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Friday, June 24, 2011

Play

We as Christians are always asking God to reveal more of himself to us and give us a greater understanding of who he is.  We ask basically the same thing through prayer and the songs we sing, and we are taught about knowing more of God from people who "know more" than we do.  Well, during morning worship the other day, I asked God to give me a better understanding of who he is and what that means for our relationship.  The next day he gave me an answer.  Here is that answer.

It was 8:30am and people were finishing breakfast and gathering for morning worship as usual.  It was still a bit chilly so we were outside the main entrance of the main center and I stood near my usual spot on the edge of the main circle of people in a patch of warm sunlight. I had had a couple simple thoughts rolling around my head for the last few minutes but now that I was taking time to be quiet and focus on God, these thoughts were amplified until they took up my entire focus and I didn't want to break my train of thought by singing with everyone else. I had simply been reminded somehow about how a Christ follower is called a friend of God (Isaiah 41:8, John 15:15) and I couldn't stop meditating on that thought.  It wasn't a new thought to me, but I'm pretty sure that God wanted to unpack it and make me look at it again more closely.

I thought about what my friends and I did when we were kids.  We would go fishing, explore in the woods, ride our bikes, build tree forts, play football, build things with Legos and destroy them, and a multitude of other insanely fun activities. What if my friendship with Jesus was like that? What if every morning, as soon as I woke up, I would run over to his house as fast as I could and bang on his door to ask, "Can Jesus come out to play?"  Of course he would smile real big and say, "I was hoping you would come over today." Then we would go out and have more fun than I could possibly imagine. Every day would be a new exciting adventure. Jesus would always know where we should go for the best fishing, where to find the coolest new discoveries as we explored, and he would always know how to make every new day the best day of my life.

As I thought about all of this, I couldn't control myself.  All I could do under this enormously simple and intimate thought was just stand there, perfectly still in the morning sun, in my red Carhartt sweatshirt with the hood up and my head down and let my tears make mud of the Zambian dust as they rolled off my face.  I couldn't sing, I couldn't dance, all I could do for the next 30 minutes was just be there and joyfully weep as I thought over and over again of how much fun it would be to just go play.

Be encouraged, dear reader, by your friendship with Christ. If you have chosen to give your life to Jesus and be his disciple, then you are his friend and he lives with you and in you. He is the friend that sticks closer than a brother (Proverbs 18:24) and he likes you and enjoys your presence. So, knock on the door to your heart and ask Jesus to come out and play. You'll have so much fun.  It'll be the best day of your life.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Pete.
This was such a blessing to me.
Thank you for taking the time to write this and for knowing that the stories of the crazy beautiful things God does in our lives are absolutely meant to me shared, as they continue to do crazy beautiful things in others lives.
Best,
Emily Hindman

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