living from receiving

Yesterday the Lord and I had a moment. 

Not a passing fancy or an emotional highlight.

One of those sacred-ground revelations that you can't walk away from picking up where you started. One of those holy moments where He shows you His perspective, and it trumps all you had been holding on to.

It came from a thought of O.Chambers, that the only sign that a person is saved is that he has received something from Jesus. He noted that many Christians' eyes are open, but they have received nothing from Him...salvation means that we are brought to the place where we are able to receive something from God on the authority of Jesus, forgiveness of sins.

As God was walking me through that idea, He took it one further. 

I have been dwelling for a long time in a place of my own strength. 

I have been walking with Jesus from a place of my very best efforts, my utmost for His glory. I've been walking with Him holding onto my losses...some life has brought, like my dad, some people have brought, like wrongs I've suffered or disappointments I've shouldered.  I try to bear all the costs, and try to dig deeply in Him, and try to trust Him and walk in that.

But He showed me yesterday that He wants me walking out of this incredibly heavy and dark season from a place of giving only what I have received from Him. Of holding onto only what I have received from Him.  

Have I not received from Him the richness of His grace, mercy, forgiveness?  Have I not received from Him so many good gifts? Have I not received from Him His help and power and love?

What if I walked--instead of in what life has dealt me washed with a holy perspective--simply in the reality of what I have received from Him? Only from Him?

What if what I received from others, from myself, from life, didn't matter? What if my whole focus was on what I am receiving from Him?

What if all I gave, every day, was what I've received from Him?

Not from the depths of my efforts, not from my best decisions, not from my own forgiveness and grace and strength.  What if I lived in a place of pouring out what I've received from Him, dwelling close and extending from one hand what I'm receiving from Him with the other?

How many distractions have kept me from this image of abandoned living!  

And how quickly He showed me a line in the sand, and a few things I needed to do, immediately, to set out on this new course.

While I have been trying to forgive, He has extended SUCH forgiveness to me, the God against whom all sins stand!  When looking at the injuries and trying to forgive, I am begrudging and slow and hesitant and hurting. I can GIVE forgiveness, true and deep, because I have RECEIVED it from Him, Eyes on Jesus!

That strength and courage for a new season which I have been trying to muster in Him, can I not rely instead on the source, receiving strength and wisdom from Him for each new day and circumstance, and depend only on THAT?  Is it possible that I could walk into today with NO strength of my own, from NONE of my best efforts, and instead sit so close to Him that I am receiving His strength, and living on THAT alone?

His goodness is running AFTER us, friends! Is not HIS goodness more than enough to be OUR goodness for today?  Aren't the riches I receive daily from Him enough to be the richness I'm dolling out?

Is not the great patience I receive continually from Him more than enough patience to glorify Him in my daily living?

Is not His authority on the future enough for mine?

Could I live in a constant state of receiving from God, and giving what I'm receiving?  Would that life not look a whole lot more like Him, and cut what I'm receiving from myself and the world out of the equation?

His eyes on this lifted a veil on mine, and I quickly crossed the line He drew and signed up for it, reaching out to a few people I couldn't bring myself to reach out to....having a few conversations I couldn't imagine ever being able to have, until I took my eyes off of what I've received from them and caught a glimpse of the sacred abundance I've received from Him. 

How faithful the Lord has been to be healing and preparing me for this next season, giving others what He's given me, sharing what He's shared with me...just a beggar, showing the other beggars where the bread is. 

That was long :)

Make a list of what you've received from Him...and see if it doesn't change how you head into today.

love you precious prayer warriors