Passion: An intense desire or enthusiasm for something

For too long now I’ve been missing something in my life… I haven’t been able to place a finger on exactly what has been missing. I’ve gone through the day to day motions – living as a machine, carrying out the motions, doing what is necessary to get the job done. Something was out of place, I just couldn’t place what that something was.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago as I was leaving a friends house – she had the word ‘Passion’ printed on her bulletin board. For some reason that word resonated with me.

Passion, as defined in English, has many meanings. It’s most commonly defined as “a strong and barely controllable emotion”. You can be passionate about collecting Hummel figurines or the music of The Beatles, you can share a passionate embrace with your spouse.

I believe my work should be my passion. I am blessed to work in the greatest institution ever created: the local church. Is the church, any church, perfect? Absolutely, positively not. To call any earthly institution – even one as great as the local church – perfect is an insult to the only perfection that this earth has ever seen: Jesus Christ. The church was begun by Christ but they are ran by man so they have the flaws held by everything man is involved in.

The local church is akin to a lobby: No one’s ultimate goal is to end up in the lobby… They enter the lobby to reach their ultimate destination. To find out how to get to there, to catch the elevator. The lobby is simply a passage to their final destination. The church is just another lobby – it exists to provide direction to people seeking the throne room of Christ – even if they’re not sure where or what, exactly, they’re looking for.

Why should I be passionate about my career? Because of the passion of Jesus. The word passion originates from the french (via latin) word “passio” – literally “suffering”. My passion should derive from the very same thing the word is derived from: the suffering of Christ that we might not receive our deserved reward: death and an eternity separated from God. Instead, because Christ was willing to suffer in our place we receive the reward reserved for Him: an eternity worshiping Father God in Heaven.

I should be passionate about introducing people to Christ, teaching them about Him and His passion. Planting the seeds that will be watered by the Holy Spirit. Perhaps seeing someone accept Christ as their Lord and Savior. I should be passionate because He is passion.

In a blog recently Scott Bourne (a photographer) challenged new photographers to stop waiting for that lens. To get out there and shoot with what you have – good photographs don’t come from the camera, they come from the eye and brain controlling that camera. I must confess I’ve been looking for that next lens. I’ve been lax and saying ‘maybe when I get X or Y’. I’ve already got the tools. I’ve got my experiences, the skills He has blessed me with. I’ve got the Passion of Jesus and the story of how His passion has affected me. Out of His passion should flow mine.

"When I heard this, I sat down and wept. I mourned for days, fasting and praying before the God-of-Heaven." Nehemiah 1:4, The Message

I've returned to my favorite spot between work and the house - again I've felt the need to blog and here is where I seem to do my best work.

After my last post my good friend Bo reached out to me and asked a simple question. 'Have you thought about fasting on this? Coincidentally (I don't believe in coincidence) I had been hearing that quiet voice in my mind telling me to fast for a long while. It is a voice I've been able to ignore before but with the weight of my friend (and the threat of his virtual backhand) I couldn't ignore it any longer. We agreed to a week long liquid only fast.

I was surprised how focused I became that week, how the trivial no longer mattered. I learned so much just by not eating and focusing that time on God- seeking his face and his will.

I learned several things. First that I don't have one stronghold in my life. I have several. Secondly I built those strongholds - they didn't magically appear in my life and they aren't going to magically disappear either.

The third, and the most powerful for me, is I need to stop asking God for what I want. I need to thank Him for what I have. So what - I'm lonely. I have parents who love me and aren't afraid to show their love. I have an earthly Dad who isn't afraid to hug his adult son. I have a Mom who calls me and shares the latest news with my niece and my sister. I have a sister and a niece who I love so much I have problems expressing it.

I'm surrounded by friends who are there for me. Friend who'll ask the simple question 'wanna fast?' and then they'll fast with me. I have friends who enjoy spending their time with me and aren't afraid to let me know when I'm being a jerk.

I can get out and enjoy His creation with a couple of plastic discs and 18 baskets to throw them at. I own a house for goodness sake. I am so blessed I now find it funny I have anything to complain about.

Now Nehemiah, he had something to complain about. His home city had been sacked and its wall and gate destroyed. His people were in distress. So what does he do? He mourns, fasts and prays.

How does he pray? He doesn't just whine and moan to God. He begins with praise - praising God for preserving His promise and loves His people. Then Nehemiah gets on his knees and confesses his sin... He apologizes for the sin of his people and begs God to forgive them.

After the praise and the confession, after, he reminds God of His promise and then, only then, does he go about setting things right with God by bringing his people back to Him. Nehemiah trusts in God to give him the strength and the wisdom to know how to restore his people to God's grace and favor.

After.

I had it backwards. First off I've got to praise His name. Praise the Most High. Then I've got to confess my sin - the lust and the pride, followed by reminding God of his word,

"Then the Lord God said, 'It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.'" Genesis 2:18, NASB

After that, after, I can ask for His will to be done. I can trust in Him and do what I know I've got to do as well as what He tells me to do, no matter how impossible it might seem.

I need to rebuild the gates of my heart and the walls of my mind. Walls and a Gate that I cannot build without His help and His love. Then it's all up to God. Whatever happens I will remember the blessings that He has showered me with.

I won't forget that without Him I'd have nothing.

I have a confession to make. It is a confession that I'm not comfortable making so, odds are, it is one that God wants me to make. I struggle with depression and loneliness. This struggle occupies a disproportionate amount of my thought and brings so much worry and stress with it that it's often almost overwhelming.

What do I do about it? Try and stay busy or waste a large amount of time reading, surfing the internet or daydreaming about my future mate.

I see others in happy, unhappy or even dissolving relationships and I want what they have. Yes, I'd even settle for the dissolving relationship because something has to have been there to dissolve - sometime in the life of those two people was a point where they cared about each other.

I don't covet others wives: I covet the fact that the love the bridge-groom shows to his bride is reflected back to them by the very one they shine their love on. The cyclical nature of this is an astonishing display of power.

Anyone who has ever heard audio feedback or stood between two mirrors understands this power and its immensity.

For audio feedback a signal is introduced into the system, it gets reproduced by the speaker system and re-enters the system via the same microphone it was originally produced on and is doubled and the loop continues - growing in power with each iteration. It grows in power exponentially until it is the strongest signal in the system and overwhelms everything else.

Likewise with standing between two mirrors. One mirror results in one reflection of yourself. Add another and there are suddenly an infinite number of you. An infinite amount of love. Love like someone standing between two mirrors. Reflected and strengthened by each reflection.

So what do I do if its God's will that I remain a bachelor all my life? I don't do a thing. God is the source of the infinity of reflections. I'm just one of those reflections. God is God, I am as nothing in comparison to His glory and infinite wisdom. If it is His will I only hope He reveals why someday. If He chooses to keep me in the dark? I can do nothing to change that. Maybe it's my 'Thorn in my flesh'.

The biggest fear in all of this is this: That it isn't God's will that I am lonely and alone - that it's my fault. I fear that the hooks of my sin have allowed the enemy to whisper in my ear: "you're not good enough", "who in their right mind would want a fat slob like you?" "The only way you'll ever have anyone is through your imagination", "Its just a picture - how can that hurt you?"

Yes, it is just a picture. It is the scattered image reflected back from a mirror that's been shattered: never the entire image, but bits and pieces of that image trying desperately to gain the power found in the whole, but failing miserably.

Though it will never be the entire image the jagged edges can still cut, still cause injury. I'm bleeding a death caused by a thousand of these cuts. Even though I no longer look at those images they fill my dreams, call to me through the memory of my sin.

They display to me their piece of the whole and promise the rest. It cuts me while I try to reassemble the shattered mirror. Meanwhile all I hear is "you're not good enough - you'll never be good enough. Why don't you just sit down and forget? Who needs the entirety of the image?"

Though I listen desperately - that's all I hear - Satan's voice whispering his lies. I want the feedback that is His still, small voice to overwhelm that signal, to drown out the whispers. The feedback of His love on me, filling me, driving the darkness away. My heart fears that my cries are lost in that darkness that surrounds me. My mirror is shattered and only He can make it whole.

My head knows that He hears my cries. I know that He loves me and cares for me. Now if only my head could convince my heart.

I'm in Atlanta tonight doing some Christmas shopping and generally enjoying myself. The trip is primarily fueled by a desire to go the the Ikea store... Love that store...

So anyway, as we were driving to the hotel I thought how pretty this city is. The lights are up for Christmas and everything sparkles and glitters. Our hotel has a great view of downtown Atlanta and it shines. This city is beautiful at night. During the day it's a different thing. The pretty lights are hidden in the branches of sleeping leafless trees, the streets don't look as clean and you can see how dingy all the windows really are.

Sin is like a city at night. It is pretty, shiny and sparkly. It is attractive and looks like something you'd like to be involved in. However, when it's brought into the light it's revealed for what it is: dirty, dingy and nasty. The light reveals the true nature of sin and it's not a attractive as it is in the dark.

This is why we must, absolutely must, bring sin into the light. Because it looks good in the dark. It's only in the light that we can see sin as it is and do the work of getting rid of it. When we're no longer distracted by the sparkly and shiny parts we can do the work, with God's help, of disassembling the hold sin has taken on our lives.

Next up: Sleep, breakfast and then Ikea!