Search Me (Part 2)

The most basic way I can explain my experience yesterday is as follows.

I simply prayed three words: God, search me. So you could say God (aka Yahweh) typed my name in the search line at Google and clicked the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button. The top results:

His thoughts of me before the foundations of the earth.
His plan for my life that He has known since before time.
His creating me and my birth.
My life, my heart, my mind, and my strength (oh yeah and my weaknesses).

The crazy part about all of this is he knew I was going to make my search request on that very day at that very moment before He even created me. So, needless to say He came to our meeting yesteday prepared, or would it just be suffice to say omniscient. Either way, He knew my innermost thoughts and shared them with me. Compare it to that moment when you know something and someone else becomes aware that you know and they too know what it is, but you don't want them to know it. Yeah, not a good time. But He was not angry or upset. He calmly laid ME out in front of me and said, "AO, I love you." Now, I remind you, I know ME. I am messed up, screwed up, torn up, beat up, a good for nothing, piece of crap. I am inconsistent, incompentent, insane, and invalid. I am selfish, self-righteous, self-involved, and just plain full of myself. And Yahweh has the audacity to say, "AO, I love you." At that moment, I knew it. Pure truth poured from His mouth. I couldn't argue with it, despite wanting to. I knew I couldn't escape it. His presence and love would follow me. They would be there waiting for me where ever I ran to and remain my constant companions as I ran. What I would want to be a lonely trail, would turn into an adventure in love. My only choice... acceptance. I could not refute the TRUTH.

By acceptance, I mean accepting the truth that Yahweh has, does, and always will love me and accepting the reality of being unconditionally loved. I can accept the truth part, but accepting the reality part remains a challenge. A challenge that I will battle everyday. Remember, I am MESSED UP. Love will make you honest too, by the way.

Truth trashed me right there. Now, I went from messed up to extremely messed up, but in the best way. Love, real love will mess you up. It will get all over you. It will strip down your pride, wipe out your defenses, and leave you vunerable. I confess, there is something about vunerability that brings excitement, humility, and authentic fear (the best kind though). For some Godly reason, I am AO-k with that fact. As a result, my prayer will continue to be: God, search me.

Inspiration for this blog comes from Psalm 139.

Search Me (Part 1)

This morning, during my 10 & 10 (a practice where you take 20 minutes to communicate with Yahweh... 10 minutes talking & 10 minutes listening... it's how a conversation works [Communication 101]) and let me tell you He got all over me. Thankfully. So, I am certain He did nothing more than just turn the faucet on just enough to get a drip ( like you do when it's going to freeze overnight and you don't want the pipes to freeze) but it felt like the force of a fire hydrant. Oh gosh a migthy!! But you want to know the surprising part about the experience, the violent rush ushered in refreshment like jumping into a pool on hot day. As the flood rushed over me, I felt my bitterness, anger, confusion, doubt, guilt, shame, and all my simple AO tom-foolery wash away. As quickly as those conditions washed away, newness came upon me. At that moment, I knew joy, relief, and hope. I still don't have answers to many of my questions but God said, "AO, you don't need them now." Ok, if you say so.

This all started with three simple words, "God, search me." That's right Psalm 139. I will continue this blog later. Here's a teaser... I bet you didn't know God invented Google.