Oh God!

I read this and was stopped in my tracks. Jeremiah 22:16

“Is that not what it means to know me?” What? Where did that come from? How have in my 30+ years of following Jesus did I not see this before? Too consumed with Jeremiah 29:11 just a few chapters to the right, maybe?

I went through my Bible looking up Scripture that had to do with the poor, oppressed, widowed, orphaned and can I just tell you how ashamed I was (am) that most of them we not underlined. You see, I like to underline. Everything that is awesome and wonderful about the Word of God that inspires me and changes me and makes me feel amazing about being a Christ follower gets an underline.

Most of the passages I read concerning “the least of these” are naked in my Bible.

Naked and overlooked. 

Much like the people themselves. I am stooped low over this.

But, you see, I KNOW God! He’s changed me, He’s saved me, He’s loved me and kept me from falling to pieces. He’s blessed me and given me more than I can imagine!! Yes, all this is true, but in light of that verse…..

do I not know Him?

I’m wrestling with this. Don’t you know I know you Jesus? I know your voice. I know your heart. I know your breath. I swear I know you!

What I’ve come to begin to see, what I’ve come to begin to swallow is this:

What I do not know is his brokenness. 

I recently thought,

When you start praying like this, things start shifting. You start looking at life differently. The car we drive, the food we eat, the clothes we wear. They start to diminish, make you feel a little sick. They make me look down at my hands and wonder, “Who are you really serving?”

What are we doing? What am I doing? What am I not doing?

It’s time for those passages in my Bible that have nothing to do with me and everything to do with them to start having hard lines underneath them. Not only that, but I have to ask myself, “Will those lines move me to action, or will they simply be an underlined thought?” Will I pride myself in more pen in my Bible or will I risk having love and blood on my hands?

Will I risk more?

Will I give more so that someone else might live? Will I dare to run the risk of looking like a foolish American, giving up the “American Dream” so that someone else may have a chance to dream at all? Will I do things that make us less comfortable (which might mean, what? that we have to give up a meal out?)? Am I willing to even abandon what I think might be the road to “my” dreams so that I can see more clearly His road to His dream?

I think the answer to all of these must be Yes. If it’s not yes, then what am I doing? Who am I serving? Who do I really know?

This is messy right now. Please hold for more underlined passages, or more messy wanderings around what I call comfortable. It’s not so comfortable now, but then again, He never said it would be.