from December, 2002

So tonight I was reading Psalm 40.

The most significant thing that i read:

"He lifted me from the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire.� He set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand.� He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord"�
Psalm 40:2-3

What does God want me to do in response?
-remember where I came from that - gross disgusting pit of sin and remember what gifts God's grace and salvation are that i don't have to go back there
-that my sinful ways are like slime and mud and mire, even now when i am clothed in the white pureness of His love...which makes them stand out more when i do sin
-He LIFTED me up to a BETTER place where I could STAND-a firm place- on the rock
-He put a new song in my mouth and i need to sing it all the time and not let other words come outta my mouth like gossip and cursing, deceitfulness, hate and self-glory. Just words that honour Him, not words that would make Him ashamed of me. -people are going to see and i guess have already seen all these changes in me and when I give the glory back to Him and name Him as my Saviour, they, not knowing what it's exactly all about (fearing) will put their trust in God and He'll lift them out too.
The best part is the first line...that is exactly how I feel about my rebirth...like His hand reached down into a dark pit for me specifically and kept lifting me even though i was hideous and dirty and disgusting...so me and the guy that wrote that psalm totally had something in common...that's cool to think about.

There is so much here to think about.� I wonder though, how long it'll take for this all to sweep through my everday life. Sometimes i feel like this stuff that i write and think about and feel so passionately about at this exact moment fades slightly by the morning when i wake up,so the way that i feel right now is just a vagueness...something that i can't quite nail down and start my day with. How do I pull it through? How do I let my "light so shine" when i feel like it is constantly flickering on and off?
Maybe it is something that comes with time and practice, but i don't WANT to wait. I feel like the longer i am a Christian here the more "experience" i get, the more "accustomed" i become,� the farther i am from that initial joy of my salvation.
I don't want to be like a lot of the others I see.
I don't want God to spit me out and call me lukewarm.�
1 Thess. 5:19 orders us "do not put out the Spirit's fire" but that is what i do. I throw a blanket over it when it suits me. I throw a bucket of water on it, watch it start to die and then rush back in and try to light it up again. So sporadic.
How do I deal with this?
I've been praying, but I guess it's a spiritual discipline thing. I feel like there is so much that i don't know.� My self-control button must be broken cuz i seem to have none lately, old habits are creeping around.� Not the stuff like alcohol or smoking or physical sins...but gossip and deceitfulness and taking offense, impatience.� That stuff is way harder for me to deal with because no one is forcing me, I am permitting myself. No one is offerring me a beer or taking me to the casino...i can deal with that.
Maybe the problem here is self-honesty and self-truth...