Just Give me JESUS!!

That is all I WANT, JESUS!! I am not looking for an easy life, or the desires of my heart, or even to have blessings come my way... JUST GIVE ME JESUS!

I have been trying to read "The Pressure's Off" by Larry Crabb. I say trying because I have been attempting to pick it up since about Christmas... but, in light of all that is and has been happening in my life this year there seems to be no time.

However, I am making the time to read it. If this is the only book I get read this summer I will feel like I have accomplished a lot.
*though I must make a note here to say that I have read a lot of text book material and articles this year, as well as my quiet time, so I am reading! I am just not reading like I really like to. But then it is ALWAYS GOD's Perfect Timing when I finally do pick up and begin to read.

My prayers before finally picking the book up to read have been that I could have More of JESUS, that's all period. As well as, prayers about Trusting HIM more and being myself again (which I haven't felt like I have been in a long time... feel like I have been pretending and afraid. That I have been walking in fear, as well as pain and hurt of the past).

Anyways, I pick up the book and those things are what Crabb is writing about. He talks about an old way and a new way of living. He states it best when he states that there are two difficulties:

One, it requires us to yield control over what happens in our lives and to trust God to do whatever He thinks best. Regular quiet times and fervent prayer do not guarantee the cancer won't come back; neither do they ensure expanded and effective ministry. We prefer to claim influence,if not control, over which blessings come our way.

Two, it's harder to enjoy God than His blessings. Offer a young child the choice of having Daddy present Christmas morning with no gifts or having Daddy absent and a stack of gifts piled high beneath the tree, and the child might choose the gifts. Only the mature value the blessing of presence over the blessing of presents.

Hmmm... valuing the blessing of presence over the blessing of presents... That soooo stuck out to me because that is where my heart has been lately. Sure I'd love to have some things happen in my life, but truthfully I'd rather have HIS Presence than any Presents, so to speak, that HE could give. Again.... JUST GIVE ME JESUS!

I find that lately in the past few years I have not been living as fully or abundantly as I had at the beginning of my thirties. I find myself living the old way that Crabb is talking about, consumed with my desire to feel alive, not be bored, but to be in a passionate, adventure seeking experience. I then get tired from the effort of making it exciting that I need to find relief in HIM. I think I have been walking down the path wanting the presents, along with the presence. But my heart wants more of JESUS!

Then I get to the part about not being me and walking in my fear, not Trusting GOD. Larry Crabb used an example of an apple that brought my thoughts more into prospective. He writes:

I've viewed myself as a shiny red apple sitting in a fruit bowl positioned on the center of a dining-room table. Look at me from a distance and you'll be drawn. The apple is big, there are no visible bruises, and it's well shaped. Come a little closer- read a book I've written, attend a seminar I'm leading, listen to me teach the Bible- and your impression that the apple is good fruit might be strengthened. You may want to pick it up and take a bite... Have a conversation with me, come to me for spiritual direction, join a small group with me, combine your gifts with mine to develop a ministry- and you might conclude that indeed I'm the juicy, substantial, sweet-tasting apple I appear to be. But I know. I know what you don't know and what I'm determined to never let you discover. There's a worm in the center. A few more bites and you will spit me out. I must keep you from moving too close. To know me much is to like me. To know me fully will reveal how disgusting I really am.... I can buff the apple till it shines and convince you that no worm could possibly live in such a good-looking piece of fruit.

For most of my thirties I haven't minded being fully know... so what happened when I went to Korea, as well as my return? This really hit me that I haven't been me... Kimie is not afraid to let the worm be seen inside the good fruit, but I have been afraid to be me. Afraid that if I was really seen it would be yucky and ugly. This has been so true since meeting someone very special to me. I don't know why he has stayed around, because I sure as heck haven't given him any chances to see the Kimie that I Know GOD has created me to be and that I am. And in the process of walking in that fear I haven't even given him a glimpse of a shiny, juicy, good-looking apple on the outside... so how the heck can I let the one person right now that I want to know me, really know me and see me?

The only way to truly get there is to Trust GOD and JUST GIVE ME JESUS!! Let me put it this way by using more of Crabb's words, yet changing a word to fit me right now.

Who am I? Am I the moral weakling I so often know myself to be, full of pride and fear? Or am I the woman of GOD I long to be, centered in the Person of CHRIST and empowered by the Spirit to reveal HIS Glory through my life?

Again, let me add that it still amazes me that GOD brings me to a book that adds to my own thoughts at the moment. It is like HE is speaking through the words right to my heart and then it feels like a hug from HIM as well. Thank you GOD for loving me that much.HE knows that I want more of HIM and that I want to be centered in HIM in order that HE may be revealed and Glorified through my life. JUST GIVE ME JESUS!

Here is something else from the book that made me think. Crabb stated that: We live near a three-headed dragon. The world is around us, the devil prowls toward us, and the flesh lies within us. When this dragon roars, it doesn't always sound like a volcano erupting. It can seem more like a friend dropping in for supper.


I also liked how Larry Crabb compared Paul and Bilbo Baggins,from J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Hobbit". He said like Baggins, Paul left a comfortable life and set out to find treasure. He wrote: They both walked away from the Better Life of Blessings and entered on a journey full of hardship and trouble that promised a Better Treasure. For Paul, it was nearness to God- now in measure, then face to face.

That is what I WANT too....I don't want a better life of blessings....

JUST GIVE ME JESUS, and a life that seeks HIM, a life HE can be Glorified in and through.

Yes,....
JUST GIVE ME MORE OF JESUS!