Comments (post-study Eph. 1)

I want to take this opportunity, while in the stream of reading Ephesians, to take note of the prayers I've made.

I prayed for power, and to be aware of the experience of grace.

They say that reading the bible is spiritual. This must be another example why that is the case. After praying those things, what took place? I remembered something significant that I honestly hadn't thought of in many years. I saw the impact being clearly both (especially) a dispensor of power, and, greater awareness of grace.

And while it is true that the Word is living and active the action in which I really made progress, was prayer. In the book of James it says "You do not have because you do not ask." I have been so reluctant for a long, long time to pray because I was afraid that in anything His answer would be "no." I couldn't stand the thought of it. Or I was disgusted to think I might have to give up something I didn't really want to. Both of those issues of course are ones of lacking trust. The LORD showed the power of His Word to me not in reading it like when I first believed it, but this time instead by the new task of praying on what I believed. I had no choice, but to ask. Since belief was completed so long ago, He knew that was the only way left for me to grow. He wanted to show me what He could do when I thought He should be listening. Those worries of hearing the answer "no" were issues of trust that had kept prayers to a minimum, but trust is a lot better since I remember where my alabaster box has gone.

Once that box has been broken, I'm not sure it must be re-broken again even if the power of it had been long-forsaken. What do I do now with newly made precious items that once I would have placed carefully inside the box? I have a new system set up in memorial of the meaning of the box. My mind has been transformed in function; it is more like a post office rather than a holding-tank. Whenever worries are refreshed, or new worries arise, I have a stack of pre-made address labels on the counter from which I take one and slap it on. Those labels read:

Jesus Christ
c/o God the Father
Right Hand, HEAVEN (zip code) Trinity

So they don't stay with me very long. The shipping costs are high... they are always high. It would be much easier to hold on to them rather than go through the fuss and emotional expense of surrendering and sending them off. However there are a lot of benefits of having them cleared up & out, and, just like a post office, life brings shipments of His response care-packages, rain, sleet, hail or snow.

So the most interesting question left to ask before I read on in Ephesians, is, if that's chapter one then what's the rest of the book going to do to me?

Ha ha.

Does He really know, does He really care?

The authors of Lady in Waiting used the visual of an alabaster box that contained all a woman's expectations and hopes of marriage, but for me I saw it then and also now as methodology by which Jesus would be selected as Lord of my whole life. Why stop with just those specific expectations? I knew it could be all of my hopes, my ideals, my fears... everything.

Just to bring it to Jesus was a big deal; carrying it in my hands, feeling protective of it as I transport it there because of the value of the contents, and setting it down, all were good. Surrendering it, was... a good thing. But the book described the custom with a detail of breaking it, too. Breaking it, so to spread a pleasant aroma at His feet like spilt perfume.

For me the process could not have been permanently effective without the added step of breaking it.

Leaving those items poured out as a mess, unable to gather up again, left me with only Jesus to look at. He knew what was spilt. He watched me bless Him with it. Now He would have to be real with me in response.

So I traded my cares for loving Jesus... whom I had been told, loves me.

No more do I have to mess around with re-reading doctrines of grace; no, no no.... This is superior to everything I learned. It's actual relationship. Somewhere along the way I forsook and forgot it though I never lost it. I am glad to just be living in a relational way with Jesus again. No more fear, no more stress, no more complication.

Waiting for Jesus, and watching for Jesus -- that's all I have to do. Letting Him prove Himself to me.