The Real Awesome

Today I find myself in Auburn, AL. War Eagle. I'm thouroughly enjoying a week of vacation filled with beautiful Lake days, a Hillsong United concert, spending time with dearly loved people, and delicious shrimp & grits (which is tonight-- SO excited!). I am just so thankful. Does anyone else randomly get so overwelmed with gratitude for everything? I have that feeling right now. My heart literally feels like its overflowing and I can't stop thanking my beautiful Savior for EVERYTHING I have. It's all because of Him. Even the shrimp and grits!

I want to share something very cool with you today. It's from my Bible Study- Knowing God by Name. A couple days ago I read about El Gadol Ve-Nora, the Great and Awesome God. My understanding of the "fear of the Lord" has once again been enlightened. That phrase has always been a bit fuzzy to me, I guess because of all the manipulations or wrong teachings of scriptures that speak of fear. It is so much more! Have a listen:

"Those who KNOW fear have NO fear...
To know God is to know fear. The fear of God is a heart-pounding, knee-trembling spine-tingling, shuddering recognition that God is infinitely more good and powerful and important than me. It means that I live and think and act and speak with a keen awareness that He is the Creator and I am the creature; He is holy and I am not; He is wise and I am a fool; He is powerful and I am weak; He is Ruler and I am a servant; He is self-sufficient and I am utterly dependent.
To fear God means to be ever-aware of His all-pervasice presence, conscious of my absolute need for Him, mindful of my responsibility to follow His way, determined to obey Him, cautious of offending Him, and overwelmed in amazement and gratitude at His incredible goodness and grace.
Some people fear God because they suspect He is intent on hurting them. Theirs is a negative emotion, fraught with dread. This is not what the Bible means when it speaks of the fear of the Lord. We can only fear the Lord correctly when we understand that He is wondrously terrible yet at the same time wholly and completely good. When we do we are freed from every anxiety, and fearing Him becomes a delight."

...And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. Isaiah 11:3

I really enjoy when God so wants me to understand a certain point or subject that it will keep coming up in my life. For example, during my counseling appointment on Thursday, Dr. Q was teaching me about gladness and the difficulties we encounter when others don't share our joy. He drew a diagram of steps- the first was labeled "Disobedience", the second "Duty, the third "Desire", the last "Delight". He described how this applies to every relationship in our life, especially with God. We begin our journey with Him often saying "I don't want to," to certain things He may ask of us. Eventually we move on to "I need to," knowing that there is a certain way we must live and act if we bear His name. Next is usually the "I want to," and we begin to see the benefits and blessings of obedience and relationship with our Father. Finally, hopefully, we arrive at Delight-- "I can't wait to!" This is the place of ultimate surrender and love for Christ. We have experienced Him, and we know that He is the Life we need, and the only Life we could ever want. We cannot imagine turning away or forgetting Him. He has become our biggest Delight.

Then, on our way to the Lake on Friday, I was listening to Beth Moore's series "Delighting in Him." I had listened to the first cd a couple weeks ago, and knew it was going to get even better so I needed to finish the series. Well, yeah. God blew me away. And here is this DELIGHT thing again!

So now in this Bible Study, the woman is talking about making the fear of the Lord our delight. Do you think He wants me to get something? Ha, just a little!

My life verse has always been Psalm 37:4 "Delight yourself in the Lord & He'll give you the desires of your heart." I know it's kind of cliche-- many people have that one highlighted. But do we really understand those words? It's a promise, but it's a conditional promise. IF we delight in the Lord THEN He will give us what we desire... which will become Him, all of Him, nothing but Him. I will never forget when the revelation of that verse smacked me in the face and I repented of my ignorance and selfishness. I had wanted "stuff"-- a boyfriend, a new car, more money. How needy and obsurd we can be.

I will save the notes and pieces I got from Beth Moore for the next post. I'll really get goin on that!!

So stay tuned if you really want to hear some rantin' and ravin'. The good kind :)