Presence, Power, Glory

Long overdue, I know, and I'm sorry. I can't express the up's and down's, busy-ness and avoidance that has postponed this post. It's hard sometimes to sit still long enough to be very honest. I intended a while back to specifically share about what God's been teaching me lately, and now, almost a year later I'm finally getting to it. I was feeling quite guilty about waiting this long to finally update the ol' blog, and then I realized that I did in a way actually give the update in the form of various posts on Facebook (which I have put in a post on the blog in case you should want to browse those. Click here). But since those have already been published, I thought I'd still aim to boil down the main idea I've been working on swallowing over time. So, this is what I'd boil it down to.

I spent a lot of time this year coming back to the heart of understanding what it means to have really died with Christ, to have been raised with Christ, and to walk daily in His resurrected power. I think Tim may have referred to this as "remembering one's baptismal vows" (or I could have just given new meaning to what he said, but whatever, this is my post haha). And by "walk daily" I mean I'm averaging 2 out of 7 days a week. I'm working on it, ok? I didn't say I was the master of anything. ;)

Anyways, this is to say, it's easy to think that I have to work very hard to please God and obey Him. But mostly, the hardest thing I have to do is to stop doing anything that I think I have to do, and start focusing on with whom I'm supposed to be. Or I should say, with "Whom" I'm supposed to be. There is something about getting to know God and Christ Jesus that actually changes how I live. And I do not think there is an end to getting to know Him either. As I behold Him in the scriptures or experience Him in real time, I am taken back at how much it turns out I didn't know about Him. And often when the Bible talks about your good works, your obedience, your faith, etc. it connects it with knowing Christ. We were actually just talking about this on at church recently. We were looking at Philippians 3:7-11,

"7 But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, 9 and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, 10 that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; 11 in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead." (emphasis mine)

I have nothing worth offering to God. I have no righteousness of my own. But faith. And by faith I come to know Him. And by knowing Him, I get to know the power of His resurrection. This knowledge has the power to conform me to His death, and His present life. It's the kind of thing I think Matthew talks about in chapter 5 of his gospel, because it's the kind of faith and testimony that couldn't possibly cause people to mistakenly glorify you for your good deeds, but rather preaches loudly the glory of our God:

"Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in Heaven" (Matthew 5:16)

I did a study with my youth group girls a few months ago on glorifying God. Do you know what glory means? It is to recognize the greatness of who one is or what they have done. I do not glorify God unless I am recognizing the greatness of who He is, what He has done, and what He can and will do. It requires knowing Him. And when I make this the goal of my studies, I approach scripture differently. When I make this the goal of ministry, I approach it differently. I serve people differently when I want to get to know God by doing so, and simultaneously want them to know Him too in the same way. I thought the power to grow came from forcing myself into action, but I think it actually comes from His presence and glory. And I see now that I don't seek Him as a means to bettering myself, rather I seek Him as a means to know Him, and the change that results is just the fruit of being connected to the vine. Great, short little song that about sums up my prayer on this here.

I think originally I wasn't able to post about this so succinctly, so you could say waiting so long to post about it was actually a great idea. Gave me more time to grasp it first. :)

By way of general life update, I'm happy to say I have accepted a job at Reading Health Rehab Hospital! I'll be an RN on their Acute Rehab Unit just as soon as I finally take the NCLEX. Which is something I'd love prayer for. I'm studying for it with an online program recommended by my school, and the program (Virtual ATI) is supposed to give me a green light when I'm ready to take the NCLEX. The studying is burning me out a tad. I almost feel like I was more prepared to take the NCLEX when I first graduated (I scored a 98% probability of passing the NCLEX on our school's predictor exam) than I do right now, but I believe I'll get there. I just really would like to get there sooner rather than later. Before the end of July, really. I would also love prayer for the orientation process to be adequate. The rehab hospital gives you a lot of patients per RN, and I'm slightly nervous about this, but I think with proper orientation and a whole lot of prayer there's hope I can manage this well.

Thank you for reading and at least pretending any of this is new or inspiring. :)