Just be....

This is my latest challenge, I really don't know what this looks like. All my life I have struggled with significance, I have always wanted to know I am unique, that I have something special. But I have never thought that just me, alone am significant. This has manifested in a desire for leadership and position. I took a lot of pride in the fact that at age 24 I was a business owner. I did an awesome job of making my business look good, have a professional appearance. I designed a great logo, the sharpest looking business cards, professional invoicing, nice looking company vehicle. The list goes on and on.
I was also very involved in my hobby of radio control cars, there were no clubs in the area so I started one. I loved being the president, we got a great looking website and logo, started making appearances in various shows around town.
I don't think I am being conceited when I say I did a really great job of making things look really good.
These things were a reflection of what was going on inside of me. On the outside I was a really nice guy, tamed if you will. I was no threat to anybody and people inherently trusted me. But there was no substance.
With my business there was no way I could have even gotten it off the ground had it not been for the financial support of my parents. My Mom loaned me money that was to be used for supporting my family so that I could keep operating capital in the bank. I would often use money in my account to buy myself new toys, RC's, vintage toys for my collection, computer games or technological gadgets. All to satisfy my flesh. My Dad owned the building I had my company in and I shared space with him. There is no way, that had I needed to pay rent that my company could have survived five years.
My RC club did okay, I think mostly because nobody else wanted to start another. There was a lot of infighting in the club, a core group of 3 or 4 that worked hard so that the others could have fun. But eventually they burned out and started complaining why nobody else was helping. I had a few critics that used the anonymity of our club's website to take shots at me, something that cut me to my core. Eventually when the going got too tough I stepped down and let somebody else take to blows.
In both cases when the rubber met the road there was no substance. Its like had I written a book, it would be a 500 page novel with the best looking cover and the catchiest title. But the pages would be blank. Had I been a block of gold thrown into the smelter for the impurities to be burned away, there would have been nothing left. Jesus was speaking of me in Matthew 23:27 when he said "What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs—beautiful on the outside but filled on the inside with dead people’s bones and all sorts of impurity."
How do I learn to just be. To have the confidence that the way I am IS the way God me? That I am valuable without being able to offer you something. That I am important without a label or title. I can tell you right now, I don't know these things.

Matthew West - The Motions

This might hurt, it's not safe
But I know that I've gotta make a change
I don't care if I break,
At least I'll be feeling something
'Cause just okay is not enough
Help me fight through the nothingness of life

I don't wanna go through the motions
I don't wanna go one more day
without Your all consuming passion inside of me
I don't wanna spend my whole life asking,
"What if I had given everything,
instead of going through the motions?"

No regrets, not this time
I'm gonna let my heart defeat my mind
Let Your love make me whole
I think I'm finally feeling something
'Cause just okay is not enough
Help me fight through the nothingness of this life

'Cause I don't wanna go through the motions
I don't wanna go one more day
without Your all consuming passion inside of me
I don't wanna spend my whole life asking,
"What if I had given everything,
instead of going through the motions?"

take me all the way (take me all the way)
take me all the way ('cause I don't wanna go through the motions)
take me all the way (I know I'm finally feeling something real)
take me all the way

I don't wanna go through the motions
I don't wanna go one more day
without Your all consuming passion inside of me
I don't wanna spend my whole life asking,
"What if I had given everything,
instead of going through the motions?"

I don't wanna go through the motions
I don't wanna go one more day
without Your all consuming passion inside of me
I don't wanna spend my whole life asking,
"What if I had given everything,
instead of going through the motions?"

take me all the way (take me all the way)
take me all the way (I don't wanna go, I don't wanna go)
take me all the way (through the motions)
take me all the way

I don't wanna go through the motions

Cardboard Testimonies

Wow, all I can say is powerful.

Those Sneaky Agreements - John Eldredge

So, Stasi and I have been writing a book together for the past many months. (It’s on marriage). Through the holidays I was pretty much chained to the computer, trying to get it done by January 15. I took Christmas Eve and day off, and New Years day (which is my son Blaine’s birthday), but the rest of the time it was write, write, write. I felt like I barely saw the holidays.

Now, I love writing. Of all the things I do, I enjoy it the most and I think it might be where I shine best. But I noticed that my heart was getting heavy when I woke up in the morning; I found my energy to write had slipped away.

I was sitting at my desk, feeling blah. But instead of just muscling through the malaise, forcing myself to write, I stopped and asked God, “Lord, have I made some agreements here about this book?”

Bam.

Right away I could sense the Spirit revealing some things to me. “That dam# book” was one of them; not said in malice or cursing, but more in the spirit of resignation, “Well, I’ve got to get back to that dam# book.” Another agreement was, “I don’t really enjoy this.” A third was, “I don’t really like the subject of marriage; I wish I was writing on something else.” NONE of these were true. But they had snuck in, over time, and I had very subtly made an agreement with them.

Sneaky. Very sneaky.

Knowing how damaging agreements can be, knowing how they pin our hearts down and give the enemy a place to work in our lives, I stopped and broke them. Each of them. Out loud. “I do like this; I love writing. I do care about marriage; I reject that agreement” and so on.

The effect was almost instantaneous. In but a few moments, my heart was light, I was looking forward to the day, my inspiration for writing returned.

Take agreements seriously, dear friends. Ask God to reveal to you the ones you’ve been making. Sometimes the “revealing” will come when you make the agreement again, you catch yourself saying it out loud and you realize, “Wow – that’s an agreement.” Sometimes it’s something that plays “in your head,” in your thought life. Sometimes the Lord will speak to you what it is, or show you the topic you’ve got to look at. However it comes, he will show you.

Then, break them. It’ll do you a great good.

If

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!

--Rudyard Kipling