"A hard, deep call to obedience."

This title, as I read it, my soul both rejoiced and also quaked. So much is wrapped up within that one sentence. If I am to be honest, there is some unease I find creeping into my heart when I read the above sentence, yet in the same instance, there is so much joy and peace found within it too. For obedience can be both hard, but in the same breath, it can bring so much joy and peace to one's soul. The title of my post today comes from a book that my good gal friend gave to me. It is a book composed of beautiful prayers by Old Testament professor, Walter Brueggemann. The book is titled, " Awed to Heaven, Rooted in Earth." I want to share the poem I encountered today with all of you. Here it is: "You are the God who makes extravagant promises. We relish your great promises of fidelity, and presence and solidarity, and we exude in them. Only to find out, always too late, that your promise always comes in the midst of a hard, deep call to obedience. You are the God who calls people like us, and the long list of mothers and fathers before us, who trusted the promise enough to keep the call. So we give you thanks that you are a calling God, who calls always to dangerous new places. We pray enough of your grace and mercy among us that we may be among those who believe your promises enough to respond to your call. We pray in the one who embodied your promise and enacted your call, even Jesus. Amen" (pg 90). This prayer, oh this prayer so spoke to my heart this morning. Sometimes, God's call to obedience is SO difficult, so painful, so heart wrenching....but I want to be the person he knows will respond to his call, regardless of the loss I might endure. There are two verses that came to mind as I read this poem. They come from Matthew 10:37-38 and Luke 9:23-25. Here they are: Matthew passage: 37 “Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. 38 Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39 Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it." Luke passage: 23 Then he said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. 24 For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it. 25 What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit their very self?" Obedience to the Lord and what he might be calling his people into may very well look like giving up the love of money, job, desires, loved ones, comforts, ect. Is this easy, of course not. Denying oneself and bearing their cross is a death sentence....but as Jesus said, "whoever wants to save their life (keep those things that do not align with obeying God and his call) will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it. "And by losing your life, you gain yourself because it is in Christ and doing his will that we finally encounter who we truly are! We gain more than this fading world could ever offer. We gain eternal life, peace, joy...the very things this world will never be able to offer us. But we must choose. We cannot have our cake and eat it too. Either we choose to step into a hard, deep call to obedience and reap the unfading riches the presence of God gives us, or we chose comforts, desire for more money, jobs, self, etc (whatever is getting in the way of drawing close to God) and reap the never satisfying, ever fading things of this world. I know I have some decisions to make, and I can only pray for the courage and strength to embrace this hard, deep call to obedience my Father is leading me into. Be encouraged that God is always for you. He wants to shower you with his love and peace and joy and can only do this if you agree to be found obeying him. Believe me, I am saying this as much to myself as to you. To end, I wanted to share this link with you. I woke up thinking about this song. Because of His love, I with all my heart want to obey and following this God who so dearly loves us and wants His eternal perfect good for us! So, will you be a person who responds to his calling? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FxaUYjRtkc. Have an incredible day my people:)