2020 - what has been, what will be.

I have seen people leaving the fields, and the ones that remain plant wiser.

Workers thin out, the few that remain plant. There is an easiness that is known. There is a readiness that comes.  With one heart and one mind there is no fighting, no questioning a shared depth of understanding.  Unified, they go out. Day after day focused hands to the ground, eyes fixed on the prize.

If the workers are few and the harvest great – the great few will endure.

The ones that have left stand at the edge – scoffing, questioning. The few that remain draw closer - compelled by a force stronger than their own. A quiet confidence rises in the mornings like a mist over fresh waters – each day as they plant, new hope, joy, peace is found, and shared.

It belongs to the land of the living. The people of the life – life eternal, life received and given. This field and this work has been set apart. The ground where you stand is holy – radiating with anticipation of what will be. Placed here in the beginning – and included your feet, your hands, your being. He saw you in this at the beginning.

Do not fear as the floods rise and the lands reap a harvest of war – He will remain. You were put here in His minds eye at the beginning – for such a time as this. Though they point and laugh and can have no hope to understand you will stand strong – like a tree planted by streams of fresh water you will not be moved. For the roots of the vine run deep and His branches produce the richest fruit of the land – sacred, holy.

Ask the hard questions. You cannot change the outside if you are not first willing to look in. Change is hard, honest, disassembling work. Take apart all that you know to be filled with what you will need for this next part of the journey. Do not fear – and do not forget what has been told of you. You will do greater things – things greater. Do not focus on the dirt before you, but raise your eyes to the place you found your first love; love first with a love not your own. “Remain in my love.”

2020 has been the year of change. The year of unrest – the year that has seen more pain and discomfort than one year should. Why are we uncomfortable in change, why does our heart crave peace? We were not made for this world - this is not our home. In the perfection and complete love that is, and one day will be – our being was made for more. The greatest history lesson ever told must be unearthed, and His created reminded of who they are – a resurrection of the chosen – an awakening of the few.

Isolation is a lie. It is a choice, the beginning of personal punishment, the mouth of a cave filled with torment and fear... waiting to swallow you whole, with no intention of release.

The lie isolates. It whispers that we are alone in our sin, alone in our torment and do not deserve to have others enter with us into our dark places; it speaks words of damnation to keep us ruined at the bottom of a pit where he hurls our worst belief systems at us.

If isolation is a choice. What is the alternative?

My default is isolation. If you looked closely at your own life, you might unearth the same dark truth. Is this true because it is easier? Because we fear being known? Because we are unaware that others might want to know our stuff, share in our stuff, and want to share theirs? Might it be part of this sin stuff that covers us here on earth?

Isolation does not trust, it fears, it hides, it destroys.

On the side that brings hope, gives light, extends grace, and covers a multitude of sins is Love. In all that isolation kills, Love breaths back to life. In all that isolation steals, Love willingly surrenders back. In all that isolation puts down, Love builds up. Isolation demands, Love invites. Isolation pushes, Love holds hands and walks beside.  Insert Jesus where love is.... and carry on.

How can Love become our default? In failure, in sin, in hidden places... to allow oneself to be loved, and not to isolate.

Trust. Whom? Ask. Why? Because the alternative is death. Spiritual, emotional, and eventually physical death. Many of you have walked that path already, as have I.

You will always be given the opportunity to isolate. Right now, a few minutes from now, tonight, tomorrow, next year...

Dare you choose to be loved? and love?