from emptying.  And I want that.  I don’t know what this will look like but I sense I am on a new journey.  Walk with me, won’t you?