Consistent Freedom and Progress

I have been thinking about the following things for a couple of weeks now:

How do I consistently make good choices? How do I systematically choose what is right for me and those around me? What is my disposition to be like? How do I cater to God and His will for my life on an daily/hourly/minute-by-minute basis? How do I cater to the Church and how can I see my purpose be consistently fulfilled?

And I realized that these questions have plagued me for a very very long time. I cannot tell you how many times I have made agreements with myself and God. I have made vows I have not kept. I have made dramatic decisions and have come up with dramatic resolutions. I have tried my best to keep my life and my decisions under control. I have done this with every habit, every inclination and desire of my heart.

This has happened with everything that has taken too much of my time, or my energy or my well-being. I have abandoned things dramatically and then I have committed to something new. I would commit to other things consistently, and then I would feel bad for breaking the rules I placed over myself. I would delve into self-condemnation for not being able to keep my word.

I have gone back and forth between having incredibly strict schedules to being way way too loose. I have tormented myself far too often. At times, It was God who told me I could no longer jump into those dramatic commitments. At other times, He insisted on having me keep the vows I made Him -because God is serious about vows. I was 29 years old and I still had no direction in what could possibly be a solution. That is until I began to be discipled by Torrey Marcel Harper.

If you know anything about my pastor, you will know that he rides the waves of the Lord. He goes where Holy Spirit leads Him in whichever way, shape or form; at whatever time. He simply... goes. It is so simple it boggles the mind of many of us who have operated under a religious spirit and who have allowed control to rule over our lives. The concept is simple yet the execution is a lot more complex. I have struggled with it over and over again. I let God have His way and then I work extra hard to keep it the way He commanded it the last time He spoke. It is sometimes as if I was leading a double life. I let Him have His way, and then I have it my way by living life out of the last thing He said.

God is always moving. He never changes. But His strategies are different. Every battle the people of Israel won were conquered by a divine new strategy released from the heavens. Every time they went into battle the strategy was different. Do you ever wonder why God doesn't do things in the exact same way again and again? I know why. Firstly, He is all too great to be reduced to one manifestation. Second, if He always worked the way we expect, then we would be god. We would be the ones commanding Him to work because we followed the recipe.

So if God is always moving, and there is always a strategy for everything He is doing in our lives, then what is God's strategy for me today? What will He have me do and how will He have me move? Would I be okay with starting my day going for a run and letting Him speak to me through it? What if He wanted the day to be started with worship? What if it was prayer? What if He placed the spirit of intercession to be with me all day? There is something about riding the waves of the Lord and being perfectly safe there. Some of us are not completely ignorant to this. But some of us also know that we only use this for ministry. We don't focus on carrying the glory the Lord, and to truly be glory carriers, we need to ride the waves 24/7. We need to ride them at work, at church, at home and everywhere. We need to ride the waves of the Lord anytime and anywhere. That is our true security and safety.

So I can no longer make big dramatic decisions. I am not in control. I am not my own. I need to make mostly small obedient decisions. I need to make decisions that are good for me. I need to choose to write when the Spirit leads, read when the Spirit leads, spend time with my loved ones when and how the Spirit leads. But for the most part, we have used this expression quite flippantly. We talk about the Spirit leading as if He only leads sometimes and in specific ways. The Spirit could actually lead the entire time, if we wouldn't insist on leading ourselves- like we usually do.

Most of the greatest things that have every been built have been erected by people who made really great, small, consistent decisions. They were not built dramatically and quick. Dramatic and quick doesn't work. Dramatic and quick doesn't last. Dramatic and quick is the house built on the sand. But when we take our time, and we let our Great Artist lead the creative process, the most majestic work of art is created. And guess what? We take none of the glory. We don't even know or understand what He is doing until we see the finished process. And it is amazing, mind-blowing and provoking in more ways than one.

Who's going to hold the brush of your life from now on? Who will choose the colors? Let Him do it in His timing and His way. The greatest work you have ever seen is in process. Will you say yes to the Great Artist and His creative process?

"The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” John 3:8 ESV