Sunday, January 22, 2006

Renewal Begins

Today was the first full day of the conference. A whole day spent in prayer and song and meditation, in seeking God's face and not His hand.

I had it in my head that renewal would happen a certain way, at a certain time, and that I had to do certain things to make it happen. How easily I forget that I belong to a sovereign God of mystery, that apart from Him I can do nothing, and that I can work out my salvation in fear and trembling only because God first works in me.

And so, before our first session even starts, he breaks my heart. I sit down next to a friend from high school who happens to work out here at HQ, and I'm thinking, "Okay, we'll catch up, have a little small talk before things get started." After the "How've you been?" I follow up with the "So what have you been up to?" And she shares, quietly and matter of factly, that her mother is not doing well, and the doctors have given her a couple weeks. And my gaze is wrenched from the spirituality to be discovered in my navel, my heart breaks, and renewal begins.

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