-  I've been thinking about Abraham... how he was so aware of God's personality and faithfulness... so sure of His ability to invade the natural world with His Power... so full of absolute, undaunted trust in His God... that somehow, someway, he knew that God would fulfill His promise, even if Isaac was sacrificed. This seems like such a harsh test, Lord... such a seemingly unloving thing to ask of any parent. But, hidden in this test, I think the Father of all Fathers was displaying what abandoned trust looks like. I think the Father was actually showing Abraham off, immortalizing him in scripture forever. God wanted all the world to see that Abraham's heart could not be moved to distrust Who God was! Adam and Eve were led down the path of deception, where they chose to believe a lie about their God and Creator. Ah, but Abraham, the Father of our faith, didn't waver; rather, he embraced the mystery of this command to give up his son of the promise because he believed in and trusted Who he knew God to be, even in this horrible and unfathomable request. Speak to me, Lord, about this mystery. 

+ It's often been said, "My ways are not your ways." This isn't meant to make you feel helpless and small but to let you REST...knowing without a shadow of a doubt that My plans are perfect and born out of love for My wayward world. Through Abraham, I wanted to show what real trust looks like. Oh, how Abraham loved and celebrated his beloved son! Could he have heard God right? Didn't he doubt his ability to hear God's voice? Couldn't he have withdrawn and held Isaac to himself, unable to even believe, let alone obey such a request? But remember this is the man who set out to an unknown destination at God's request. This is the man who waited for the promise until all natural hope was gone. He was too old. Sarah was well past childbearing age. He knew what a miracle Isaac was and how God had managed to fulfill His promise against all odds. He knew His Father could call things that are not as though they are and His Word could become flesh. So, when the word came to take this cherished son and sacrifice him, he obeyed completely because he knew His God was no ordinary God. Abraham overruled his emotions and his reasoning and stepped out into eternity simply because he knew Who God was - Love incarnate - Faithful and All-Powerful. His obedience gave him freedom!

Beloved, I want you to take all that is precious to you... everything that you hold as dear - your husband, your children, your music, your destiny, even your understanding of who you've been created to be - bring it ALL to the Father in full trust. Believe that He wants to fill you with revelation and faith. He wants you to know that everything about you is HIS... that all that you hold dear is only a reflection of His Love manifested in your life. Bring your offering... everything that is "you". Set it on the altar and look to Me. When you trust Me enough to give Me your all, you will be lifted into a new understanding of "She who the Son sets free is free indeed!" Your trust in My unfailing Love will soar! All you contemplate will be shining with a new understanding... a faith that explodes in your entire being and sets you in that place of perfect Peace. Nothing can touch you now! Your life and all you love have been covered over. Your offering has been received. You can rest that everything about you... all you love... are safe in My Embrace. Your gift, freely given, is then given back to you. This exchange transforms the power these once had over you. All fear of things not working out... of disappointment and loss...melts away like morning fog. You have risen up and put your face in the sun. Your Father's bright Glory has risen on you! Rejoice! You will never be the same!   

 -  I feel the closing of my days coming upon me. Even if I have twenty years left, it's nothing ...a blink. So, Lord, I want to use my time well. I want to hear Your Voice saying: "This is the way. Walk in it." Show me, Lord, where You want me to put my energy. I sense it has to do with "Going after a life of love." What does that look like, Lord? 

+ Think of the Last Supper. Think of Me surrounded by My friends ...those I had poured so much into ...those who had glimpses of My true identity. How I loved them, despite the fact that I knew one would betray Me, literally sell me out for a few pieces of silver and the others (all but one) would scatter and run to save their necks. My beloved leader of the pack would deny that he even knew Me. He who saw My Glory with his own eyes! So, there we were together, on the cusp of the moment of truth ...the manifestation of the Father's Love-poured out in response to His plan. On that dark night, knowing all the betrayal and fear in My friends' hearts, I invited them to feast with Me ... to celebrate the last Passover of the Old Covenant ...the leaving of Egypt forever. I gave them all the Love I had ...knelt before each one (including Judas, whose hard heart could not be melted by My Love) and washed their feet like a slave. I showed them what it looked like to follow the Father's ways. Then I fed them the celebratory meal, the thanksgiving offering that they were to understand more fully in time ... that I was the Lamb to be sacrificed and that it would be My Blood that would be their protection ...their salvation. Love empowered Me every step of that fateful night. Again and again, I revealed the heart of a Father Whose Love was willing to suffer so that all could be saved. 

You long to love well ...to be a good representative of the Father's heart. I am answering this prayer, right here, right now, with all the people in your life who you find difficult to love.  Trust Me. They are My instruments of training. When a boxer is in training, he lifts weights and does increasingly more difficult work-outs to empower him when he faces his challenger. He even is put in the ring with practice opponents, who test him for strengths and weaknesses. He needs to understand and shore up his vulnerabilities. If you can view your life as your training ground in the fight to love like I love, then every challenging person/scenario can be used by your Trainer, the Holy Spirit, to strengthen you ("harden you to difficulties" Isaiah 41: 10). As you grow in these workouts, He brings tougher and tougher challengers into the ring. And, unlike the boxer who must depend solely on his own strength, you have been promised that where you are weak - I am strong! You are not in the ring alone! The key in this training exercise is to choose to not view your opponent (the one who challenges your capacity to love) as someone to resist...but actually, as someone to embrace! You learn to disarm hostility with peace ...to overcome insults with kindness ...and to extinguish hatred with love! The Kingdom turns worldly wisdom upside down! So yes, you are in the ring and you will have opponents who magnify your inability to love the way you want to, but your goal is to have the strength to love your enemies as I did. If you can climb into every scenario, viewing it as a supernatural boxing ring, and face these challengers not as those who will take you down (into hated and judgment) but as God's trainers, put there to teach your spirit the Power and Strength of My Love, then, despite your weakness, you WILL be Strong in Me! You will be still, in wonder at who you can be in Me, and know that I am God. I am Your God ...Who is eager to empower you to love in and through My Gentle, Unfailing Love. 

 - Lord, what is my calling? Reveal Your heart to me, showing me the main reason You made me, then, give me the courage and humility to be that person. 

+ I called you primarily to be My child ...guileless ...full of enthusiasm and awareness ... very conscious of My Love meeting you at every turn. I've called you to be a balm on the wounds of people around you. You have a great desire to love all (exhibited when you were a child and wanted to include all your stuffed animals in your love). This is something the Father placed in your DNA. It's a quality very close to His heart. This explains the great warfare you've been engaged in to love fully those who are difficult to love. You know how antithetical it is to your Papa's heart for you to exclude people from your love. What is your calling? As you ponder the lessons from the Word and from authors you've been studying, the answer is not hidden. I would never create you then leave you in a vacuum, not knowing what it is I've called you to do. Trust Me, I am constantly leading you into the fullness of who you are in Me. That's your calling. How can you be My Hands and Feet today? I am calling you to be My disciple ... to live by My side ... to watch Me and absorb the healing grace that flows through Me from the Father in the Holy Spirit. You are IN this Trinity of Love. You have been called by name into a creation that was loved into existence from the beginning of time. The world would have you feel like a nameless speck of dust. The Father focuses His gaze on you and has put His Seal on you. You are His because He made it possible through the cross I endured. So, here is who you are called to be:

• Your calling is to be still and know that I am God. 
• Your calling is to rejoice always...no matter what!
• Your calling is to trust every word that comes from the mouth of God.
• Your calling is to give thanks in all circumstances. 
• Your calling is to experience Love that is perfect and intimate...that is always for you - never against.
• Your calling is to fill your mouth with praise.
• Your calling is to love all who are in your life with My Love.
• Your calling is to do the impossible...to step out in faith over the waves that are raging and to know that you can do all things in My Strength.
• Your calling is to believe that no matter how things look, God is always working them for good.
• Your calling is to run at your Goliaths...to know without a shadow of a doubt (or even in the midst of doubt) that God is for you and that you can do exploits through the mighty Power of the Holy Spirit Who is in you!
• Your calling is to be a warrior princess - carrying the shield of faith - wearing the crown of favor.
• Your calling is to always turn your face towards your Father...the Father of lights in whom there is no shadow of turning. 
• Your calling is to be you, and as you seek the Holy Spirit, all power will be given to you to know just who that is!
• Your calling is to be filled with the Spirit of power and grace, overflowing with love, gentleness, kindness, and peace...enveloping those who are in your life with the same Love with which you are loved.
• Your calling is to have confidence and a deep awareness of God-in-you...the unchanging Hope of Glory.
• Your calling is to belong to Me, to be My bride.
• Your calling is to cast your every care on Me...to let Me give you My perfect Peace, especially in the midst of turmoil.
• Your calling is to know Me and to let this knowledge inform every area of your life. 
• Your calling is to radiate Hope. The Holy Spirit is in you to help you cultivate this Hope as the Anchor of your life. 
• Your calling is to live, move and breathe and to have your being in and through Me.
• Your calling is to appropriate the substance of things hoped for...the things not seen.
• Your calling is to live from Heaven to earth...from the answer to the request...from the end to the beginning. 
• Your calling is to be only the person your Father created you to be...to rest in the fact that He Who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it. Remember, He doesn't know how to be unfaithful!
• Your calling is to speak to the mountains in your life about how big your God is!
• Your calling is to rest in Me, believing that I've got you and will never let you go.