desires

A Note from Laura Jones: New Year’s Revelation

/ laurajones / 5 Comments

For most of my life, I’ve avoided New Year’s Resolutions. I hate them. Who needs one more hampster wheel to burn out on, right? I certainly don’t need another way to fail.

However, the Lord’s been up to something new in me.  Since I’ve been in Jana’s class and John Dee’s class, they’ve taught me to ask for New Year’s Revelation: to ask the Lord to reveal Himself to me more, to show me the desires He put my heart, to give me His word over the coming year.

You know what’s amazing? He’ll actually answer.

For example, in 2008, I asked the Lord to give me a new song (Psalm 40:3). I meant metaphorically. All I wanted was a fresh start. But He took me literally! He gave me lyrics to six songs that year, each one verbalizing some of His love He’d been teaching me about. Love that gave me the fresh start I longed for.

In 2009, He pressed on my heart, “Be ready.” Didn’t even have a verse for that one. I had no idea what I was getting ready for. Just a sense that I was to prepare and be watching for what He had next, whatever that was. Sure enough, 2009 has been about weeding out. Setting boundaries. Learning about how He wired me. All things that have prepared me to walk through new doors that He’s opening like working with Women Getting Real and going back to school – things I was not ready for last year!

The fabulous thing about asking for New Year’s Revelation is it takes all the pressure off.  It’s not about performance.  It’s looking at Jesus and listening for His answer.  It’s reaching up to put my hand in His as He leads me through the New Year.

Why don’t we ask Him together? Ask Him to give you more of Himself. Ask Him to show you the desires He put in your heart and His desires for you. Ask Him to give you a word for the year. And as we have this dialog together, post back here when you hear His answer!
 
In His Love,
Laura

For the Sheer Pleasure. . .

/ Jana / 4 Comments

I was brewing on a question my friend asked me about writing a few months ago.  It surfaces in my thoughts every couple of weeks when I get a quiet moment. She asked, “Do you write for some teaching purpose or just because you enjoy it?” I still hate that question because I continue to look for the right answer, as if there is one.

But here is an even crazier question that God posed to me yesterday: “What do you do for the sheer pleasure of doing it?”

It really took me aback because like all good grown-ups, my to-do lists are filled with obligations, duties and responsibilities.

But for the pleasure of doing something? Not just fun or relaxing or worse, coping. But “pleasure.” Webster’s dictionary defines it as “fulfilling desire, gratification, pleasing in the utmost way.”  And then to make things worse, I thought of the passage out of Psalm 16 where it says that God has eternal pleasures in His right hand.

Does this mess with your mind like it does mine?  Not service. Not missions. Not work with purpose. Not should’s and ought’s.

But pleasures. Eternal pleasures.  Do you ever even think of the word “pleasure” and “God” in the same sentence?

So what do you do just for the pleasure of doing it?  I’ll get back to you later when I have an answer myself.

Let Earth Receive Her King – Part II

/ Jana / 1 Comment

In Part I, I told you about how my crazy husband got me so, so good with a surprise birthday party. I began explaining all that the Lord had revealed through this one event in my life.   Here is Part II.

My first lesson was that I can trust God with the desires of my heart.  But the second and perhaps more important lesson is: Do I know how to accept gifts from Him when He sets out to fulfill my desires? Through my birthday extravaganza, the Lord showed me that I don’t really know how to receive from Him.  Let me explain.

I told you that my instinct was to run away from the gathering of loving friends.  In the middle of the night, I went back to the Lord to ask Him why.  He explained that as long as Jana was giving to someone else, Jana was fine. But when someone wanted to give TO ME, then my hard drive went haywire. Somewhere in my God belief system, my programming was distorted.  I believed to the extreme that “it is better to give than to receive.”  So much so that I felt guilty, selfish, even sinful if I was ever given something.  Not from God, you understand, but from other people. When other people tried to bless me, I felt vulnerable, undeserving, lacking.  Do you hear that worth bell tolling?

To clarify, this scripture about giving is specifically geared toward stewarding money. Yet this verse had been manipulated into a theological equation that totaled: giving, giving, giving.  Only it didn’t quite add up.

You see, Jesus has his own doctrine:
Love one another.
Love your neighbor as you love yourself.
Love as I have loved you.

Somewhere in His doctrine there must be recipients.  Somewhere there is a giver AND receiver. Just look at Christmas.  Look at the gleeful children so ready, eager and waiting to Receive their Christmas gifts.  God Himself says: “Unto you a child is born, unto you a Son is given.” We have to Receive the Child that has been given to us. Receive the life He gives to us. How powerful now is the refrain, “Joy to the world. The Lord is come. Let earth receive her King.”

At my surprise birthday party, I was going through card after home-made card.  Reading scriptures, pictures and stories of how God had connected my life to others and how we had all been changed.  We were gifts to each other.  Gifts to be received.  This wasn’t a one way street. This wasn’t a benevolent, unconnected exchange.  This was flesh and blood interactions.  It was God’s life poured out through our lives, into my life.  It was Emmanuel.  God with us.  In us, through us, for us….

So revelation number 2: To really experience the Christ life is to Receive Him, His love and gifts — especially as they come through the hands of others….

Let Earth Receive Her King – Part I

/ Jana / 1 Comment

Joy to the World, the Lord is come.  Let earth receive her King.

I have had a phenomenal revelation this weekend in the unlikely form of a Surprise Birthday Party. My ever clever husband conspired with my children (what restraint!) to have me, completely clueless, walk in to a room full of loving friends saying, “Surprise!”  My first response was shock. I stood there open-mouthed, dumbfounded and speechless. Which is a RARE condition for me. But my next responses were of embarrassment and the desire to run away. So I just sat down at the table and cried.  Overwhelmed and undone.

It was a great, great night, with home-made cards and words of love and blessing. As I looked around the table, I kept shaking my head thinking, “I can’t believe all this is for me.”  My cup was indeed running over with thankfulness.

But at 3:30 in the morning, I had to get back up and process with the Lord. Why did I want to run away? Why was I so embarrassed? Why did I feel so guilty over being the recipient of such love and affection?

His answers were astounding.  As usual.  Over the next 24 hours, He began whispering truths into my heart.  Truths about desires, design and receiving His goodness.

So in this first of several blogs, let me give you some background. During the day on Saturday, I had been whining. I was really in a wad about my birthday plans or lack thereof (so I thought). Not one to be overly sentimental about my own birthday, I surprised myself and Chuck with shooting down his plans for our night out:

“No I don’t want to drive the kids out to my mom’s, then drive back west for dinner.”
“No, I don’t want to dress up.”
“We’re only going to Macaroni Grill because you like it.”
“This is stupid, it doesn’t matter, let’s just stay home with the kids and I’ll make dinner.”

Fortunately, Chuck had enough self control to NOT blurt out, “You need to get dressed because I am going to have a surprise party for you, and the kids have to go to your mom’s because all the other people to babysit will  be at YOUR party at Macaroni Grill!”  So glad he resisted that temptation.

But I was still whining. I went outside and told the Lord, “I am just really under attack. I don’t even know what’s wrong with me. Help me to just calm down and be thankful for whatever comes.” But the Lord very quietly asked me, “What do you want?” I said, “Nothing.”

And as soon as I said “nothing,” I wanted to laugh out loud. Because if I wanted “nothing” then what was the whining about? So I ‘fessed up that I wanted to have a heartfelt card from Chuck; that I wanted to feel special but didn’t want to have to ask for it.  That I just wanted to be loved on…. But instead of softening my heart, those thoughts hardened my  heart. I recalled past times of dashed hopes and disappointments. There was no cheese down that hole.

So I concluded my time with the Lord with a grown-up white knuckling version of “that stuff doesn’t matter, and I need to be thankful and not complain.”

How funny that the Lord already knew the desires of my heart, even the unspoken ones, and already had a plan that I knew Nothing about. And how funny that I was tormenting Chuck and all the while he was trying to bless me… How crazy that just hours later, I had the first surprise party of my life and handmade cards telling me how well loved I was. How funny, how crazy, how God….

So for today, I want to end with revelation number one: I can trust God with the desires of my heart. He has plans for me that I know Nothing about.  And, He loves surprises as much as I do….