Skype date with Christy

There has to be both a recognition of who we are, and who we are in Christ. The balance of both truths produce praise; for we in and of ourselves are sinful, and only when we see who we are in Christ do we comprehend His grace! It is through His grace that we no longer think our righteousness or good deeds to be sufficient, but that we recognize His righteousness as our righteous standing! Praise God!

I feel like there has been so much that the Lord has been teaching me lately. I've gotten to read some great books, and through the Word, conversations, and homegroup, there has been an abundance of information that I don't think I have processed. Whenever my friend Christy and I get a change to sit and talk, it is just amazing how the Lord speaks to us and brings understanding as get to share these things He has been revealing! We speak a lot through analogies, and like my other dear friend Lili, the Lord has been so faithful to bring similar experience to bring wisdom and light on our conversations.

I have to share just a piece of this goodness with you! So I recently got done reading this George Mueller book, and as we all know him as a man of faith or prayer, it brought more meditation on these two things. Like faith for example- it's something we all would love to grow in, but we know when we pray for it that we're also given an opportunity to use it... which usually leads to less prayers asking for that. So to obtain greater amounts of faith, we must exercise it in whatever small area now. I started to look at this as a muscle. I use to be in track, and when I was in shape, running wasn't so much a difficult thing to do as much as it was a discipline thing to continue in. Now that I don't run consistently, running sounds like a great thing... but also something that seems far from my priorities. Faith is that same thing. Although it is a spiritual muscle, it requires the same continual discipline.

I have been thinking about how strong my physical man is. I've been getting pretty strong. Not necessarily in muscle, but in dependence upon my own strength. I know the things that I can do on my own, and although I would like to think I'm being dependent upon the Lord, I realize I'm not when it comes down to the things that are unknown to me. He has been stretching my dependency muscle, and He is calling me to trust Him with the baby things and the grande things. It really is breaking to see how easy in our flesh we can fall to depend on the things we know. Oh but how sweet in this lifetime to be able to experience a deeper dependency upon the Lord and see His goodness on earth deeper and deeper before seeing it in the fullness of face-to-face!

As faith grows, so too does our understanding of our fallen state and our righteous standing before God because, and only because of the blood of Jesus! Praying now for a deeper understanding of Jesus' blood over you and over all who might read!