When God Answers [Not So Ideally] “Here I am! Send me!”

And I wanted to tote around my this-goes-straight-to-God megaphone screaming, “Here I am! Send me!”

I thought I would be carrying it across oceans right now, into the soils of Southeast Asia or South America. I thought I would be singing the name of Jesus in Khmer, writing his name in the sands along the Gulf of Tonkin.

What do you do when the God of the Universe says “Stay where you are?”

What do you do when everything in you wants to tell the God of the Universe he is wrong? That you were created to go, and go now, for goodness’ sake!

What do you do when you have stayed where he told you, and the grumbling obedience suddenly became a quicksand of “I’m stuck!” and all of a sudden two months have passed and just maybe you haven’t meant a word of your prayers or praise?

What do you do when you turn around and realize you can no longer feel the weight of the Holy Dove on your shoulder that was just months ago your best companion?

How do you say sorry to the God of the Universe when you have—for weeks now—grumbled and complained about being stuck in a prayer room to worship him and be with him? How do you say “but I had these dreams God” when—for weeks now—you have hardly given a second thought to the very places you were sure you’d be in by now?

And then there’s the hiding. Trying to pull the two pieces of temple curtain back together out of fear—the very temple curtain he ripped like his body to get to your heart—and all you can think is how it just couldn’t be possible for him to bear the weight of disappointment if he saw you and all your shame-shadows now?

What do you do when the very gospel rhythm you’ve been dying to march forward to actually looks something like lying low and learning to listen for once?

And his command to me? Stay. Abide, won’t you? And I think, if I can’t learn to lean into him here, I won’t lean into him anywhere. And I think, maybe the battle ground is fiercer here because I have to fight through my totalitarian independence in order to win dependence on Him.

How do you “give up everything and go” when going actually means staying, [even if for a season, and seasons always feel like the weight of forever,] and giving up everything means… releasing all the ideas that I’m carrying around like they’re more important than God’s? Choosing to stop for the rich man who demands he is entitled to receive the very stars in the sky and still stooping to wash his feet through the tears of obedience?

And here I am, mesmerized by the Gethsemane prayer of Jesus, contending for “unity in the church,” having no idea how or who or where or why but maybe somehow yes, because Father is hearing Jesus ask for it always. But when have the steps towards unity every been glamorous? When there are hands pulling at the flesh of Jesus and ripping him apart all over again so certain pieces of him fit in our individual God-box sanctuaries? When the older generations are swinging axes at the head of every young person who must be the sole cause of all immorality on the planet? And so many young people are marching to the rhythm of me [aren’t we?] Aren’t we all just trying to figure out what the heck is truth anyway in this everything-is-relative-so-just-stop-trying world? Aren’t we all in need of a grace that burns deep? That burns at all? Grace that actually has the power to stir up a genuine “yes!” in the deepest heart of the rich man? Of me?

And the very grace that is stubborn enough to pry my eyes open to the Light again illuminates the very glory of God I was blinded to. And my heart beats fast and my eyes can’t blink because I know my very purpose and radical destiny is to really truly behold his glory, to know Him. That’s it. That’s everything. And it’s too much for me.

So I’m here, undone, unraveled, with all these desires to be radical and awesome and foreign spun away. I am the dizzy clay, spun bare. I am bare. Papa God cloaking my ashamed-and-naked spirit body with grace, with patience, with new eyes and a whole lot fewer expectations of what “radical” looks like.

My life is becoming an adventure to grasp hold of and utter the word “Yes.”

And the way I will release my ‘yes’ is different than the way Mother Teresa or Katie Davis or Heidi Baker say yes. I am adding a wholly unique set of fingerprints to the shining white flag of surrender. I am laying down wholly unique dreams and desires and words and feelings, trusting that they will be picked up and carried into glory by the very fingers of Father himself.

The yes in me was created for glory. The yes in me is an echo back to the One who said YES to me first. He said YES to me. He said yes, I love you. Yes, I desire you. Yes, you’re beautiful. Yes, I’ll never leave. Yes, I’ll really never leave.

The royal cloak he gives me is not a heavy one. Every lie [you’re not doing enough,] every doubt [He’s not going to provide for you,] every discouragement [you’re just wasting your time,] evaporates as soon as I see His glowing yes before me. Yes means Jesus. Yes means me. Yes means we’re back in the Garden. Yes means we’re one step closer to Home.

Yes means making a choice. Yes means choosing with clarity. Yes means belief in Him. Yes means faith in his faithfulness. Yes means the very anchor of hope has indeed been wedged into the under-ocean floor of my soul.

Yes means “Here am I! Send me.” Send me deeper into radical abandon, radical grace, radical love. It’s where I was created to be.