It’s been a good year for CDs for me this year so far! I am finding that songs written in all kinds of places at all different times are echoing what God is doing in me: stirring, causing faith to rise, stoking a burning in my soul.

I received the latest Passion album (‘Let The Future Begin’) as a Mothers’ Day present last week. One of the tracks on that album is called ‘Burning in my soul’ by Brett Younker. The chorus says:

‘Hear the sound from heaven! A mighty rushing wind!
We’re calling for revival!
God, let Your fire fall again,
It’s burning in my soul.’ (‘Burning in my soul’, Brett Younker)
‘Burning in my soul’, Brett Younker

The theme of fire falling on the altar and consuming the sacrifice is so prevalent in the Bible that it is difficult to single out just one instance of its significance. This theme is taken up on the Day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit came to rest on the disciples in the form of tongues of fire: “They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them” (Acts 2:3) and in the form of a ‘violent wind’ (Acts 2:2). Strangely enough, though, the verse which God reminded me of as I listened to this song was in Jeremiah 5:14 where we read “I will make my words in your mouth a fire.”

There is heat and warmth and a scorching that is not always pleasant in fire. God is stirring and rousing us, causing us to step out in new directions, making us aware of the ‘so much more’. Virtually every sermon we hear reminds us ‘we ain’t seen nothing yet’ or ‘there’s more!’ As the song ‘Consuming Fire’ reminds us ‘there must be more than this.’

We cry out for revival; we pray for God to move; we long to see sons and daughters moving in the realm of the Spirit; our hearts are hungry and thirsty for more of God. Only God can satisfy. Only God can do the mighty things we cry out for.

The GCSE art students at school were discussing their work yesterday and I discovered that their first ‘theme’ had been ‘Identity’. They had to come up with original artwork on that theme, looking at the question of identity from whatever viewpoint interested them.

I was interested because the question of identity is one which fills my thoughts on a regular basis. I have written my thoughts on this on a post-it note which sits in my classroom where I can see it every day: “We are children of God. Our identity must always be based on who we are, not on what we do.”

Today I was reading a commentary on David which contained this quote: “The primary concern of the spiritual life isn’t what we do for God, but what God does for us.” (Eugene Peterson, ‘Leap Over A Wall’).

Eugene Peterson takes this thought further in his paraphrase of Romans 12: “Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him.” (Rom 12:1, The Message) He goes on to say “Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him.” (Rom 12:3, The Message)

Casting Crowns tackle this theme in their song ‘Who Am I?‘, saying that our identity is
“Not because of who I am
But because of what You’ve done
Not because of what I’ve done
But because of who You are.” (Casting Crowns, ‘Who Am I?’)

Our purpose and identity are, therefore, bound up in who God is and what He does. Eph 1:11 in the Message says “It’s in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for.” So often we feel uncertain about who we are and what we should be doing. Kutless sing, “I don’t know how to find myself. Am I the only one, the only one?” (Kutless, ‘Identity’) – a question to which I always give the answer ‘No!’ with gratitude that someone else is articulating how I often feel!

I find the thought that my primary concern in the spiritual life is what God does for us both reassuring and frustrating. It’s reassuring because it removes the burden of performance from us. We live in a performance-saturated culture. Jobs are very task-oriented these days and pay is often linked to performance with little thought to other factors. Employers look at the ‘bottom line’, ‘value for money’, ‘hitting the targets’ till employees feel like performing monkeys. It’s a relief to know that God is not that kind of boss!

But it’s also frustrating to me because I am not in control of God. I can’t dictate what He does, how He does it or when He does it. So often I feel frustrated as I wait for God to move, to speak, to heal, to restore. I am reminded that I am not in charge. I am relatively impotent!

As always, there seems to be two ways of looking at the same thing! Learning godliness with contentment, being willing to wait for the Lord patiently, are things which take time (for me, anyway!) to grasp…

I read a quote today; sadly, I can’t find out who first said this, but I agree with the sentiment: “When wonder is dead, the soul becomes a dry bone.” Since dry bones have been featuring so much in the blog posts this month, that quote caught my attention. How do we keep the wonder of all God is and all He does in our souls?

Ray Bradbury said, “If you enjoy living, it is not difficult to keep the sense of wonder.” On a similar theme, Albert Einstein once said, “He who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed.” Certainly I think Jesus meant something about the wonder of a child when He told His disciples that they needed to become like little children to enter the kingdom of heaven (Matt 18:3). Children view everything with wonder. Life is so exciting to a child, so new, so full of things to explore and discover. If we become jaded and tired of life, we lose that sense of wonder.

Neil Armstrong said “Mystery creates wonder and wonder is the basis of man’s desire to understand.” Again, one way to keep wonder alive is to gaze on the mystery of God. We will never fathom all He is and never reach the end of discovering more of His love, mercy and forgiveness. It’s difficult not to feel wonder when we spend time gazing on Him:

“When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?” (Ps 8:3-4)

Let’s not lose the wonder and awe of a little child. Let’s keep wonder alive in our souls.

March is obviously a good month for birthdays – we had another to celebrate last night!
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Last night we looked at Psalm 57, one of the psalms written by David when he was in a cave, fleeing from Saul. The historical background to the psalm is found in 1 Samuel 17-24: how David was anointed king by Samuel, found favour with Saul through his musical skills and through the slaying of the giant Goliath, how he lost favour with Saul who was jealous of the people’s love for David and fearful of his own loss of favour with God (see 1 Samuel 15 for the story of Saul’s disobedience and 1 Samuel 18:7 for the root of his jealousy and irrational hatred of him.) David ended up fleeing for his life, confused and bewildered by Saul. There seemed no rhyme or reason to what he was going through, and certainly no chance that Samuel’s prophetic word would come true in his life. There are often times of great confusion in our lives, but we need not despair in those times.

Faced with this situation, David wrote a song. He showed us strategies for coping with trouble in this psalm which can help us today. He could look trouble directly in the face (verses 4 and 6 explicitly mention the trouble he was in and the pain this caused him), but he could also see God beyond the troubles (see verses 1, 3, 5, 10). He was able to acknowledge God’s character: providing mercy and refuge (verse 1), a God who sends forth love and faithfulness (verse 3), a God who delivers (verse 3 & 6). He was also able to focus on his own response to God: taking refuge in the shadow of God’s wings, crying out to God for mercy, singing and making music to God, having a steadfast heart before God, praying for God to be exalted even in the midst of difficult circumstances.

Being in a cave is an apparently restricting experience. But David knew that God was a solid foundation beneath his feet and that He was exalted above the heavens. There are no restrictions, no ‘glass ceiling’, on what God can do in our lives. David discovered, as Paul did later, that God’s grace was sufficient for Him (see 2 Cor 12:10). The wilderness wanderings can teach us much about the all-sufficiency of God!

As you will see if you look at the previous post, that was published at 9.51 a.m., just minutes before I actually left the house to go to our morning meeting. There was a real sense of God’s presence with us this morning. The songs we sang meshed with the theme the preacher spoke on. There was variety in how we approached Communion this morning, serving each other as we all stood at the front of church (not something we normally do.) God is clearly stirring and moving people in so many different ways. I really shouldn’t be surprised, but I still am rather awed by all this!

Kevin spoke this morning on the ‘two Ps’ of protection and provision. His text was Psalm 119:65-67. He talked about how we all come to church in different states and to do different things: to thank God, to remember Jesus’s example, to remember His death for the whole world and for our sins, to open our hearts to God. Through everything, we see that God has ‘dealt well’ with us.

Protection
The psalmist prays ‘keep me safe, O God, for in You I take refuge.’ (Ps 16:1) Church members have recently testified about God’s protection when they have encountered accidents but have not suffered serious injury or harm. God has our best interests at heart and looks after us. Is 41:10 reminds us “Do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” As the old hymn says:

“Be not dismayed whate’er betide,
God will take care of you!
Beneath His wings of love abide,
God will take care of you!” (W. Stillman Martin)

Provision
John 3:16 reminds us of God’s provision for the whole world in sending His Son to save us. We often like to be able to categorise things and explain them in a structured way (rather like scientists picture the double helix of DNA):

God’s love can’t be categorised in this way, but it can be accepted! Jesus was wounded for us and we can be awed by His great love (see 1 Sam 12:24, Ps 36:7, Ps 68:19). God daily bears our burdens and provides refuge for us. He has done great things for us, which we should remember with thankfulness, but we also need Him to do something new and fresh in our lives. As Jimmy Cricket used to say, ‘There’s more!’ We need God to revitalise and re-energise us and to do new things in our lives, our churches and our communities.