Lléname

It's already been a couple weeks since I shared Chapter One of my so-called "heart update".  I think it's time for round 2...

Today I'll simply share a prayer that I wrote back in March.  I think it summarizes well thoughts and struggles that are continually churning within me.

I've titled this post Lléname (Fill me), the refrain of a song that we sing in church here.   This term has reverberated through my thoughts and heart often since that first morning that I heard it used.

17 March 2013
God, I really sense that you are leading me through a breaking period.  I woke up this morning with a heavy heart once again, thinking through all that's been on my mind recently...and then I realized: this is part of me dying to myself (Luke 9:23/ Matthew 16:24/ Mark 8:34).  This is part of your work, God, stripping me of vain enjoyment and selfish pursuits.  This is the weight of reality...the reality that there IS cost in following you.  We are called to give up and surrender EVERYTHING to be your follower.  And the reality is that YOU ARE WORTHY OF THIS.  We aren't worthy to be called Your followers, Your worshipers, Your own children.  But you've made it possible.

Help me, Lord, to SURRENDER.  HELP ME, Lord, to be REFINED by the powerful FIRE of Your Holy Spirit.  Be faithful and powerful in your ongoing breaking, refocusing, and molding of Tim and I both!!!

It's painful.  Not fun.  The shattering and crashing of my vain and self-consumed heart as it comes into the atmosphere of the REALITY of your glory.  The reality of my existence in you and for you.  I'm not alive to have fun.  I'm not alive to be comfortable.  I'm not alive to establish a happy life and a self-fulfilling existence.  Lord God Almighty, I'm your follower, and my calling as such is to GIVE UP this world around me in order to pursue YOUR GLORY.  To LIVE for you.  Not just make mention of you.  Not just make occasional choices that honor you above myself.  Not to simply claim with the words of my mouth that I am yours and that I want to live for you.  As your work is churning within me and breaking my will and selfish pursuits, I must think:  Do I really want this?  This is what I've asked for...but am I willing to truly be broken and transformed?  Lord, by your grace and your power, YES.

I pray against complacency.  I pray against spiritual blindness and self-consumed, self-gratifying living. I pray against empty pursuits and empty living: against accepting the outfight LIES of the enemy...lies that life is about me and for my comfort, my fulfillment, my glory.

Keep churning.  Keep breaking.  May your heart-work in me be like a hurricane, wreaking havoc on my sinful, human pursuits and desires.  Do damage.  Make my human, sinful perspective unsalvageable.  FILL ME with your purpose, your pursuits, your power, your perspective.  Fill me with your prayers, your heart.  Just as your work will faithfully persevere in my heart all the way to perfect completion in you (Philippians 1:6), give me perseverance and faithfulness to SUBMIT to your work and PURSUE your glory (Philippians 3:12-14, Hebrews 12:1-2, Romans 5:2-5)!!!!  Help my enjoyment of and love for all other things in life to look/seem like HATE in comparison to how I'm drawn to you and how I love and pursue you (Luke 14:26).

Lléname.