Roots

You know, so often I think that we get away from the fact that the Lord has put us here for HIS GLORY and HIS RENOWN, not our own.  I mean, this could possibly be just me, and that is just fine, but I am thinking that this may be something that all of us, as believers, deal with from time to time.  (I tend to deal with this more times than not!)  The Lord is so gracious to point this out to me though.  

This week has been a toughie for me...not sure why, other than I was not daily confessing where I was and, yet again, NOT TRUSTING the Lord with my present, past and future.  When I am not in a constant confession with the Lord, I am also usually not being obedient to where the Lord wants me.  I fight within myself to be this perfect little person and have everything right, before I feel like I can bring it before him.  This is some mixed up thinking that I have.... if you are reading this and you are not a believer, I would like to note that I this confession thing is not something to be looked at as a legalistic practice.  But, something that I am grateful for, because through mistakes and other sin issues that the Lord shows me, he allows his grace to cover.  For me, it is easy for me to begin the thinking of I have to do everything perfect before I can bring it before the Lord.  This is such wrong thinking.....and something I have been dealing with this week.  I have been processing a lot this week, which I do think is also from the Lord...but I still was not obedient this week in the way I was doing things.  I was looking to myself instead of the Lord and doing things to convey to myself that I was perhaps "in control" of my surrounding as well as everything that might happen in the future.  

Here lately the Lord has really been bringing me back to the passage in Jeremiah about being planted by the water....

"Thus says the Lord: Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes his flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord.  He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not seen any good to come.  He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land.  Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose TRUST IS THE LORD.  He like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.  The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick, who can understand it?"

Jeremiah 17:5-9

So, this may seem really silly, but I have been kind of in awe of trees lately.  I know...this may sound crazy; but hear me out.  Look at the biggest trees you can find.  They are strong, but not immune to decay.  They are usually thick in the trunk and a beautiful shade of green at the top when healthy.  When unhealthy, there can be branches that are dead, lifeless.  They must be cut off from the tree, because they are of no use.  I just think that this illustration in the Bible is a good way to look at our lives.  Are our roots founded in the land, or for us the Word of Life, and are we planted by the water?  What kind of tree would we look like, when we compare ourselves to the passage above?  

Another passage that I was actually looking at this morning, and was pointed to through my step-study at church was Hebrews 12:5-17:

"And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?  My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him.  For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son who whom he receives.  It is for discipline that you have to endure.  GOD IS TREATING YOU AS SONS.  For what son is there whom his father does not discipline?  If you are left without discipline in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and sons.  Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them.  Shall we not much more be subject to the Father or Spirits and live?  For they disciplines us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness.  For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.  Therefore, lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put to out of joint but rather be healed.  Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.  See to it that one one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no "root of bitterness" springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled; that no one is sexually immoral or unholy like Esau, who sold his birthright for a single meal.  For you know that afterward, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected for he found no chance to repent, though he sought it with tears."

So many times I think we look at discipline with a negative connotation, instead of looking at it as something will refine us and something that is done out of love.  I am challenged, encouraged and uplifted by this passage, because it makes me look at discipline in a way that I do not always think about it....

Just some things the Lord is really making me think on, and I wanted to share ;)  I love you all....