Be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.

For the past 6 days I have been meditating on the Sermon on the Mount. I felt led to just sit in it. It has been amazing. Each day God has revealed something new to me. He has shown me of Jesus’ authority, his intimacy, the new standard he set, and more.

Last night when I got to the part about salt and light, I was struck with the revelation of who Jesus was actually speaking to. When he said, “You are the light of the world,” he wasn’t speaking to me directly. He was sitting on a hill, facing a group of people. Those people included the sick, the poor, his disciples, and those destined to fail. Jesus looked them in the eyes and said:

You have a purpose

You are worth something

You will change this world

I can’t help but feel a range of emotions. I try to put myself in their position. I’ll bet they cleaned out their ears, whispered amongst themselves, then politely said, “Um, sir, can you please repeat that? We don’t think we heard you correctly.”

But they did.

Jesus looked among this group of lowly and saw what they were truly made for. They were there to reflect the glory of God. They were there to show others who God is.

It amazes me really. Jesus gave that group a whole new identity. I don’t think I give Jesus the opportunity to do that in my own life. I often pray that I may be found in him and that he will show me who I am. However, I fail to invite him in me to transform me. I don’t listen to him enough.

I am influenced by everything around me that tells me that I am not good enough. I always have to be better. I have to be thinner, I have to be more beautiful.

Jesus sees me differently.

He thinks I am perfect. He thinks I am beautiful. Nothing I can do will make him love me more or less. He is overwhelmingly for me, not against me. He is in love with you. You are perfect.

Jesus perfects us.

God looks at us and sees his son.

Why should we see ourselves any different?

Joy

I have been thinking a lot about joy today.
I started thinking about it during worship at church. We were singing Tear down the Walls by Hillsong and I felt led to read Deuteronomy 10. It talks about how we are called to live and who God is. . It's a wonderful passage. As I read it, I felt overwhelmed with joy. It was as if the more I read about who God is and let that fill me, the more excited and uplifted I felt.
Joy is not a feeling.
Joy is deep.
Joy is not uncertain.
Joy comes from complete trust.
I have joy in my life when I fully trust and surrender to my Father. When I slowly take my life back into my own hands, that's when I waver in my faith. Sometimes it seems completely crazy to 'surrender' my life to a spiritual entity that I have never seen. But honestly, I have found it safer that way. When I control my life, I crash. Every time. The times in my life when I have fully trusted God with my life were the safest times. Those times are marked unmistakably with joy.
This summer started off a little rocky for me. I let fear of what could happen dictate what did happen. I didn't trust God and I lost joy. God delights in us and wants us to experience the joy that comes from intimacy with him. I'm learning that daily. No matter what goes on in my life, there can be joy because, in the words of Moses, 'the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigners residing among you...He is your praise; he is your God, who performed for you those great and awesome wonders.'
God is love. God's word is truth. and from the truth comes certainty. and in that certainty is unwavering joy.
For this God is our God for ever and ever; he will be our guide even to the end. Ps 48:14

Revelation

This summer I am staying at Olivet. I am house sitting and I don't have a full time job. I will have lots of free time, and that scares me a bit. However, I have been learning. In my own straying from God, I have found myself in a desolate place. I don't want to be where I was a week ago. Sunday at church I felt the presence of God for the first time in a long time; I think for the first time in a long time I was open to experience God. It's not that he isn't there, it's that I am not opening my eyes and my heart.
A few weeks ago, I felt convicted because I know the spiritual gifts God has blessed me with, and I haven't been using them. For example, there have been times in my life where the voice of the Lord is so clear and he leads me to share words and visions with others. That hasn't happened recently. I haven't created a chance for it to happen. I haven't sat and prayed.
Earlier today I was reading "The Gallic Confession on the Canon of Scripture" written by the French in the 16th century. They name off all the book in the Bible that they consider canonical, or the Word of God. Then they said something that stopped me.

We know these books to be canonical, and the sure rule of our faith, not so much by the common accord and consent of the Church, as by the testimony and inward persuasion of the Holy Spirit, which enables us to distinguish them from other ecclesiastical books which, however useful, can never become the basis for any articles of faith

I think about how much of my faith is based on what other people say, or on what C.S. Lewis says, and it's no wonder I find myself so confused. The Holy Spirit gives us the ability to know truth. We can know the Bible to be the word of God because of the Holy Spirit. Am I looking for the Spirit's work in my life? Do I ask God to reveal truth to me? A lot of times the answer is no. Things shall change.