Soul Alignment

Here I sit on Sunday June 29th up at some friends lake house, its before 6am. The sun is breaking through the clouds, the bird’s voices are competing with one another, the breeze is light, and there is a bit of fog hovering over the still water. There is no sign of cell phones, not a sound of cars, and the lack of noise is deafening. There is something divine about this time of day.

I’m amazed at how much pondering and reviewing of my week I can do when there is stillness externally, stillness all around me. There seems to be some correlation with the state of my soul when there is stillness around me. It seems to soften, relax, and bring my soul to a calm place, a destination its been longing for.

I’ve heard it said before that “busyness is a disease”, and often times I feel this disease and see this disease all around me. This often drives within me the desire to move to another culture, or relocate to the wilderness of Alaska or something, perhaps a similar “into the wild” desire.

I’m also amazed at the lifestyle of Jesus, one who in his early thirties had grown to an incredibly popular status, while he didn’t have email and voicemails to return, he did have the constant pressure of people, the constant attention of people, and the pace of a culture trying to thrive within the Roman Empire. Yet Jesus lived out of a centered place.

When I think of the discipline of solitude, or all disciplines for that matter I think the word discipline within its self throws me off. I go back to places in my past of countless hours in the principles office, or receiving rightful discipline from my parents. Its taken me some time to get over the mere semantics of this gift, the gift of disciplines.

One of my closest friends in Axis is a welder and recently he was instructing me on the ins and outs of welding. He told me “the most critical element within welding is alignment. If you don’t line the piece up, then the finished product will be off. Some may not notice, but I would know so that’s why you do the meticulous work of making sure you have alignment first.”

This conversation has helped me see disciplines in a new light, they have opened me eyes to see that they are a gift and they do produce alignment within my soul. Disciplines are not the destination, however they are the vehicle that help me arrive at the destination, that being the presence of God; enjoying time and conversation with the Father.
Getting aligned vertically with the Father is key, it’s a necessity to live a life of love, to live a life of joy, to live a life on mission. It’s the key! To get aligned daily with the Father.

Its about 6:30, my coffee has turned cold, but my heart is burning. I feel so close to you Father, your presence is here, I breathe you in, I’m excited for the day and thankful that this morning you invited me to “lie down in green pastures”, and you lead me “beside still waters”.

How about you? Have you been able to sneak away today? Can you carve out time to be alone? Are you afraid of the silence?

Lets chat……

Lumen

About a year ago I came across a quote that says “surgery is never done in the dark”. As I thought about it I realized how often I try to fix myself; alone, perhaps passing myself the scalpel and bandaging wounds that don’t need bandaging, however really need to be cleaned out an examined by others. I am blown away at my tendency to hide.

I’ve been acknowledging the ever growing temptation to stuff and hold in the pain in my life, temptation I’m dealing with, or things that I’m afraid to bring to friends, because after all they need me to have my stuff together right? I’m seeing the gap between my theology and reality when it comes to the words of Jesus’ brother in James 5:16 that say “therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed”. I believe this is true in my head, but do I live this?

I’m amazed at how often I reduce the power of light, the power of bringing the light of Christ into the dark corners of my soul, into the dark corners of my life.

A lumen is defined as a unit of measure of the quantity of light. One lumen is the amount of light that falls on an area of one square foot. This word Lumen has been capturing me a bit and is driving me to examine the luminosity in my life, the luminosity in my soul.

How much light am I allowing into the dark corners of my soul, into the dark corners of my life?

How about you?

Maybe you don’t struggle with this, maybe its just me.

Does your Community really know you?

Do you have a couple friends that ask you really hard questions?

I’m praying that as a Community we continue to carve out time to sit with one another and share the difficult things, and confess our sins to one another. I pray that we would live out James words, and find that its actually true that when we crack open the door to the dark rooms in our soul the healing light of Christ’s love pours in through his redemptive community providing the healing he so desires for our souls.

Lets Chat……