Desert

Empty.

The longing is unbearable.

What creativity was in me has left. The life in my body is mechanical. What remains is a machine that thinks with only one goal in mind and mystery has become my enemy.

Although mystery is the joy of life, I haven't a got a dime to my name to toss into that well. I know that I'm cornered. I'm crushed down into nothing. Good intentions and false hope have betrayed me. This battle called life is confounding. The true complexity of it is as impossible to behold as it would be to see 360 degrees at one time.

I just don't know where to go or what to do. Where should I invest my heart? What can offer peace, what can offer truth? I want to find it in the Bible, but I fear that I foul it up. I can't understand because my mind is bereft of that initial faith. It seems that it dwindled down and withered. I hate to think this because I then have only to believe that I'm doomed, hated by God. How can I tell? It's clear that my self-diagnosis has failed me countless times. I've thought I had something pinned down so many time in the last few months, tidbits of wisdom that would carry me. I thought I had something I could build on, but now my proverbial house is blowing away in the storm. I hate that I am so fluid in all the wrong ways. I writhe around like a snake when someone tries to tell me I'm wrong, but when I trudge through my thoughts I refuse to put stock in anything. I guard so desperately the exterior but the interior is empty. What tragedy.

This seems so disgusting to me. My blog sounds like whiny, self-indulgent blather. I hate myself again. The clarity of truth in my heart has burdened me with it's memory now that it has left me. It is worse to lose your sight rather than be born blind. I'm infected with a foulness that I thought I would never have to know with Jesus.

Maybe this is exactly how it is supposed to be. Maybe this is exactly what every person who has ever loved God goes through. Maybe I'm just going through the typical experience and I think that I'm special so no one else could possibly understand. I just don't know. How can I?

At this point you probably are getting the theme. My own mind is treacherous. My thoughts are untrustworthy. The only thing that I know is that I want good. I know the difference between good and evil. I know the difference between life and death. The dilemma is that there is no way of telling what thoughts that would guide me are motivated by. My pride, self-destructive ego or the Life that is within me.

Ah. It seems clear now. Faith is suicidal but only if you value the approval of man. To believe in something that you can't control or understand is to betray the fallen human instinct and also betray anyone who still abides by it. I must deny my allegiance to the Fall. I see that my mistake has been believing that blessings of a life of faith would cancel out the cost of that faith.

I will believe. My only option at this point is to devote my mind to the Bible. It is clear that my mind of it's own persuasion will lead me toward a death that I've been pardoned of. To filter faith through my intellect and trying fit faith into my intellect is trying to fit the ocean in a swimming pool. It is also like using mud to wash your hands. I cannot get clean using the dirty faculties I have. It is clear: I must abandon my reliance on my thought and my experiential understanding and submit my mind to the thoughts of God. I am hopelessly lost guided by intelligence. It's time to pray.

Father,

So. You pointed the way. I will submit my mind to your word, the Bible. I will let it transform my mind with out reservation. I will accept your truth without trying to control it or twist it to my will. I offer my mind to you. I pray that you give me the strength to stop trying to think my way out of obedience. I pray that you guide me as I relinquish navigational control of my life to you. I pray that you free me of the bondage I have submitted to under my intelligence. I want my thought to glorify you and reflect your truth. I pray that I can use my mind as a tool and sacrifice to you, rather than a hindrance. I pray to stop trying to work my way to you by understanding. I pray that I have the humility to love you in all your mystery and I pray to be consumed utterly by the unfathomed depths of your nature. I pray to accept you as a child, and lay aside my prideful attempts to master you with postulation. Allow me to enter your court as a servant, an unworthy sinner.

Jesus, sweet Jesus. I want you. I want to fall deeply in love with you. Drive the sin from my heart so you can reside in me more fully. Cleanse your temple, make me a pleasing sacrifice to you. Please let me accept your grace. I just want to be completely absorbed in You. I can't live another day with this sin. The things I do are so pitiful. They could never fill the need I have, yet I submit to them daily. It's tragic. I need your love. I need your grace. Create something from nothing within me. Grace does dwell in me. I pray that it flourishes without ceasing. I pray that I be consumed by it for the rest of my life. I want you. Hear me! I want you!

I'm broken yet again, and I need you. Please be here. I accept, I believe, I submit. I don't know anything outside of your word. Your truth is the place that I will build. I will make my home in your words. That's it. I surrender again. Here we go.