Are You Engaged?

  Papa is good about taking the things in my day to day life and allowing them to speak to me of a magnificent truth.  I love that about Him.  Life doesn’t have to be complicated, hearing Him can be so simple, if I will but take the time to listen and observe.  Today He’s talking to me about my coffee warmer, which actually belongs to my husband.  It sits by my side of the bed most of the time, though.  I use it to keep my tea warm while I sit with Papa and contemplate life. 

       He reminds me of the day I went to take a sip of my “expectant” warmed tea to find it dreadfully cold.  Could it be that my precious mug warmer had seen it’s final day?  A quick assessment caused me to find that the plug was in the extension cord, but not fully engaged.  Though it looked plugged in, it had broken loose from the power.  A little jostling around with the prongs into the cord caused it to once again engage and begin to slowly warm my tea.

      I am amazed at what Papa shows me, at just the right moment, about this picture for my life.  How often am I hooked up to the power source, but not fully engaged?  To the outside it looks like everything is intact, yet life is lukewarm and sometimes dreadfully cold.  It feels like something inside has died.   Somehow I’ve become disengaged from the source of power, limiting it's affects in my life.

      How often do we go through life, plugged in but not engaged?  How easy it is to be tugged just enough to become disengaged and distracted from living life to the full.  How easy it is to unplug and just exist.  When life grows cold we wonder why.  We’re not even aware that we have disconnected, after all we are still attached to the cord. 

      Maybe we choose not to fully engage.  Maybe we like having a little control and self-preservation.  Maybe we hold back from being fully connected for fear of what it might cost us.  If we can just hold people at a level where the appearance is intimate, yet disengage just enough to be safe, then maybe it will be enough.  Maybe no one will notice.  It's not enough.  It leaves life dreadfully cold.  We were meant to be engaged fully in relationship with Papa and with others.  When we're not, life is not as it was meant to be.

      The source of life indwells us.  We house the seed of life, we are the temple, the dwelling of Christ, yet life can can seem so stagnant, empty, lifeless, and cold.  To bear the life of Christ we cannot just be hooked up, we have to be engaged.  Self-preservation keeps part of us withheld under our control.  He doesn’t want part of our hearts.  He wants it all.  He wants us to risk in love, to interlock fully, in order to find that life to the full that He promises us, with Himself and with others.

      Papa asks me, “Jewel, will you engage yourself, all of you, with me?” “Will you set aside all control, all self-protection, independence, performance  and need me?”  “Draw your power from me, not your capabilities.”  “Don’t hold anything back, Jewel.”  “I want it all.”  “It’s then my power will course through you.”  “It’s then you will be alive, fully alive.”  "It's then you will know love, complete, perfect love."  "If you hold back with others, Jewel, you'll rob them, you'll rob yourself and you'll rob me."  Life will never be full."  "Because I bear love through you to others and with others to you."  "There's no need for self-preservation, I've got you."  "Will you trust me to preserve you?"

      A simple cup warmer speaks Papa's heart to me.  He's speaking to you too.  Do you hear Him?  Look around you and consider, what's Papa asking you?

      9But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. 

   10That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Jewelz

©copyrighted 2008 by Julie L. Todd