Broken and Grateful

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My friend Kent and I were exchanging edifications this morning about "deconstruction." You know, what God allows into our lives with the aim of taking away what He doesn't want in us before He begins building that which He would like in us.

Some people would like to think that this deconstruction is not a valid concept, that it's not meant for their lives if they're walking rightly with God. But in my humble opinion, I don't think that's true.

The apostle Paul went through it, after all. He needed God, like we do, to remind him of Who was both Creator and Father to him. We, like him, need God to allow us to get into a circumstance that will push us beyond what we think we are capable of so that we may discover what He is capable of when we truly surrender our lives to Him.

For we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about the affliction and oppressing distress which befell us in [the province of] Asia, how we were so utterly and unbearably weighed down and crushed that we despaired even of life [itself].
Indeed, we felt within ourselves that we had received the [very] sentence of death, but that was to keep us from trusting in and depending on ourselves instead of on God Who raises the dead.
[For it is He] Who rescued and saved us from such a perilous death, and He will still rescue and save us; in and on Him we have set our hope (our joyful and confident expectation) that He will again deliver us [from danger and destruction and [a]draw us to Himself]...

2 Corinthians 1:8-10

It's as though God is peeling away our layers like an onion, trying to get to something He's placed within each of us and is precious to him. It's a loving process, mind you. He is ever close and gentle as we learn.

So, deconstruct, Lord. Peel, Father. Help us to get down to that which You first placed within us when we said "I believe and I will follow."

In her song "What I Thought I Wanted," Sara Groves so eloquently (as she often does) sings of this constant process in our lives of faith. In some seasons pronounced, in other seasons subtle. But always, He is there and working within us. Please read these lyrics and ponder the wonder of His care for us all. (Click on the "Read More!" link below)

"What I Thought I Wanted"

Tuxedo in the closet, gold band in a box
Two days from the altar she went and called the whole thing off
What he thought he wanted, what he got instead
Leaves him broken and grateful

I passed understanding a long, long time ago
And the simple home of systems and answers we all know
What I thought I wanted, what I got instead
Leaves me broken and somehow peaceful

I keep wanting you to be fair
But that’s not what you said
I want certain answers to these prayers
But that’s not what you said

When I get to heaven I’m gonna go find Job
I want to ask a few hard questions, I want to know what he knows
About what it is he wanted and what he got instead
How to be broken and faithful

What I thought I wanted
What I thought I wanted
What I thought I wanted
What I thought I wanted

Staring in the water like Esops foolish dog
I can’t help but reflect on what it was I almost lost
What it was I wanted, what I got instead
Leaves me broken and grateful

I’m broken and grateful
I want to be broken and grateful
I want to be broken, peaceful, faithful, grateful, grateful
I want to be broken, peaceful, faithful, grateful, grateful

The Winepress of His Love

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God allows things - trials and tribulations - to come into our lives to help along the process of our transformation. As we walk through these testings with Christ, our ways of the independent flesh are replaced with God's ways as we become dependent upon Him through the Spirit.
 
God wants to get down to the real us - the "Spirit" us. And so he allows us, like grapes, to be squeezed until all that is left is the juice, the wine, the Spirit.
 
It's not fun being in the winepress of His love, not in the flesh, anyway. It discomforts....our flesh. It hurts.....our flesh. It destroys....our flesh. It is a place of learning, of chastening, of correction, of spiritual transformation.
 
And, as the winepress of God's love tightens around our fleshly perception of ourselves and our fleshly opinions and our fleshly priorities and our fleshly goals, then - one by one - they are broken and then crushed amidst His love for us.
 
It is a disconcerting, disappointing and humbling experience to watch the skin, and the stem, and the pulp and the seeds of our own personalities spew forth as we are transformed to have the personality of Christ.
 
But, in the end, all that is left......is Wine.
Spirit.
Truth.
And Peace.
 
And this is a precious vision of our Father's love, that when we do not choose the right way, He will choose to bring us back to it.
 
Gently as possible.
Firmly as needed.
This is the Love of our Father.
 
Now no chastening for the present seemeth joyous, but grievious: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.
Hebrews 12:11

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In her song Less Like Scars, Sara Groves sings so eloquently of this process of change and growth and transformation in Christ. Please read the lyrics, watch the video, and be blessed as you reflect upon this aspect of the Journey that we are all sharing.





Less Like Scars

It's been a hard year
But I'm climbing out of the rubble
These lessons are hard
Healing changes are subtle
But every day it's

Less like tearing, more like building
Less like captive, more like willing
Less like breakdown, more like surrender
Less like haunting, more like remember

And I feel you here
And you're picking up the pieces
Forever faithful
It seemed out of my hands, a bad situation
But you are able
And in your hands the pain and hurt
Look less like scars and more like
Character

Less like a prison, more like my room
It's less like a casket, more like a womb
Less like dying, more like transcending
Less like fear, less like an ending

And I feel you here
And you're picking up the pieces
Forever faithful
It seemed out of my hands, a bad situation
But you are able
And in your hands the pain and hurt
Look less like scars

Just a little while ago
I couldn't feel the power or the hope
I couldn't cope, I couldn't feel a thing
Just a little while back
I was desperate, broken, laid out, hoping
You would come

And I need you
And I want you here
And I feel you

And I know you're here
And you're picking up the pieces
Forever faithful
It seemed out of my hands, a bad, bad situation
But you are able

And in your hands the pain and hurt
Look less like scars (x3)

And more like
Character