52 Days Have Past . . .

. . . and where am I?

. . . in a greater expectation for God to show up in my every day life!

"This is a time of letting the wind blow things out of your hands. This is a time of letting the wind blow in that which you must grab hold of. In times past, you would have loved to direct the wind in a way that it would blow certain things into your hands for your keeping. But this is a time that the wind is blowing and blowing loose. Let the blowing loose and the blowing away occur so that I can blow in what you need. I will sustain you. Don’t worry about your future. I will sustain you. But let Me blow loose what needs to be blown loose and let Me blow in what needs to be replaced." (52 Days prophetic word)

I'm supposedly through with this prayer and bible reading time. I am FAR from being done though. This has been an interesting time. I thought these 52 days would drag out, but here I am . . . done. I don't think I connected with everything that was intended, but I do know there have been incredible changes, not only in me personally, but in my sphere of influence.

We have had a major catastrophe in the southern United States that affects the whole country. Hurricane Katrina has left her strong imprint on my country. She has touched me emotionally, financially and socially. I am still working out how to live daily in the wake of her influence on my life.

My church family is in a major change mode. We have a month before we know what changes await us - a new pastor. The truth is that we really don't know if even then there will be a decision. It provides great opportunity for prayers to be made on behalf of who God would send to this congregation to pastor.

Then I have to ask if I am still connected to this congregation? I am continuing to read Leonard Sweet's book which is shaking my thinking about how to do "church" in the day we live in. The whole book is about how relationships thread through everything we encounter in life. Relationship is the key to knowing God. It's the key to fulfilled life on earth. It's the platform from which I can story the gospel. But . . .WHY is relationship so hard?? It's not that neat clean pulpit vs pew interaction. It takes work and time. Both of those things drain the life out of a person sometimes! I am coming to learn though, that the deep places that God calls out to in us can only be opened in the community of relationship. Communing with God is a community - God and me. At every level of my life it's about that relationship in and around community. So, how can I just leave a community - the one I call my church?

Maybe the relationships I have are still "community" because we are all a part of the body of Christ. (Listen . . . at this point, I'm asking questions and have no clue of the answers or who might - well . . . ok . . . God does.) Again, the history of my prodigal heart reveals the wasted extravagance of friendships I severed when someone decided they weren't attending my exclusive "community" called "church". It's been hard to look them in the face in the years following. These days though, they seem much more receiving of me and I of them. They wonder what I'm up to when I show up in unexpected places. Their first thought is "what are you doing here? Is something wrong?"

Yeah . . . I've been wrong. Just like Hurricane Katrina blew to smotherines everything in it's path, I am hearing that the Spirit of God wants to blow on me. "Let the blowing loose and blowing away occur so I can blow in you what you need. I will sustain you." I think it's time to hold the traditions just a little looser for the Spirit of God to blow the dead out and blow the new in. I see those images of the whole foundations blown out from under houses. Some houses stood, some collasped. His promise is that He will sustain me. My faith journey is leading me to risk the chance that the "blowing in" will be a continuation of the full destiny God has for me.