Maybe you don't know how I feel about prayer lines and healing lines and dotted lines and even double yellow lines... all about the same. They make me nervous. Sometimes I think I'm an outside the lines person trying to live a "color within the lines" life. It's not that I can't color in the lines, it's just that the picture I see isn't always what everyone else tells me I'm supposed to see. Kind of like one of those inkblot tests. "What do you mean that's a spider? It looks like an alien spaceship to me!"
Call it the rebel in me. Call it several years of charasmania. Call it even more years of strict religious traditionalism. (Snap your fingers, wear red, make a mistake, go to hell. Go directly to Hell. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200 dollars.)Call it Bob. I don't care. But me and lines have not gotten along for years.
I'm in graphic arts. I know what lines are for. They are used for definition. If I want you to see what I see, I have to put lines on the paper and define it. If I want you to see a stop sign, I have to make lines that spell out the word "Stop" in whatever way you'll understand. Lines define. Lines limit. I don't always like it. But I know they are necessary. 
That's why we draw lines in the sand; why we tow the line; why we stand in line; line things up; read line by line; and so on. Lines can be good. But lines can be bad too. Color lines, racial lines, denominational lines, party lines, and those awfully long lines at Six Flags during the summer.... but I digress.
But I needed a line on Sunday. I needed to define what I believed. I needed definition to the nebulous "sure God can do anything" type of faith I had been living. It was a blank sheet of paper. So I went down to put lines around my faith. To get a good picture of what I wanted from God. I wanted to be healed. I wanted the pain that I have been living with daily to go away. Lots of people were in line. We were defining our request to God. IF our bodies still ached when we went back to our seats, that was ok. We love God for who HE is not just what he does. But for this moment of faith, it was time to get out of our seats and stand in line. Maybe even draw a line in the sand within ourselves. "You have not because you ask not..." "(Keep)asking and you will receive. (Keep)seeking and you will find. (Keep)knocking and the door will be opened to you."And as I walked away with no pain in my legs or arms. I realized... sometimes lines can be good.
2 comments:
Amazing!! I have 2 comments from this post and 1 for you to go back and read my blog, I know you just read and posted there but there is exciting news! I'm expecting!! No, not really. Not for a -long- time in fact. But do go read and do the happy dance with me!
Ok on to the two comments:
1."...it's just that the picture I see isn't always what everyone else tells me I'm supposed to see." *sigh* I love those few words. I really do. It captures me entirely. I always think outside the box and get, sometimes, yelled at for doing so. It's frustrating but an amazing ride at the same time. Why don't more ppl do that?! And you know what? God told me that He likes the fact that I think outside the box, He really did.
2)This sentence caught me off guard: "So I went down to put lines around my faith." How can we put lines around our faith? God can't be captured no matter how hard I try to capture Him. He somehow gets out of my hands like a greased pig and teases me and captures my attention, and curiousity, some more until I think I caught Him again.
But I think I know what you are saying and meaning with that sentence. It just caught my attention was all.
OH! And yes that was a very big aloe-vera plant. You get a: Great Job!! It's an ugly forest isn't it? Ok long enough comment to you. ;) -Z
I forgot to answer your question. Yes, Wednesday was passover. Thursday He was cruicified (sp?) and then He spent -3- days in the grave which would bring us to resurrection Sunday. He didn't spend two days and rise the third, it says three days -in- the grave. But then again that's my take on everything.
Blessings -Z
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