For the Love of God

So what about the heart of a servant vs. the faith of a servant?

As you may know, I have been separated from my church for about a year and a half at this point (by medical necessity, not by choice). Since the separation was neither planned nor chosen, it took a long time for my heart to let go of the faith of a servant. I would read something, hear something, sing something, think something, and immediately give it away - start thinking about how it would hit wrapped in a certain message or how I might present it the next time I had a chance or who in my circle of faith might need to hear it and in what certain way. 

Habits die hard. 

But as the time has worn on, as life has kept me removed from a place of service, something started to shift. 

I don't remember now exactly what it was, but I was reading my Bible - as I do every morning - and for the first time in a very, very long time, a passage hit me that felt like it was hitting deep at my heart. Not at my heart for service. Not at my heart for someone else. Not as a good morsel meant to pass right through me and pour out. But as a message meant just for me. 

And I realized how long it had been since I'd felt that way in my soul. 

I realized how long it had been since I felt that "strange, warm" sensation that the disciples talked about on the road to Emmaus. I realized how long it had been since I felt like God would talk to me just for me. I realized that I had come to a place where I even had a relationship with God where I believed He loved me for my performance, for the things that I did, for the way that I did them. For doing a good job in service that helped to bring glory to His name. 

I realized it had been so very long a time since I had felt like God loved me. 

That moment changed everything. 

Once I hit that moment, I have invested my spiritual practice deliberately in knowing God's deep love for me again...and deepening my love for Him. Not in ministry. Not in performance. Not in service. Just in existing, in being, in being a being created in His image and indwelt by His Spirit. By knowing the breath that is moving in my lungs is His breath of life. 

I've missed that. 

And oh, how I need that kind of faith that doesn't just pour right through me but sticks to my bones and puts a little meat on my being. 

It doesn't mean I don't still have the heart of a servant. I do. And it doesn't mean that my servant's heart isn't driven by my faith. It is. But it means that I'm reclaiming my faith so that when things do pour through me, they're touched by the essence of something greater. 

It's one thing if Moses's face was glowing because He was simply reflecting the Light in whose presence he was standing; it's another thing entirely that His face was really glowing because that light was coming from inside of him. 

Let us have a faith that does not merely reflect, but radiate.