Impossibly Unchanged

I know I have to write this.  I know I cannot let this one slip by, left for me to meditate on and keep to myself for the rest of my days.  I know that this one is a screaming post, one that has been set to my ears and placed on my heart.  It follows appropriately the post I wrote a few weeks ago about the presence of the Lord.  And now I have received new revelation.

We can't be the same.

When we enter His presence, we can never be the same.  Every time we worship, every time we pray, every time we talk about Him or witness Him work, every time we write His name or speak His truth.  When we gather together for bible studies on random days throughout the week and when we join together on Sundays to unite as a body for church.  When we look at the masterpiece of His sunrise or feel the coolness of His wind as it blows by us on a Tuesday.  When we come in contact with Him, He does not want us to leave the same.

So what does this mean and how do we do it?  What kind of radicality does this assume?  It's not that it's radical, it's that it's only obvious.  We are coming in contact with the Creator of the Universe, how could we not be affected?

He touches us.  We are touched by His mighty presence.  Do we invite Him in?  When we sing of His Name do we tell Him to draw closer; do we make ourselves vulnerable to His power?  Are we open to His refinement?  Are we available for His revelation?

Or do we leave with the same burdens we carried in?  Do we sing those songs with familiar words, simultaneously clinging to the familiarity of the world we are used to?  Do we even let Him in at all?  Do we leave in the same state of romance in which we entered?

Or do we fall more in love with Him?

That, oh, that is what I want!  To enter into His presence, to know Him and to never be the same because of it.  What are our expectations?  To go to bible study and to leave with no practical application, no heart change, no sweet, sweet revelation of how good Daddy is, or no awareness of some piece of my heart that has been wrecked and needs rebuilding?  Do we allow change at all?  Do we expect change at all?  Do we welcome change at all?  No?

That is "doing."  That is legalism. That is religion.  Why even go!

When we invite the Lord into our lives (and we should), we are saying, "God, I don't want to be without You."  When we enter into a time of worship and praise to Him, His beauty becomes magnified to us and His Spirit manifested in us and every bit of His glory swallows us whole as we realize we are singing to the Maker of Heaven and Earth.  And when we declare His matchless glory an unspoken comparison of who we are with who He is takes place and we are overcome with the realization of how broken and little and unworthy we are and through His exaltation we fall on our faces and say, "Make me more like You!  I don't want to be this person anymore!"

So, you see, worship is all about Him.  And if our life is worship, wouldn't that mean our life is all about Him?  This is not a new statement, but it is a different angle.  We ask God to come about us because we love His presence.  His presence is where we are safe.  His presence is where we are created for--that realm, not this earthly one.  When we enter into His presence, lives are changed.  Cliche as it may sound, it's true.  If we attempt to enter into the presence of God with no expectations, but familiarity, if it is just something we do every Sunday, another part of our schedule, "Oh, you know, just meeting up with the Savior of my Soul, no big deal," we will find ourselves trapped in a mundane prison of monotony.  We will see ourselves as conversing with a humanized God, one without limitless power and with just enough love to fulfill to our appropriate time frame.

Let Him change you!  Let Him wreck and rebuild you, His child.  Let Him enter into the deepest parts of your heart, the ones that no one knows, the shame that no one sees, the battles you have struggled with for years.  Don't hide these things.  Don't contrive His Lordship to your own appointed heart hierarchy.  Don't pick and chose what areas of your life you want Him to refine.  Let His revelation fuel your transformation.  Surrender all!  Do not let an encounter with Him leave you still holding onto these things.  Let Him take them.  He wants to.

Not one scripture read, not one journal entry, not one strum of a guitar or one line of a song or one healing or miracle or gathering or fellowship, not one mention of His name...


Let not one of experience with Him leave you the same.  If they do, why are you doing them?  An important question to ask.

Make us like You.

LMB