Take This Life And Let It Shine

For the past few years I’ve flirted with lent, but this year was moved to get dirty with it. I’m giving up social media and booze until Easter, and additionally fasting on Mondays.

Let’s back up, shall we? Over the past few years, I’ve learned the big fat lesson that God is bigger than my fears. He’s bigger than my anxiety, He’s bigger than my concerns, and He always shows up when I call on Him. This Oprah-style-Aha!-moment has walked me through pregnancy, a 44 hour labor, delivery by c-section, three miscarriages, multiple tests, bloodwork, and now, acupuncture.

This might not seem like a lot to the average, medically minded individual. But those who know me, know how HUGE THIS IS. Because I have a tendency to faint, fall on the floor, and seize when a stranger down the street gets a papercut.

So, lesson learned: My God is alive, and He is bigger than my fear, and fear is a LIE.

I’m starting to think Yahweh is graduating me on to Big Life Lessons 102, and I’m sensing it is this: I have defined myself by my strengths and weaknesses and what the world thinks of me for far too long. I am undergoing a transformation. A huge transformation. And my identity is no longer in those things, it is in Him.

I don’t really know what this looks like, and frankly, I’m not yet at a place where I trust that my identity in Christ will be more fun/enjoyable/easy/better than my identity with ME at the helm. But Yahweh asked me to give Him my fears, and He carried me through scary times. So I have decided the smartest thing for me to do is to give Him my identity, and let Him redefine me there as well.

Part of this is peeling away everything in my life down to the basics. The things I know right now are that I’m a follower of Jesus, wife and mother, daughter and friend. So in an effort to simplify myself down to those obvious things, I’m cutting out social media, an often distraction from those roles. With less in the way to distract me, I’m praying that I find myself more often in a posture of humility and acceptance such that Yahweh has space to move. I have also found in the past that fasting also helps to bring me to this posture where I find myself actively praying and waiting on God.

As for the booze, I’m giving it up because my acupuncturist told me to, and I’d jump off a cliff if he told me to.

I have high hopes that in this lenten season, I will be humbled and prostrate before God without additional distractions, and I’m a bit nervous for the outcome. But this is where my journey has brought me, and I sense I need to push through this identity issue before I can go any further. It’s so tied in with my health and with my hopes of future babies, that I sense I don’t really even understand the tip of the iceberg. My prayer is one of complete transformation, and I know that to get that party started, I need to lay myself down on the altar to be rebuilt in Him.

Take a gander at this song that I’ve been listening to nonstop for about two weeks. I think this is my prayer for this season.

Maranatha. Maranatha. Maranatha.

Lay Me Down – Chris Tomlin

With this heart open wide
From the depths from the heights
I will bring a sacrifice
With these hands lifted high
Hear my song hear my cry
I will bring a sacrifice

I lay me down
I’m not my own
I belong to you alone
Lay me down
Lay me down
Hand on my heart
This much is true
There’s no life apart from you
Lay me down

Letting go of my pride
Giving up all my rights
Take this life and let it shine

I lay me down
I’m not my own
I belong to you alone
Lay me down
Lay me down
Hand on my heart
This much is true
There’s no life apart from you
Lay me down

It will be my joy to say
Your will
Your way
always

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