crazy love

something is in the air... it feels like i am cheating some system - is it okay for one person to have this many good days in a row? it's not that i necessarily feel on top of the world, or that i feel invincible. it's surely not the fact that my days have been lacking in any normal share of disorder or struggles... everything is ordinary, except the way that i'm feeling.

the thing i attribute it to? i've had some incredible study time in the Word this past week. seriously. i think that's all there is to it... in my heart, i know.

i've been reading through Acts, as i've been reading through Crazy Love (by Francis Chan) for the second time... talk about humbling. it has been really interesting, to see the comparisons of the "early" church in Acts and the revolutionary impact of the Gospel in their culture at that time... and then to studiously take a look at the current Church many of us are familiar with or part of, and the impact that we often struggle to make on our culture (i'm certainly not discounting the radical movements that the living Church daily makes to show and share Christ to our neighbors, the poor, the orphans, the widows, and the lost as a whole. this is not a tirade on the failures of the church - merely a comparative glance of two different times, two different cultures, and their impact on one world... that maybe hasn't changed as much as we sometimes think it has)

it's been really interesting, and it is certainly changing the things that i've been thinking about and praying about this week.

in Acts, it is evident to see how much of an impact the Church made in their world. it all started when the Holy Spirit came down in fire (Acts 2:3), and the revolution continued to begin effecting the lives of individuals and masses alike - whether in crowded city streets (2:14), on religious councils (7:1-53), on ordinary trade routes (9:3), or in the innards of prison cells (12:6). the Holy Spirit was alive, and the carriers of this inner fire (who later began to be called Christians - Acts 11:26) lived out His witness by the steps they took, the choices they made, the prayers they prayed, and with each breath that they took. they prayed for miracles, and they believed those miracles would happen. they based their life on what they had seen and known, and we as Christians today continue to carry the Message they were the first to carry boldly into a broken world.

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so i have been thinking a lot this week, about the way i live... the way i pray, the things i believe... the things i have seen and known, of His presence in my life and in this world.

does the Holy Spirit still move just as clearly now as He did back then? have we shrouded His work? are we just not seeing His movement because we are blind? would He move just as clearly, if we knew how to ask Him differently? does He still have the power to literally raise the dead, heal the lame on the sides of the street by a touch, empower us to cast out demons, multiply food for masses of people... have we forgotten what He is powerful enough to do? have i forgotten what He is powerful enough to do?

i'll be honest. most of the time my prayer requests resemble the following:

i pray about where i'm going to live. what i'm going to do and become. what he is thinking right now. i pray about things like jobs and skill sets, resumes and bills, and whether or not i will ever have a chance to be a wife and mom. i pray about the temptations i daily fall into, and the ways i can possibly not fall into them tomorrow. i pray about the ways i can or do interact in social gatherings, i pray about the way i am perceived versus the way i intend to be...

and all of these things are genuine, and please don't misinterpret what i'm saying - i know that God delights in us, human as we are... He numbers the hairs on our head, holds us in His hands, impresses comfort on our hearts when they are hurting, and listens to us as we cry out... no matter the topic or eloquence of expression.

but.

when was the last time i personally prayed for a revolution, with passion in my heart? when was the last time that i believed that the Holy Spirit once did come in fire, and could again if He willed? when was the last time i really tapped into the reserve of power of all He is, by even a whispered prayer in my bed at night?

as Francis Chan makes clear in his book... we are commanded to live a life of love, in order to serve and worship and make known a God who is Love. it is not an option, no matter how much we (as a culture and as a modern church) focus on our "right" to choose. and as i've been reading through Acts, the one thing i see over and over again so clearly, is that to live a life of crazy love for a God of crazy love... we must learn the discipline and of begging for the passion He has made available to us. we must ask Him to make our hearts crave Him more. that our lives would begin to be worthy of the passion He poured out for us by His blood and the Holy Spirit - already alive and in us, breathing fire into our hearts and our bones.

despite all the things that we come to so easy in our modern age, there is not an "app for that". we must take up our crosses. we must follow. we must sow and reap. we must plant and water. we must get dirt on our hands and feel passion flow through our veins again.

the type of crazy love many of us would say we pray for will remain out of reach for many of us until we deliberately begin changing our routines, changing our minds, changing our decisions, changing our ways - and begin tapping into what was already made free to us by His blood.

i am praying for miracles again... will you join me?