Psalm 40

It is very difficult to put into words what exactley God is doing. I feel inadequate to speak of such things, I simply do not have those words. My flesh would want to rush what God is doing here in this most blessed of places:but there are lessons to be learned in God's timing. So I will let God's word indwelt in the hand of man speak where season permit me not too...

I waited patiently for the LORD; And He inclined to me and heard my cry. He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm.He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God; Many will see and fear And will trust in the LORD.

How blessed is the man who has made the LORD his trust, And has not turned to the proud, nor to those who lapse into falsehood.Many, O LORD my God, are the wonders which You have done, And Your thoughts toward us; There is none to compare with You. If I would declare and speak of them, They would be too numerous to count.

Sacrifice and meal offering You have not desired; My ears You have opened; Burnt offering and sin offering You have not required.Then I said, "Behold, I come; In the scroll of the book it is written of me.I delight to do Your will, O my God; Your Law is within my heart."

I have proclaimed glad tidings of righteousness in the great congregation; Behold, I will not restrain my lips, O LORD, You know. I have not hidden Your righteousness within my heart; I have spoken of Your faithfulness and Your salvation; I have not concealed Your lovingkindness and Your truth from the great congregation

You, O LORD, will not withhold Your compassion from me; Your lovingkindness and Your truth will continually preserve me.For evils beyond number have surrounded me; My iniquities have overtaken me, so that I am not able to see; They are more numerous than the hairs of my head, And my heart has failed me.

Be pleased, O LORD, to deliver me; Make haste, O LORD, to help me.Let those be ashamed and humiliated together Who seek my life to destroy it; Let those be turned back and dishonored Who delight in my hurt.Let those be appalled because of their shame Who say to me, "Aha, aha!"Let all who seek You rejoice and be glad in You; Let those who love Your salvation say continually, "The LORD be magnified!"Since I am afflicted and needy, Let the Lord be mindful of me. You are my help and my deliverer; Do not delay, O my God.

-Psalm 40

JG

That is cool

I've heard it said somewhere that God has everything ordained. That he has purpose somewhere in it all.

I have heard about this God. I have known this God intimately and have seen every incidence that I could refute purpose pass by without that coming to be truth.

Yet somehow my faith is still weak, there are moments where I can't see. There are moments where I doubt in what I most certainly know. That is frustrating.

I have been reading through the old testament as of late regarding Jacob and Esau and the dynamic, and questions about God's choice to allow the blessing that followed Jacob's life that still impacts us today. I have been reading it and gaining a lot of perspective on the way God made men.

For those of you who don't know me well this may come as a shocker. I struggle incredibly with the way God made me. A lot of who I am at the very core of my being stands in sharp contrast to many men. I have come to understand through much sandblasting on this now much softer heart that God made no mistake when he knit me together.

As of late though it has been increidbly hard to believe there is much purpose in me being so incredibly different. I find myself overwhelmed at the work cut out for me by my maker the one who made me specifically for the purpose ordained, predestined before the dawn of time.

My name means: YAHWEH is gracious, He is most certainly! He is walking besides me through this incredibly difficult season.

I was talking with Elise tonight a little about what an increidbly difficult week this has been and as always she poured out incredible insight into what God is doing. All of it is simply breathtaking. Women have a way of hearing that men seldom posess, what a gift for men.

I thank God for women.

I thank God for stream of conciousness, that I don't have to sum all of it up here. That I don't need to understand it all I can choose bits and pieces to focus on and work my way in faith.

That is cool.

JG

Layers Of

Every layer of truth
Every weapon given to me
Every desire
Every carefully chosen word
Everything broken. peeled away and gave for You to see

Jesus, hear the heartbeat of Your child. your son
Split before this dire need
Fury filled, silently swept away
Wholly overwhelmed by the story

Every thing I seek
Every move breaking the stillness
Every action chosen in specificity
Every secret
Everything broken. peeled away and gave for You to see

The callouses on my hands and heart
Remenants of the broken self
Humility developed in this man
Truth now becomes deeper
No longer footsteps just by sight

Every bit of glass
Every remanants of daggers
Every gift that cannot be denied
Every wound left unhealed
Everything, no more mediocrity

I could wrestle with my God.
Veins in the hands of this man
Till dawn begins breaking
Face to face in glorious morning
This move breaking the stillness
This action chosen in specificity

The callouses on my hands and heart
Remenants of the broken self
The layers of my truth…
The layers of His Truth…

Diagonal

I am reminded tonight that if things do not flow from the relationship that I have with Christ there is no true heart within the action. If I am too busy to seek out God individually to sit before HIs throne boldly approaching His wonderful face then I miss the point. If I am too busy doing ministry that I miss ministry on the way I miss relationship with the two things that matter God and man.

I have missed this.

All my life I have tried to excell in one aspect, God or man, much to the neglect of the other.

I am begining to find though that community begins when those two aspects are combined. I call this the diagonal relationship.

What was once only horizontle and what was once only verticle can be no more.

This diagonal is the road I traverse.

Over the course of this summer I normally sit in the UU of the college here and sit and people watch and think. Over the course of these past three or so weeks of doing this I have observed a few things worthy of note.

1.People always love to be in conversation.
2.People don't like to be alone.

I was sitting one day and saw this mom and her two kids walking by. The girl stopped to tie her shoe and over the course of the time she took tying her shoe her mom walked probably forty feet or so ahead. The girl couldn't bare the thought of being alone. Forty feet away. This struck me. This little girl loves her mom and wants to simply be in her presence as close as possible.

I was sitting another day in the UU and I saw this older lady praying and reading Mere Christianity. She had a huge smile and a peace about her the look of one who had just realized that they were loved. More impprtantly though as if she realized she was not alone.

Another day I was sitting back and listening to a conversation people were having the floor below me. It was about the most pointless things according to my mind. But then it struck me. Perhaps it's not merely about the conversation but the presence.

Jacob declares in Genesis " God was in this place, and I surely did not know." I know it to be so true so often that we strive for those times of pure verticality. So often I see us just waiting till that blessed moment where we can be with God alone? We miss the point of this life though. People were made for people!

Like often happens in dating relationships a bond becomes so strong much to the neglect of all the others. We have all experienced this:a friend who finds a deeper relationship with someone else and neglects you and most everyone because of it
But you know what! I am guilty of this with my Father in heaven.For most of my life I have been so captivated with Him that I lost track of everything else. Not a bad thing by anymeans but I refused to recognize I was still here on earth. I am part ministry as well as part worshiper. I eagerly look forward to the day when I can worship fully and unhindered but there is still a job to go to. bills to pay. relationships to build. food to eat. cleaning. videogames. and everything else this world is full of.

My dad was very wise when he once said" the mark of true christiany is how you learn to make it work in the real world.

Elise was saying something funny the other day. She said it was really odd to get to talk to the pastors of the church we attend here in SLO. I asked her why. She said. " They are real people." That is the the mark of a true christian right there!

JG

To hear this...!

I do not know where to begin. But I know when to end. And ending...! I dare not!
To recount all that God is doing? The God drenched destiny I find myself in...where to begin ? This is merely a begining!

Could I speak of the birds that sing ... for the first time really begining to be heard? Music made in the hearts of men singing in tune with the hoofbeats of the ryhtym of heaven.

Could I speak of a community of believers. A unity of Spirit.

Could I speak of a God who does more than these pages could even begin to try and say! A God who heals. A God who redeems fully. who reaches down and finds us in the pit of our sin and blesses us so incredibly?

I come late tonight more awake with each passing day and moment! Clarity is coming in the gentle whisper.

Strength is sharpened in this silence. Every word spoken with more power. things are most certainly returning but uncharted.

And I ask the question of myself do you know what you step into, John? I do not, but I step in.

To hear this...!

JG

Why I Stand Silent

When it comes to the words that I say.

The letters I pen.

The books I read.

The thoughts I hold.

The love I have.

The very words I speak.

The music I make in my heart...it all flows from One.

The perfect circle in which all things encircle and all worlds revolve.

And tonight before this God I sat silent. The night needed no words to rip through the fragile birth of hearts awakening.

And this is why I stand silent. Because my God is in control. How could I add to such a beauty.

Perfectly inadequate. Perfectly where I need to be.

My time is coming but not quite yet...I know my place

So Lord prepare the way...pass on before my way and make the new day a glorious dawn.

JG

All the Way my Savior Leads Me

All the way my Savior leads me
What have I to ask beside
Can I doubt His faithful mercies
Who through life has been my guide
Heavenly peace, divinest comfort
ere by faith in Him to dwell
for I know whatever fall me
Jesus doeth all things well
All of the way my Savior leads me
and He cheers each winding path I tread
gives me strength for every trial
and He feeds me with the living bread
and though my weary steps may falter
and my soul a thirst may be
gushing from a rock before me
though a spirit joy I see

And all the way my Savior leads me
oh the fullness of His love
perfect rest in me is promised
in my Father's house above
when my spirit clothed immortal
wings its flight to realms of day
this my song through endless ages
Jesus led me all the way

-Fanny J. Crosby

The Story Begins

While I was back in Colorado I awoke Saturday the 30th of June to a text message from my roomates telling me that the hills in front of our house were on fire.

To be honest I got a little excited.

I knew God had answered prayer in the ways He does and begun a new story in the book of my life with that fire.

For those of you who arn't regulars to this page you should know that those hills are the place I commune with the almighty. Every time I go up there God meets me with the extraordinary.

I have been back in California for what is approaching two weeks now. I have stared at those hills out my windows every day and everytime I do I am reminded of the law given to Moses on Mt. Sanai. How God descended upon the mountain and burned the top. I have longed so desperately to go up there for these past two weeks to meet with my God my All Consuming Fire.

This morning came. I awoke...7am. I felt God calling me to those hills. Equipped with my bible. journal. water. mp3 player and warm clothes I ventured into the hills where the fire was.



I sat down. I saw what God had allowed to happen to these hills. Curiosity got me up kept me going through the fog and the burnt forest.

The fog began to break as I ventured along the top of the ridge. Revealing the mountaintops waking to meet the morning. It was simply breathtaking.

I sat down opened my bible to Isaiah 42. I kept reading, kept hearing the ever silent whisper of God.

"I will lay waste the mounatains and hills and will wither all their vegetation...I will lead the blind by a path they do not know in paths they do not know I will guide them. I will make darkness into light before them and rugged places into planes. These are the things I will do and I will not leave them undone"

I kept reading...

do not fear for I am with you"

I kept reading...

"Do not tremble and do not be afraid; have I not long since announced it to you and declared it?"

..."for I will pour out water on a thirsty land and streams on the dry ground;
I will pour out my spirit..."

...God is going to do something wonderful and the fire it was merely the begining.

JG

Desert of the Night ( hidden in the depths of night)

Eternity since I last penned a word
that would rage a world and bring the sword

Eternity since you last spoke a word
slashed this heart that it might sing in it's fullest tune
to raise a thousand voices to toll the bell of noon

Eternity since i had the strength to move this pen
It's hard to move in the breaking of fullest light
but you chose me to tarry through this desert of the night

Be it fear or lack of
crippling or the heart renching
noon-day or darkest night
...I know I am not alone

Every breath whispers, this breath in the coldest night
billows but reveals something behind itself, deeper
Eternity reveals the heart of someone behind the light

Echoes of a deeper treasure hidden in the depths of night
my only map, His light

Sand beneath my feet, shifting ever changing
Wind that brings the breeze
Journey ever longer ever deeper,
Moon in fullest view,brought to my knees
stars singing, ever proclaiming

Echoes of a deeper treasure hidden in the depths of night
...faith built no longer on sight

I have work early in the morning but I feel God calling me to sit here...be still and worship...there are seldom moments where I feel and understand this love this infinitude of God's love. It is most certain that in this moment I have gathered a glimpse.

I am clueless. I have chosen to fear and let it cripple me. I have chosen faithlessness to be my way. But in this moment I choose to believe and am quite confident that Jesus has laid out a way. A wonderful way. I know none of the details of this path. The only thing I know is that I love Jesus. He works out the details from there.

Thankyou for that God...for just a glimpse of Your love.

JG

Past: the Uncharted

Last night:found myself on the shores of the california coast mystified by fireworks touching the ocean's reflective depths.

Today: alone for the weekend, a weekend to be unhindered in constant communion with my Father.

Monday: flew in, discovered I couldn't bare what God was teaching alone.

3AM : awoke to a friend in the midst of battle.

Tuesday: encouraged by the hearts of others

Morning: read letters from a wise friend

Past: lesson learned in being a man

Past: taking initative

Past: defined by being a mystery

Past: the Uncharted

AND EVERY TIME GOD BROUGHT ME THROUGH IT ALL

Everytime: this time is no different

JG

New Lessons

For generally the first time in my life I believe that God has me on a string of lessons that doesn't come naturally or easy for me. I am not saying that the trials in my life have been pieces of cake. But the fact remains these lessons are a new breed.

I was telling Randy last night that I know I am exactly where God wants me to be. I am terribly uncomfortable with it. I feel as if I tell God every night I didn't choose what your going to use me for or what you are going to do with my life. But I am always brought back to the thought neither did all the other people in the bible. Those men and women God chose as his ambassadors those one he chose to do incredible things through were men and women much like myself.

When I so often turn to fearing what will happen:

Leadership. Responsibility.
Biblical manliness

I am comforted by all the other screwups in the bible that they made it out okay they clung to God's word as to a liferaft spent a lot of time in prayer and meditation stepped far outside their comfort zone but, in the end they made it out okay. Their faith was beautifully refined because of the process.

So as I sit here writing in my new house: the place I will continue to write from for probably another four years, I begin the third installment of lessons: the difficult ones that take time. Those ones that refine my character and heart far better than anything else I have ever experienced. I clinge to God and His Word to His will and His ordinance because it is the only way I will get through. I rise to the occasion.

JG