The Unfinished Sculpture: A Work in Progress

And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. Philippians 1:6 

 I’m not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don’t get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I’ve got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I’m off and running, and I’m not turning back. Philippians 3:12-14 (MSG)

We will never arrive on this side of Heaven. As I’ve said before, God has placed within us an insatiable need for him, causing us to run after Him with greater fervor. It’s the reason we desire to be in the Word, and striving to live a life like Jesus on a day-to-day basis. It’s the reason for passion in the things we set out to do in life. 

Understanding that God looks upon us and sees us in our completeness is almost unfathomable at times.  God’s nature is to see us in our completed state of being, not the empty, broken vessels that we typically are. It’s amazing to think that He sets aside our flaws, failures, and shortcomings to see us as who He’s specifically created us to be. God doesn't see as man sees. Man sees the flesh. God sees the heart. He sees us already complete in Him. 

The things we are lacking, we already have in Christ. He simply asks us to walk in them-in complete forgiveness, complete righteousness, complete favor. And in the mean time, God keeps chiseling away at who we currently are...confident that we will become who He really sees in us. 

I love that in Lysa Terkeurst’s book, Unglued she paints a picture of our lives using Michelangelo’s statue of David: 

“Sources say that the artist [Michelangelo] never left his David. For more than two years he worked on and slept beside the six-ton slab of marble whose subject called to him from inside the unchiseled places. When at last the seventeen-foot David emerged, Michelangelo reported to have said, ‘It is easy. You just chip away the stone that doesn’t look like David.’” 

My prayer is that He’d chip away at the “stones," the things of life, that don’t resemble the ME He sees. He’s working on the hard places in order for you and I to come into the light of who He’s designed us to be. 

...and I’ll embrace the chiseling because it’s actually a beautiful thing. 

Everything is Made Beautiful in its Time

Thought of the day

In Ecclesiastes 3, the wisest man who ever lived, Solomon, expounds on the times and seasons of our lives and how they all fit together. Life is not some vague process of subtle, illogical patterns placed willy-nilly in our path for us to puzzle over. It's a composite of definitives: joys and sorrows, gains and losses, giving and keeping, laughing and grieving, loving and losing...on and on until the last day arrives. 

-Luci Swindoll 

A Time for Everything

3 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:

2 a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
3 a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
6 a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
7 a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8 a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.

The God-Given Task

11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. 

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Our lives will go through seasons-some great...others not so great, it's just a fact of life. But I've come to learn that what we do with these seasons truly matters to God. He allows us to walk through the rough to find the beautiful in it. The hardship that we endure causes us to draw closer to God, and in turn, rely on His strength. These seasons allow us to come to a place where we are feeding our souls. 

On Sunday, Pastor Russ spoke a message titled, "Come as a Child." He stated that Jesus never misses an opportunity to teach His children something, just as a parent does with a child. We all have an insatiable need for Jesus-a need for him to be present in our lives. I love the fact that in Ecclesiastes 3:11 it also teaches us that God has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. He's placed that insatiable desire in us so that we'd run after him every day. We'll never arrive on this side of Heaven. There's so much to know of God. His character. His love. His endless pursuit of us. 

Ecclesiastes 3:14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing can be taken from it. God does it so that men will revere him. 

In our seasons of victory and seasons of defeat, God has called us to revere Him. To regard Him with respect, honor, and awe. To cherish, treasure, and esteem His name. 

With that, the questions I asked myself this morning were these: "Am I embracing every aspect of every season God has for me? Do I see the good in it and the beautiful God will bring out of it? Or am I forgetting that God allows us the hard times to grow closer to Him, and ultimately so He gets the glory for it? My prayer is that I'd be a woman who reveres Christ, even through hardships. As Christians, we are called to live our lives set apart, that the rest of the world may see Jesus through us. 

-Reanna