Keep ON: His Work Installment (I lost count).

Keep on.....keepin' on......

JD's only recently joined 21st century technology. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I'm much further ahead of him, but at least the effort is there. I set him up with a hotmail account three weeks ago. Um, yeah, he's a bit behind. I'm not making fun of him; just merely stating the fact.



So it comes as no surprise that when I asked him for an MP3 player for Christmas a few years ago, he paid his buddy's teenage daughter to put music on it for me. Sweet, huh? (actually, it really is pretty sweet).



My point is this: When I turn on my MP3, I never know what I'm going to get. The musical genre can range anywhere from Kenny Chesney to who knows??? I don't even know the names of most of the artists. I just know that some songs make me run faster than others and I have yet to hear the same song twice.



But I do know that I'm SO lovin' my running time. I love to breathe the air in through my nose and feel it in my toes. I love the feeling of my throbbing heart - so alive. I don't even mind the wind pushing me along...but most of all, I love the time {alone} because I talk to God. And the best part? He talks to me too.


This week, in the "Living Beyond Yourself" study by Beth Moore, I have been learning about joy. True Joy. Not the happy-happy joy-joy kind of joy. I'm talking about the kind of joy that is ever-lasting. The kind that transcends time or circumstance and penetrates the eternal heart. The kind of joy that I look hard for, but must admit, can't always see. This week, I see it though; some of it for the first time ever.



In this study, Moore speaks of five catalysts of joy. Among these, the restoration of joy, which particularly hit home for me.


There was a time in my life when I gave up on joy. There was a time in my life when I quit. I quit trying. I quit caring. I quit living. I quit loving. I wanted to quit breathing. Losing a child does that. It stops the world. It stops the love and the joy - or even the possibility of it. Everything ends.


Except, God's love. It never ends. It's magnified. It's loud. It's there. It's there in the thunder and quake and it was there on those frost bit 'mournings'. Is it a blessing to suffer? Is that where joy is? I have learned through my own suffering, the footprints poem is right- He really does carry us. Moore has pointed out to me this week that God's POWER and PURPOSE and PRESENCE is best discovered through difficulty. It doesn't mean it's easy because life ain't easy, that's for sure. But God is{powerful}. He's {purposeful}. And he's definitely {present} in my life.

I found God in my struggles. I called out to Him and He was there. And then life went on I, well, I didn't call on Him as much.

Lately, I've felt like I've had it all wrong. I've been feeling like I keep screwing up. I've felt like I've not been using all that I've learned in the way I have imagined myself - I feel like I've been on a perpetual screw up roller coaster. Some days are better than others, but overall, I'd say I'm a sinner with a capital {S}. I've not been patient and kind and loving and gentle - not like I should...not like I can. I try. Oh, I try.

I've felt joyful for MY salvation when it's not really mine to begin with. It's God's. It's His gift. Somehow, when I think of it as MY salvation, I think that maybe I did something to get it- learned something- performed something- made or did something, but I didn't. I can't. God's grace allows me to draw near to Him even when I feel ashamed to admit I'm {still} a sinner after all these years...so I've been calling out to God letting Him know that I need and desire for Him to change my heart. I want to know and understand His love like I never have before.

Then He revealed this scripture:

Jeremiah 29: 13

You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all of your heart.


I am seeking Him and you know what is exciting me to no end? I'm finding.


I'm falling...in love...with God. I'm opening my bible eagerly and you know what? I haven't searched this HARD for God since Olivia died.


In the margin of Moore's study, she asks "How does God want you to respond to what He showed you today".



My response scribbled practically illegibly in the margin?


Keep seeking.



Keep asking.



Keep showing.



Keep loving.

and it all morphed into a phrase that one of my favorite people uses often:

Keep on...keepin' on.


So it was no surprise when I stuck my MP3 earbuds into my ears in preparation for an afternoon run.... and asked God to speak to me through the music JD's buddy's daughter put on it.... He revealed this song (Keep on Keepin' On by JoJo????). If you have never closed your eyes to this song and imagined God singing it to you, you should. It's amazing.


Keep on keepin' on ya'll. Even if you are like me - a sinner with a capital {S}, seek him with all of your heart. He's waiting in the whispers of your life and I promise you this: you will find Him and when you do, you will fall in love like never before.