This post is what I hope to be the first of a series, chronicling the calling, doubts, joys, pains, victories, and heartaches of what God is doing in the hearts and lives of my brothers, sisters, and I who hunger for the glory of God in Plainview, Texas. I feel the urge to record these things at the relative outset of this journey (although God has been orchestrating these things from before the foundations of the earth), in order that transparent honesty be fostered, to portray the yearning hearts who hunger for Christ magnified in our small city, and the quest to find Him worshipped in it and through it. I write these things now so that, at the end of it, I could not look back and claim that I had it figured out, that I had planned or foreseen these things, or give any credit to a blasphemous notion that it was anything of my own devising that led to what, I pray, brings God great glory by lives transformed by the Spirit of God through Jesus Christ, and that these lives, set free by His Gospel, turn in overflow of thankfulness and affection for Christ, and raise their hands to Him and shout, “Worthy!”
Similar to our entrance into the MetaNarrative of God’s story, here in between the “Already” and the “Not Yet,” I begin this story in media res, with God having already done so many mighty things before this writing. As a testimony of nothing more than a man born blind who was given sight by this one they call Jesus, I will obviously be limited to my very finite perspective; ergo, if I assume wrongly of anyone in word or deed, I apologize and ask for grace. I can only avow to the things that I have seen, and can only come claiming to know one thing: Christ, and Him crucified. In that heart, I begin this record with the aim of God’s glory, my humbling and sanctification, and as a witness to the grandeur and fame of the living God, who has done and can do mighty things in Plainview.
Enter a young man, born into a loving, believing family. As a boy, I lived with a heart of inferiority and a lack of a sense of belonging; for instance, I was born into a family of athletes that, from my perspective, seemed to experience so much joy and connection through such games. Born with severe asthma, I simply couldn’t keep up: I was born with weaknesses not found in my siblings or friends. From this, I always felt less-than and perceived myself to be a disappointment to my parents, though I can point to nothing in my life to ever give me that notion. In response to this, my wicked heart sought out my other giftings, which were not as present in my siblings and friends, and I set my hands to construct them into a temple in which I could worship my greatest idol: me. I began to polish and hone my sharp tongue, wit, humor, and insight to become instruments with which to hack and hew at everyone I knew in a destructive effort to reduce everyone else to the feeling of worthlessness that I felt. Over two decades of life, these gifts in me began to become my identity and god, because without them, I was left with only the weight of the boulder of worthlessness that loomed just overhead. I hurt so many people, was so bitter and spiteful, so proud and so full of gall, and to this day, my inner heart still yearns to erect these idols once more.
Then one day in a small lodge in the Colorado Rockies, the One I had heard stories of all my life, whispered a message that He has had to daily speak again ever since: “You have nothing to offer Me, nothing by which to earn My attention or affection – but I have everything to offer you. I have come to adopt you, not to hire you. I have come to make you not My employee, but My son.” The boulder of worthlessness fell that day, but fell to become a bedrock and a foundation, fell to become the only platform from which I could rightfully receive that adoption into sonship; because, only founded on the realization that I could not merit His approval and estimation were my hands freed to take hold of His, to be lifted up rather than struggling to clamber up His mountain. This was spit and dirt, a hand on my eyes, and my life since has been one of becoming accustomed to sight.
In June of 2002, I was welcomed into the King’s family, adopted as one of His sons. In December of 2002, I was welcomed to join His sons and daughters as He sent them out in the ministry of reconciliation, to announce that He is redeeming everything back to Himself and His Kingdom. This took the form of a small, languishing group of people, divided and arguing about how to get more people through the front door. And they call it “ekklesia” – the Church.
To be continued…
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