It seems only fitting.  I begin this whole blogging thing one day and I am struck with a weight of humility that I hate knowing that I’m in such a position as to carry.  The lesson, I am to approach this God-given act with great humility.

I went to work on my lesson for tomorrow’s Bible class when I found myself stuck on the biblical location of a particular passage.  I did all my usually mind-searching, I attempted to search key words on my favorite Bible app, I looked through notes and memory verses.  Still don’t know where it is.  Frustrating.

I doubt myself.  I doubt my connection to the Father.  I doubt, I fume, I plead with the Lord.

I listen.

Humility.  It’s about humility.  In the wake of beginning a new venture for and with the Lord, I must approach the task with the utmost humility.  There is much that I don’t know, there is much to learn, there is much for which I must depend on Him and on others, there is so very much room to grow.

I don’t consider myself proud.  Who does. But I have certainly lived in the clutches of a plaguing sin area, pride in my humility. Strange combo, but my life clearly attests to it’s existence.  Pride of any sort must be laid aside.  If I am to serve, if I am to fellowship, if I am to lead, and teach, and write, and grow, pride must be laid aside.

Proverbs 11:2 – When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.

Proverbs 29:23 – Pride brings a person low, but the lowly in spirit gain honor.

High goals to strive for, wisdom and honor.

I am currently working on a lesson about what it means to be a priest as we are declared to be in I Peter 2:9.  One of the things that it means is that you will be used.  You will be used to teach, to lead, to intercede, to administer the Law, to encourage; in summary, you will be poured out in any way that your great God finds of advantage for the sake of His kingdom and the advancement of His glory. To be a priest means to give up all of your life and your desires, your plans and your agenda, your possessions and your dreams.  To lay them at the altar of the Lord of all Creation to be used as He sees fit.

To be a priest means to concede that you are merely an instrument in the hands of Someone great, being only a humble tool of His bidding.

And so we begin here, with an acknowledgment of our need to humbly approach whatever task He sets our hands to.  May I serve Him with profound humility today.

Pneuma.  Great word.  The Revelation of Jesus Christ that John recorded in the final book of God’s Word to us was given to him on this occasion — “on the Lord’s day, I was in the Spirit.”  That second phrase is the one word, pneuma.

Many years ago, I endeavored to study the Revelation.  It was God’s decision, not mine, I have to be honest on that.  I doubted and second guessed Him pretty ardently too.  I didn’t know a thing about it, but that only served to convince me that I wasn’t the one to get that ball rolling!  If my preacher wasn’t going to touch it with a ten foot pole, who was I to even make the attempt.

From the very beginning though, I knew, felt, sensed, had it confirmed to me that I was on the right path.  The first chapter of Revelation is quite beautiful.  He knows that it’s hard, so He makes sure-right from go-that we are made aware that it is worth it.

One line, well many actually, but the one that pertains to today’s thought, seemed to hover over the page as I picked through the beauty of God’s character expressed in those first verses.  It’s actually just after.  John tells us how all of this vision came to be, this revelation that the Lord imparted to him, revealed to him in advance of it’s coming to fruition.  John tells us the basic facts; I was here, it was this day, it happened like this. Then comes my word, pneuma.  In the Spirit.  The definition of this word according to Strong’s concordance is pretty lengthy.  English is quite limited as languages go, so this word doesn’t translate well, it misses a lot of the deep meaning.  Strong’s tries to clear it up for us.

Pneuma is “the element in man which gives him the ability to think of God. It is man’s vertical window.”

I am a nature girl.  I heard it recently said that music and nature are two of the more powerful stigmas that draw us into the presence of the Lord.  I get both, but nature just overwhelms me.  As I pondered this great revealing granted to this aging man who had walked with my Jesus, found himself loved deeply by Him, I found myself clearly visualizing him in this moment.

He was on the island of Patmos, not alone there, but exiled, not without provisions, but without his former life.  I’ve never seen it, but I have the picture more than clearly.  I see an old bearded man on a sandy beach staring out over the ocean that profoundly moves me.  He doesn’t sit, he doesn’t stand.

I like old windows.  I have the old windows from my first house over my sofa.  My wonderful husband had them restored for me and made into picture frames.  This is how I see our old disciple.  There is a window suspended from nowhere.  It hovers at just the right height amid the sandy beach.  And there relaxes John.  I picture him propped in the seal, looking a bit like Huck Finn.  He’s got one leg propped up on the seal and the other swinging freely below him, feet dragging in the sand.

There John met with his Maker.  He visited with his old friend.  He thought on his God.  He heard and saw and worshipped and communed.  I doubt that this was his first visit to that window.  I doubt that it was his last.

Like David, my greatest desire is to live my life in the sanctuary of my God, to enjoy the peace of His presence all the days of my life.  My greatest desire is to live out my days propped peacefully in my own vertical window, that place where my mind, spirit, soul, all of me is capable of thinking on that which isn’t visible but is indeed all that truly lasts.

God has graciously allowed me to set aside great amounts of time lately to do just this.  I believe that I am to do it for myself as well as others.  To those of you who would like to pull your window up next to mine, welcome.