Day Two

Dear God,

This week I am reading Isaiah, mainly because that's what we're supposed to be studying in church next week and I needed a starting point, something to stick to all week rather than jumping around in the Bible. Yesterday I read this in Isaiah 1:

17 Learn to do right; seek justice.
Defend the oppressed.
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
plead the case of the widow.

And I thought "There it is again." You see, I can't read the Bible, or a Christian blog, or a Christian book, without encountering this idea -- that we are to help the vulnerable ones. The orphans, the widows.

Today I read this in Isaiah 2:

7 Their land is full of silver and gold;
there is no end to their treasures.
Their land is full of horses;
there is no end to their chariots.
⁸ Their land is full of idols;
they bow down to the work of their hands,
to what their fingers have made.

And I am thinking -- this is me, this is us, this is my culture, my country. We have so much we can't even see the ones who have nothing. We are consumed with our stuff, mesmerized by it, in love with it. We spend all our time either taking care of it or planning how to add to it.  But the reality of all that stuff is that it's nothing. In the end, we can't take it with us. Though to judge from grave sites and burial mounds, we've been trying to do so since forever.

God, I am trying to be still this week. Again, I ask you to help me cut through the noise, the incessant demands of my day, of my stuff, so I can hear you. I want to hear your heart. What I really want is an engraved letter from you spelling out in extremely clear terms exactly what you want. And then I wonder what means I will use to rationalize that away.

Maybe I already have such a letter. Maybe it's the sinful nature of my heart to try to argue that when you said "orphans" you didn't mean orphans. You were speaking metaphorically, you weren't calling us to personally do something, to personally take in an alien, a stranger. You certainly didn't mean that.  I suspect I may be rather like the pharisees, parsing the law into all its dos and don'ts so I know juuuuuusssssst how far I can walk on the sabbath before it constitutes work, so I can focus on all the little letters of the law and miss the spirit of it entirely (of course you can pull your sheep from the pit, but you cannot heal people. No sir).

And now I'm just talking again instead of asking for the help I need so much. I don't know if I can ask to be free of fear. I want to not be small. I want to be in charge of my fear instead of limited by it. I want to be so convinced of your power, your call, that I am unafraid to put myself in a position where you have to show up or I'm sunk (oh Francis Chan, why do you skewer me to the wall like this?). I want to be the kind of person who can take that kind of risk, but instead I feel like Much Afraid.

Okay God, here it is. I need to see the path clearly -- I need to have all the noise in my head fall away, everything that isn't of you fall away. Father, in the name of Jesus, I ask you to bind the hissing, insinuating fears, the petty, selfish ideas,  the loud opinions of the world, the doubts, the anxieties. I need to be able to look at things with your eyes so I can say without a doubt "That's just selfishness -- doesn't affect the decision" or "That's the world's view, not God's; doesn't affect the decision."

And I need to know, believe, that you won't abandon me. I don't know where I get this idea but I always worry that when it really counts, I'll be alone. This lie goes so deep in me -- and I don't know why. I have a good family, a family that has always been there for me. I have a good husband, who I know loves me faithfully even when I am pretty difficult to love. And I have a God who has come through for me any number of times. I have never been left flat, and yet I fear. Father, help me weed out this thinking. Help me destroy it, stem and root.

God you are faithful. Great is your faithfulness, no matter how unsteady I may be.  I am surrounded by idols, Lord. But my idols are less about stuff and more about controlling my environment and relationships so that I am never more than minimally inconvenienced. Forgive me, God, for no trusting you more. For not being willing to put it all in your hands. It's all in your hands anyway, and my control is never more than a beautiful delusion.  Intellectually I know that, but emotionally I am still hanging on with both hands.

Create in me a clean heart, oh God, and renew a right spirit within me.

Love,

me