I was viewing pics on facebook...came across my brother's site/soon to be sister-in-law's site and their past weekend. My dad flew up to Seattle so meet Leah. I was looking at the pictures and my thought was, 'when did my dad get that old?'
Underneath some comments were that my dad looks like the guy from House (the main doctor dude.) What are they smoking?! I don't see it at all. LOL.
However, there were several trippy pics.
I hope it's just a sign I'm tired....I mean I saw him at Christmas '08...can he really have changed so much? Ok, so that was nearly a year ago...still...
Itty Bitty blog over. Good Night world. (I.E. Stacy) ;)
Monday, October 26, 2009
Mini-Thoughts--who will go...Come Again?
Ok: time for an installment of random thoughts...
So I was listening to Isaiah 6 recently...and it occurred to me how unexpected God can be. This is not the first time I've thought this, nor will it be the last. ;) There are some constants in life besides death and taxes.
So, maybe my paradigm so clearly shows that I've been raised in the western hemisphere in the 20th-21st century...that yes, Hollywood and all the drama have permeated my perceptions and somewhat set my expectations for certain plots. But then...I think there are more than a few people that would fit this description, thus this blog.
However, let's see if you can see the picture I did. (And this will be a very loose translation, very much a paraphrase...but in true Hollywood stories, let us begin.)
There once was a man named Isaiah. One day shortly after the regent of the realm had died an angel came to him and gave him a vision. He stood before the very thrown of the Most High God. The temple was stunning, in fact, the very train of the King filled the entire temple. Other angels with 6 wings were hovering above the thrown, 2 wings covering the angels' feet, 2 covering their faces...and 2 wings kept the creatures airborne, and they proclaimed how sacred and holy this place was, how amazingly sovereign this King is/was. The very foundations he is standing on shake with the tremor of the King's voice. (Can't you just see the bright lights, the dazzling effects, the sheer immensity of creation before the thrown?) Isaiah feels the contrast deeply, in fact he's very conscientious of the fact he's tracked in some mud, some filth upon his person due to where he lives, who he lives alongside of, what he hears in the streets everyday, things that have crossed his lips and here he is sullying this place. He is definitely out-of-place among the riches, the grandeur, the sheer holiness of this place. So what happens? Does he get kicked out on his keister? Nope.
Instead an angel takes burning coal from the sacrificial altar with some tongs...and flies straight towards him. (I don't know about you, but I'd be thinking punishment...hell, pit fires...burning coals just can't be good? Right?) But we are wrong. The coal burns away all the impurities about our main character, this man in the midst of heaven's glories. Isaiah stands forgiven, absolved of all sins. He stands pure in a pure and holy place.
On the heels of this profound transformation the Lord puts forth a request to the room...'who will go, who will bear a message for me?' Isaiah is filled with a zeal, and practically jumps up shouting 'pick me, pick me, pick me....I'll go...' And here is where my perceptions and paradigms take over. On the crescendo of such an amazing message, and this request, I start to expect the message to be carried will be grand, will be on par with the place and the set up so far...grand temple, grand God, grand transformation...in the background in my head I can hear the producer saying 'cue theme music, let it swell...the hero of the story is to receive his holy quest....'
So what message does Isaiah sign up to carry?
Go and tell the people....
.....pregnant pause....
dramatic effects.....
' to keep on being fools....to keep pretending that they're paying attention....keep being insensitive idiots....blind, deaf, clueless fools! For what could they risk in letting go of their own self-righteous perceptions? Nothing but salvation, nothing but healing, nothing but comprehension.'
Now if it were me, and I have a habit when I'm drastically surprised of speaking before I think, I just know the next words out of my mouth to such a request would have been something along the lines of, "Say what?!! Come again?!!! You want me to go back and tell everyone I know what again? Surely I misheard...you seriously want me to go and tell them they're fools, idiots...etc, et al? Hunh? Now wait a minute..."
I feel somewhat assuaged in Isaiah's response. 'For how long?'
Yes...I too would have felt deflated. Here I am, before the thrown of God, ready to carry a message that will change people the way I've just been changed...and I've volunteered, ready and willing...for....well, this particular memo wasn't what I had in mind when 2 minutes ago I was full of awe, wonder, inspiration....
And the Lord basically tells him to keep repeating it until everything is in ruins.
Where I was prepared for a motivational speech I encounter a God who tells it like it is...who knows the nature of man...until we've run it into the ground, until we've tried absolutely everything we can think of by ourselves....then, we'll be ready to listen...to perhaps consider an idea we didn't come up with under the illusion of our own brilliance....
Wow...He certainly doesn't seem to pull any punches. And, yet.....well....you can't escape the fact that there at the end when we've completely and utterly destroyed things there was that small, tiny, little, bitty, tiny, detail of Him saying, 'when you're ready to listen there will be healing...restoration...salvation.....'
Oh. Ok. So it wasn't what I expected when the story first began to climax.
Another message I recently heard stuck a similar note...and so is worthy to be captured here.
The pastor giving this message...well really the point I'm relating was simply a sub-point within a grander message...but this really struck me.
So that verse many of us, know and quote..."Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest." (Matthew 11:28) The Pastor's point was this....do you realize what that really is saying? Cause if I were going to give you a time in my life where you really don't want to know me...well, that would be it---when I'm weary, and tired, and stressed, and burdened...when I'm worn down, worn out, and worn in...this would be the time to say, perhaps meet me next week. I'm not a nice person at that juncture. I'm not receptive, or patient, or anything but burned out. Yet, this is the time when God extends the invitation...come...come burned out, tired, stressed, worn out...when you're impatient, exhausted, moody, snappish, snippy, more willing to hit and ask questions later...
What do you do with a Lord like that? What do you do with a man like that? For those of us blessed enough...well, we may have one or two really close people in our lives who see that side of us....one or two people who accept us as-is, with all the walls down, they see us, accept us, cut us some slack, love us...hear us out, lift us up....listen...and sometimes know from that place that goes deeper than just an intellectual front, but from an experiential one....we call them friends. We call them best friends, or life-long friends, sister/brother of our hearts...
And this is the Lord, that loves you, that wants to know you...not superficially, not as an acquaintance, but as a best friend...a soul's companion...this is our Savior. Come. Be healed. Be purified. Come just as you are. When you are ready, I'll be waiting.
So I was listening to Isaiah 6 recently...and it occurred to me how unexpected God can be. This is not the first time I've thought this, nor will it be the last. ;) There are some constants in life besides death and taxes.
So, maybe my paradigm so clearly shows that I've been raised in the western hemisphere in the 20th-21st century...that yes, Hollywood and all the drama have permeated my perceptions and somewhat set my expectations for certain plots. But then...I think there are more than a few people that would fit this description, thus this blog.
However, let's see if you can see the picture I did. (And this will be a very loose translation, very much a paraphrase...but in true Hollywood stories, let us begin.)
There once was a man named Isaiah. One day shortly after the regent of the realm had died an angel came to him and gave him a vision. He stood before the very thrown of the Most High God. The temple was stunning, in fact, the very train of the King filled the entire temple. Other angels with 6 wings were hovering above the thrown, 2 wings covering the angels' feet, 2 covering their faces...and 2 wings kept the creatures airborne, and they proclaimed how sacred and holy this place was, how amazingly sovereign this King is/was. The very foundations he is standing on shake with the tremor of the King's voice. (Can't you just see the bright lights, the dazzling effects, the sheer immensity of creation before the thrown?) Isaiah feels the contrast deeply, in fact he's very conscientious of the fact he's tracked in some mud, some filth upon his person due to where he lives, who he lives alongside of, what he hears in the streets everyday, things that have crossed his lips and here he is sullying this place. He is definitely out-of-place among the riches, the grandeur, the sheer holiness of this place. So what happens? Does he get kicked out on his keister? Nope.
Instead an angel takes burning coal from the sacrificial altar with some tongs...and flies straight towards him. (I don't know about you, but I'd be thinking punishment...hell, pit fires...burning coals just can't be good? Right?) But we are wrong. The coal burns away all the impurities about our main character, this man in the midst of heaven's glories. Isaiah stands forgiven, absolved of all sins. He stands pure in a pure and holy place.
On the heels of this profound transformation the Lord puts forth a request to the room...'who will go, who will bear a message for me?' Isaiah is filled with a zeal, and practically jumps up shouting 'pick me, pick me, pick me....I'll go...' And here is where my perceptions and paradigms take over. On the crescendo of such an amazing message, and this request, I start to expect the message to be carried will be grand, will be on par with the place and the set up so far...grand temple, grand God, grand transformation...in the background in my head I can hear the producer saying 'cue theme music, let it swell...the hero of the story is to receive his holy quest....'
So what message does Isaiah sign up to carry?
Go and tell the people....
.....pregnant pause....
dramatic effects.....
' to keep on being fools....to keep pretending that they're paying attention....keep being insensitive idiots....blind, deaf, clueless fools! For what could they risk in letting go of their own self-righteous perceptions? Nothing but salvation, nothing but healing, nothing but comprehension.'
Now if it were me, and I have a habit when I'm drastically surprised of speaking before I think, I just know the next words out of my mouth to such a request would have been something along the lines of, "Say what?!! Come again?!!! You want me to go back and tell everyone I know what again? Surely I misheard...you seriously want me to go and tell them they're fools, idiots...etc, et al? Hunh? Now wait a minute..."
I feel somewhat assuaged in Isaiah's response. 'For how long?'
Yes...I too would have felt deflated. Here I am, before the thrown of God, ready to carry a message that will change people the way I've just been changed...and I've volunteered, ready and willing...for....well, this particular memo wasn't what I had in mind when 2 minutes ago I was full of awe, wonder, inspiration....
And the Lord basically tells him to keep repeating it until everything is in ruins.
Where I was prepared for a motivational speech I encounter a God who tells it like it is...who knows the nature of man...until we've run it into the ground, until we've tried absolutely everything we can think of by ourselves....then, we'll be ready to listen...to perhaps consider an idea we didn't come up with under the illusion of our own brilliance....
Wow...He certainly doesn't seem to pull any punches. And, yet.....well....you can't escape the fact that there at the end when we've completely and utterly destroyed things there was that small, tiny, little, bitty, tiny, detail of Him saying, 'when you're ready to listen there will be healing...restoration...salvation.....'
Oh. Ok. So it wasn't what I expected when the story first began to climax.
Another message I recently heard stuck a similar note...and so is worthy to be captured here.
The pastor giving this message...well really the point I'm relating was simply a sub-point within a grander message...but this really struck me.
So that verse many of us, know and quote..."Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest." (Matthew 11:28) The Pastor's point was this....do you realize what that really is saying? Cause if I were going to give you a time in my life where you really don't want to know me...well, that would be it---when I'm weary, and tired, and stressed, and burdened...when I'm worn down, worn out, and worn in...this would be the time to say, perhaps meet me next week. I'm not a nice person at that juncture. I'm not receptive, or patient, or anything but burned out. Yet, this is the time when God extends the invitation...come...come burned out, tired, stressed, worn out...when you're impatient, exhausted, moody, snappish, snippy, more willing to hit and ask questions later...
What do you do with a Lord like that? What do you do with a man like that? For those of us blessed enough...well, we may have one or two really close people in our lives who see that side of us....one or two people who accept us as-is, with all the walls down, they see us, accept us, cut us some slack, love us...hear us out, lift us up....listen...and sometimes know from that place that goes deeper than just an intellectual front, but from an experiential one....we call them friends. We call them best friends, or life-long friends, sister/brother of our hearts...
And this is the Lord, that loves you, that wants to know you...not superficially, not as an acquaintance, but as a best friend...a soul's companion...this is our Savior. Come. Be healed. Be purified. Come just as you are. When you are ready, I'll be waiting.
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