What do I believe?

Jennifer Dukes Lee published a post on September 29th entitled “For Our Monday: Reminding Ourselves What We Really Believe.”  This post and the beautiful fall colors inspired this post. 

I believe in God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

I believe in God the Father, the Maker of Heaven and Earth, the maker of my husband, my children and me.

I believe in God, not because I can see Him – but because of creation I know His hands have touched the world.  This Divine Creator/Maker gives attention to wildflowers, sparrows, the cats that lives under our apartment building, the darkest corners of unseen caves.

I believe he attends to me like he attends to all things.

This Divine Creator/Maker irrevocably loves me.  I can feel it like the wind on face at times.

At the beginning, He loved us.

Before the beginning, He loved us.

Before the fall, He loved us.

I believe in Jesus Christ, Son of our Holy Father.

Before He sent his Son to us, He loved us.

Before Christ died upon the cross, He loved us.

Before Christ rose from the grave, he loved us.

He is coming back again because He loves us.

When we breathe lightly, He loves us.

When we sigh heavily, He loves us.

When we take in that last breath before joining Him, He will have prepared a place for us.

He loves, He Likes, and He gave his life for us.

I believe Christ is the Bride-groom who is waiting patiently for the wedding banquet to begin.

I believe in God the Spirit.

I believe it was the Spirit of God that calmed the waters that night Peter was so brave. 

I believe it was the Spirit of God that inspired Moses, Abraham, Sarah, David, Solomon, and so many prophets to share stories and write them down.

I believe in God’s attributes.

I believe you are God of unfailing, never-ending love. 

I believe you are a God of history.  You formed Adam and Eve in the Garden, you watched the fall like a disheartened parent, and then proceeded to cover Adam and Eve to keep them warm.  What love!

I believe you are God of time.  You formed the seasons.  You birthed spring in the Garden, watching things grow and took delight in it.  As growth deepened, summer came along with flowers, fruit.  Summer colors change into autumn shades of gold, red, brown, and yellow. It is this season where I notice you the most.  I watch that autumn rainbow and I want to stand within the colors. As the cold comes in and winter approaches, I feel the shiver of the Fall and original sin once again and want to feel the spring.  The seasons of this earth speak of your glory. 

I believe you are a God of grace.  None of us deserve your love or sacrifice.  Who did you die for?  You died for each and every one of us that choose to believe in you.  You would irritate the legalist.

I believe you are a God of forgiveness.  You forgive us our transgressions.  You forgive us our selfishness, our owly attitudes, our sin.  Your son took the weight of sin and smashed it forever.  It is a gift I return to again and again.

I believe you are the Ultimate Teacher, the Wisest Philosopher, the Miracle Worker, and the Living Word.  God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit: three in one.

I believe you are coming again.  This is not the end.  There is hope for all people. That love has come to claim the outcast, the junkie, the popular kid, the preacher, the rude student, the terrible waitress, the guy who cut me off in traffic.  You have a place for all of them.  You rescue the weak, the broken, the helpless…

You even rescued me.

And  I – a sinner – now falling at your feet,  I believe I will live with you forever.

You are glory.

Our Father, who art in heaven,

Who sees the world from the perspective of His own divine eternity – the now and the tomorrow lens of Divine Love that always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres – with eternal eyes and Kingdom mind and purpose.

You sit on the throne looking down but lifting us up with your all seeing and all knowing.  

Hallowed be thy Name,

Holy, holy, holy.  A perfect Father unlike no other. We kneel before you in our broken humanity and remember that you are God and we are not. You are God and our fears, our social media feeds, our prejudices, our memories, our assumptions, our desperate desires to be right and liked and vindicated are not.

Thy kingdom come,

Thy kingdom of peace and righteousness. Thy kingdom of hope and healing here in the midst of our aching. Thy kingdom where you have always said, “Let the little children come unto me” and you meant it.

You’ve meant that our own ugliness should make way for the beautiful, God-breathed-breath of 8-year-olds, 18-year-olds and 80-year-olds who are always welcome with you – the color of their skin, the texture of their hair, the accent in their voices – a tribute to your stunningly, infinite creativity. All of us in all our startling beauty a reflection of you – created in your image. Male and female. Black and white. Indian, African, Asian, European, American, Icelander, Eskimo, San and the list sings on of all that you have made and how all of it is good. Very good.

Thy will be done,

Here in Jochiwon, South Korea, here in Maubine, South Africa, here in Iraq and Ferguson, Missouri and, Washington, DC. Have your way, bring your will, raise your voice or teach us with a broken, gutted whisper.

On earth as it is in heaven.

Dear God yes, let your Kingdom come here in our homes, on the streets where we stand facing off against one another, in our classrooms, our churches, our global neighbors facing persecution for their faith and also in our ordinary cycles of laundry and dishes. Here where I sometimes temper tantrum more than my kids. Here where I make bad choices and get on my high horse and point fingers and complain about all these extraordinary moments that if could only see with heaven’s eyes I would recognize as gift after lavish gift.

Let earth gaze up with its bloodied, black and blue eyes and swollen face and still see itself reflected in the Kingdom that is to come – that is already coming right here and now when I open my door and follow my kids out into the yard comfortably leaning over back fences connecting with my neighbors.

Give us this day our daily bread.

Teach me to be satisfied with enough. Teach me the discipline of choosing need over want so that I have plenty left over for the needs of my neighbors. Five thousand hungry people, no food or markets in sight. One little boy, five loaves, and two fish. And the rest is history. Except that it isn’t.

Because God is always in the business of multiplying and multiplying and multiplying. He breaks our expectations and offers us new ones, greater ones, more satisfying ones. He breaks apart our plans and offers us back His own. Out of our foolish, stumbling attempts to be His body He multiplies and there is always enough.

And forgive us our trespasses,

I am quick with my pointy fingers like my father, Adam and my mother, Eve. Experienced at evading my own guilt. Look me in the eyes, my God, and remind me of what you see in my heart. And I will remember myself and say with my brother, David, “what is man that you are mindful of him?” And with my brother, Peter, I would beg you to wash my whole sinful self if you could and I will look into the eyes of the God who kneels before me to wash my feet and confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.

As we forgive those who trespass against us.

Because until I can forgive I am not free. Period!

And lead us not into temptation,

Of judging, of throwing mental rocks and literal rocks at those who look different, live different, believe different or blog different. Of comparing and criticizing, of sizing up my sisters and categorizing them as competition. Of belittling my brothers. Of blowing up at my kids and blaming them for it, of using Facebook as a window to covet the lives lived on the other side.

Block me off from my own dead ends, Lord. Lead me not into temptation.

But deliver us from evil.

From the darkness of a planet that seems to offer up the silent scream, “God is already dead.” Deliver us from the lie of believing that God is absent or unconcerned. Deliver us from the idols we build up to take His place – we know what they are – different for each of us and yet always so utterly unoriginal. The original lie. That God is not enough. That there is more to know beyond Him. That we can fix it, save it, see it, believe it apart from Him.

Remind us that we have the DNA of the Light of the World and the darkness has NEVER overcome it.

For thine is the kingdom,

Thine is the platforms and headlines. Thine is the viral vantage point of what matters and what does not. Thine is the victory and the battlefield and the final word.

-And the power,

For peace, for reconciliation, for justice, for abundance, for goodness that outlasts the night and streams on into the morning.

And the glory,

All my greed for success my lust to be famous even in some small nook of my own mind, I surrender it. Snatch it from my hands, Father. Light me up with the reflection of your glory – all pointing my people home to You.

For ever and ever.

Amen