I am still having just the hardest time trying to figure out how to blog about my life lately. I just feel so unqualified to talk about God, and yet that is almost all that I think about.
I'm pretty sure that today I'm going to get back into Torii. I've been re reading it, and I really like it, but oh my goodness! It needs so much work.
In the meantime, this is something I've been mulling over-
Recently, I was reading the story where Jesus is walking on water and terrifies His guys, who are struggling against the storm in the boat.
And Peter, in a moment of courage, says, if it's really You, call me to come to You.
Christ says, Come ahead.
And Peter begins walking across the water to Him. But he looks away and sees the wind and the waves and his terror envelopes him.
It doesn't say, but maybe, in that moment, he can't think how he got there and the sheer impossibility of where he is swamps his human mind like the waves do his feet and then his knees as he sinks in.
He cried, Lord, save me.
And without hesitation, Christ grasps hold of his hand and pulls Peter out of the water.
"Faint-heart, what got into you?" is how the Message translates Christ's words to Peter. This translation makes me smile every time. It just seems such a fond and tender thing to say.
And it makes me think of this verse from the letter to those crazy Galatians:
"For [if we are] in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith activated and energized and expressed and working through love."
I like that phrase very much- faith expressed in love. It seems that was what Peter was expressing. By faith he walked over the water- but I'll bet he left the boat out of love. Anyway, that's why I would have left it.
Being in His presence is a little like walking on water. I can't see Him, but I know that He is there. If I look away from Him and focus on what I see around me, or what I am in my own strength, it's as though I begin to sink into that. I feel scared and overwhelmed.
Then I call out to Him and it turns out that Christ is right there. He was right there all along. He takes my hand and pulls me right up close to Him.
If we ask if we can come to Him, He will say, By all means, come here. We can come right up to Him; we can walk right over the water to Him.
Naturally, this causes me to love Him even more.
I like how John put it so simply: "We love Him, because first He loved us."
