Beautiful ashes, scattering about on the early morning breeze;
A solemn frigid welcome is what was expected,
An overcast sky and a lingering dawn.
It is a new day but night seems to persist;
Each season seemingly more turbulent than the last.
Persistent night, made bearable only by merciful flashes of Light.
Faith
A Morning Prayer
Gracious Lord, it’s a new day with its troubles.
Hear my prayer, and incline Your ears to my humble petitions.
In Your faithfulness and righteousness, bring relief to me.
Identity Crisis
Identity is a strange thing. It is something that should be obvious but can be strangely mysterious. There are many, especially the young, who are going through an identity crisis. One dictionary defines identity crisis as a period of uncertainty and confusion in which a person’s sense of identity becomes insecure or unstable. An identity crisis usually occurs when there’s a change in a person’s life, and can also be due to a change in their expected aims or role in society. An identity crisis is a type of existential crisis. Existential crises generally have to do with questions and inner conflicts about the meaning and purpose of life. As thinking beings, reason and purpose have a central role to play in how we go about life.
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The Burning Bush
I, like many others, believe that God is. But I also, like many others, wish I could meet God like Moses met God in the burning bush encounter of Exodus 3 and 4. Moses’ encounter with God is one of the most iconic, most recognizable and unique instances of God revealing Himself to a man recorded in Scripture. Note, this was not a vision, or a dream, or an impression, or an imagination; as the Scriptures indicate later on in Numbers 11, God makes it clear that He speaks to Moses face to face, not in dreams or visions or dark sayings or riddles. So yes, though I believe that God is, and I believe in His Word, I still wish to meet Him like Moses did.
Sometime ago, God revealed to me that He’d already granted that wish (but in classical form, He had done it not in the way I was expecting). Then He went ahead to show me how the burning bush experience that Moses had in his time, was his (Moses’) version of what we would call in this dispensation, ‘the born-again experience’.
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Easy
Tell me that it’s easy,
To rise up each morning at the break of dawn
To set your knees in that spot in the mat
With the perfect grooves made from wear;
A testament to the consistency with which they carry
The weight of your desperation and dreams.
Tell me how you’ve gotten used to the familiar aches –
The pain of the strain of holding a position
That under different circumstances would be called corporal punishment;
Hands clasped underneath chin,
Elbows scraping the edge of the bed…
But none of these compare to the aches
That rampage in places the eye cannot see;
None of these compare to the screams that no ear hears –
None, except One.
Search Me
Father, You have searched me, and You know me – even better than I know myself. You know my sitting down and my rising up. You perceive my thoughts long before they are formed within me. You search out my path, even to where I lay my head to rest; there is no part of my life’s journey that is obscured from You. No word has reached my tongue that You didn’t already know about. You hem me in behind and before; and You have laid Your hand on me. You give me knowledge of things beyond me, lofty things that I cannot attain.
Is there a place that Your Spirit cannot reach? Is it possible for me to escape Your presence? If I were to ascend to heaven, that is Your throne and You would be there; but even if I were to make my bed in the depths of Sheol, I would not be beyond Your piercing gaze. If I take the wings of the dawn, and settle in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there Your hand will lead me, and Your right hand will hold me.
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Crowned (Happy New Year)
About 365 days since I last sat to write a “New Year’s Message,”
And I can’t help but loosely echo the words of the Psalmist…
In the 65th psalm, he says,
“Praise waits for You, God, in Zion.
Vows shall be performed to You.
You who hear prayer, unto You shall all men come.
Our sins did not overwhelm us, because You atoned for our transgressions.
How blessed we are that You have chosen us and caused us to come near to You.
How privileged we are to be able to live in Your courts.
You have positioned us in Your secret place,
And filled us with the goodness of Your treasuries.
By awesome deeds of righteousness, You answered us and brought us salvation.
You have shown Yourself to be the hope of all the earth, of those far and near.
By Your power and strength You have brought great things into being,
Stilled the roaring of the seas, its waves, and the turmoil of nations.
Even those in the farthest reaches of the earth
Have come to know and fear Your wonders.
You have set songs of joy into our dawns and dusks.
You have blessed the works of our hands and brought us increase;
Indeed, You crown our year with Your bounty,
And cause our storehouses to overflow with abundance.
Everything in sight declares Your praise with joy.”
The Psalmist’s Desire
Lord, there’s a thirst in me that can only be quenched by You;
My soul yearns for You, like the deer pants for the water-brooks.
Every minute I spend away from You is a minute too long for comfort;
When will I find myself before You, my King?
As I wait night after night and day after day,
I’m compelled to feast on my tears shed from excessive longing.
My soul cries out from within me
Every time I lack awareness of Your presence –
Whenever I find myself asking where You are, Lord.
Because I remember, in times past (that seem so long ago)
How I used to go with the saints, and led them into Your presence
With such joy, and with praise on my lips, keeping my date with You.
On My Knees
“I bow my knees to You in reverence, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is from You that every family in heaven and on earth is named. I pray that You will grant me according to the immeasurable riches of Your glory, sustaining strength and prevailing power through Your Holy Spirit in the inner person. Let Christ dwell permanently in my heart through faith, to the end that being rooted and grounded in love, I may be strengthened to comprehend with all the saints, the width, length, height and depth of Christ’s love which surpasses knowledge. Let me be filled with all Your fullness, Lord God Almighty. Amen.”
#Personalized
#Ephesians 3:14-19
#Praying_The_Scriptures_002
Beloved Father
“Beloved Father in Heaven, I hallow Your Name; I long for the establishment of Your Kingdom on earth; How awesome it would be, if everything was here as it is in Heaven. Notwithstanding, You are my Lord, and I look to You this day for everything I will need. Please teach me not to hold the faults of others against them, even as You do not hold my trespasses against me. Order my steps away from the things and places that will cause me pain and sadden You. Deliver me from every evil, because I am Yours, and You have the power to keep me; And I will glorify You with every breath that is in me, now and forever. Amen.”
This is the first in a new series where I take portions of Scripture that are directly ‘prayable’ and personalize them. I hope you pray along and be blessed.
#Personalized
#Matthew 6:9-13
#Praying_The_Scriptures_001
Makafui's Journal 