Lord Send me VII: the Calloused Heart
This week was a very climactic and challenging part of Isaiah 6. Isaiah recieves his call, but it seems to be the exact opposite of what one would want. You will make their ears dull, their eyes blind and their hearrts calloused.
A couple of thoughts and challenges with this. We rarely talk about the discipline, the judgement of God. This is a text of God's judgement on the people of Israel. This is not a text where God is choosing some to hell and some to be saved. He is simply letting them fall under judgement, given over to the depravity of their own hearts that they were not letting go of. If you were there this is the playdough analogy.
So, here's where it get's personal. Are our hearts hardened? Are they beginning to callous? Has something gotten in the way of our relationship with God? Do we have dull hears and hard hearts? We spent some time in the sevice to repent... to ask God to soften our hearts.
This felt like a hard week to communicate and a tough truth to really capture. Where are you at with this?
ben
I appreciated the time to individually reflect. I know its something I should be doing without invitation but there have been moments recently when we’ve been given time during the service to reflect that have opened small fissures.
I was reading on another site the idea of Quakers having an entire service in silence and I wondered what that would be like? (Yikes! sincerely that much quiet, to reflect, repent, pray, sit silently and soak up God’s wonder?) The thought popped into my head about half way through our time yesterday, even with the song playing in the background and a few verses to ponder there was still an uneasy feeling and then it came to me that I do have to get over whatever hang-ups I have about what anyone else is thinking and really honestly communicate with God.
I don't think I repent well. I can use the excuse that I never learned (the church I grew up in we just said the standard Creed or chanting every,other,line repentance/forgiveness etc.) but I think that's just the easy excuse and not the crux of the issue. For me, where it becomes murky is putting a name to many of the things that I should be digging deeper and repenting and, in particular, for those things that I typically for timesaving just lump into a “and forgive me for everything else” category. I think those are the sins or actions or whatever that tend to interfere with my relationship with God the most. (The ones that make me question Him or make me stray away from Him.) (Comment this)
Don't we all fall under God's judgement every time we sin? God already knows every sin. It's scary how easy it is to just brush stuff off and have a casual attitude towards disobedience. It's kind of interesting the juxtaposition of this screen to the book recommendation - your God is too safe...probably way too true in my relationship with Him.
The challenge is taking a step - any step really. Do I boldly go with a whole-heartedly blind leap and hope where I go will eventually allow me to see God's will more clearly or do I wait sometimes impatiently and uncomfortably here and hope for a sign, map, scribbled note, voice calling in the distance and if that really happens will I be open to believe that was God's message for me?
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