Ever Nearer...

Jesus Draw Me Ever Nearer

"Jesus Draw Me Ever Nearer"
Music by Keith Getty; Words by Margaret Becker
Copyright © 2002 Thankyou Music

Jesus, draw me ever nearer
As I labour through the storm.
You have called me to this passage,
and I'll follow, though I'm worn.

May this journey bring a blessing,
May I rise on wings of faith;
And at the end of my heart's testing,
With Your likeness let me wake.

Jesus, guide me through the tempest;
Keep my spirit staid and sure.
When the midnight meets the morning,
Let me love You even more.

Let the treasures of the trial                                 
Form within me as I go -
And at the end of this long passage,
Let me leave them at Your throne.

I love this song. (If you want to hear it, you should be able to click on the link at the very top, and it will take you to a youtube video of the song.) I was thinking through the words of this song this week as I am struggling through what I consider to be an almost insurmountable storm – there is just no other word for it. And this trial, this storm has been going on for years now, and I am so weary of it.  The first verse of this song says, “Jesus, draw me ever nearer as I labour through the storm. You have called me to this passage, and I’ll follow, though I’m worn.”  There is a comfort in knowing that this storm didn’t take God by surprise. He knew it would come and He has ordered my steps through it all.  I know that He has a plan for me. He says in Jeremiah 29:11 that His plans are for “welfare and not for calamity, to give me a future and a hope.”  Even though my heart is so weary, I will keep following Him.

“May this journey bring a blessing…” I never thought once as this whole ordeal began that any good could ever come from any of it. In the last year or so, however, I have begun to see just a few glimpses of the blessings.  I am surrounded by amazing people who love and support me and have held my hand through some dark days. I never would have met them if my journey had not uprooted me. I am in a place that I love, in a position of ministry that I love. God is restoring to me all of the things that were taken from me, and then some!  It is a marvel to me the blessings He has poured on me over the last few years.  There is another blessing I did not expect – the blessing my journey could be to others.  Last year, I received a message that I treasure from a friend with whom I had not been in touch for probably 20 years or so.  She was watching my journey from afar, and after a particularly trying storm, I had sent out an email to those who had been praying.  It was forwarded around by different ones until even I don’t know who all had received it. My friend’s message was long, and I won’t share all of it, but this one part: “I don't know if you realize what an amazing gift you gave to everyone who will ever read that. You gave us permission to trust a God that we don't always understand. You were the best person to give that gift and the most unlikely. (Thank you. It was a gift to me personally.)”  She went on to share personally what God was teaching her, and that blew my mind. God used me? He used me to encourage someone? I received several more similar messages over the weeks following that incident, and even more recently after I began the blog.  It’s crazy how we think sometimes that we are all alone in our hurt, in our pain, our weaknesses, our storms.  It takes one person to speak up and say, “This is my story, and this is what my God did!" to make us step back and go, "Wow! If He could do that in her life, He can do the same for me!" I know, because that is where I have found encouragement myself – in the lives of those who have walked roads I can not imagine, but found the strength and the courage to follow anyway. Those people reveal hearts that I want to have, an intimacy with God that I crave, a peace that allows them to continue on in spite of the circumstance. And I am learning that it is the storms in their lives that have brought them to that point. I am thankful for the blessing that they are in my life. I pray that truly, my journey will be a blessing to someone else.

“At the end of my heart’s testing, with Your likeness let me wake.” There was something I had heard before, but never understood. The Bible talks about our faith being refined by fire like silver and gold. They are heated until the impurities rise to the surface. Those impurities are removed, and then they are heated again and again. That is how you get pure silver or pure gold. A silversmith knows his silver is ready when he can see his reflection in the silver. I had heard that…and it sounded nice…but now I have lived that. I know what it is to be in the refiner’s fire. To have a situation reveal an area of my life that must be removed, dealt with. Then to go through the process over and over. I know I am not done yet, but at the end of all of this testing, my heart’s prayer is that Christ will see His likeness in me.  After all that’s what Romans 8 says – God wants to conform us to the image of His Son. So all of the things that happen to me, happen to bring me closer to Him and make me more like Him. When I keep this perspective, I can be grateful for the fire.

“Let the treasures of the trial form within me as I go – and at the end of this long passage, let me leave them at Your throne.” Treasures of the trial. That seems almost oxymoronic.  How can there be treasures in the trial? But I am learning that those lessons learned, those hard-fought battles won, those glimpses of God’s grace, those intimate moments with God that are mine alone and no one else will probably ever understand the significance of – that I never would have known without the trial – those are forming within me a faith that is unshakeable, a peace that is unbreakable, and a joy that no one can take from me. Those are treasures. And someday, I will lay all of that down at the feet of my Lord because He is the One who gave them to me. This journey is all about Him.

“Jesus, Draw me ever nearer…” This is my prayer. I want to be closer to Him today than I was a year ago. A month from now, I want to be even closer. A year from then, even closer.  Without the storm, I took Him for granted. I didn’t need Him, or at least, I didn’t know how much I needed Him.  Thank You, Lord, for this storm. “When the midnight meets the morning, Let me love You even more…”

Help! I've fallen....and I Can't Get Up!

I think it’s a pretty safe bet that if I had told you to finish this line, “Help, I’ve fallen, and I                                              !” that you would have been able to fill in the blanks – “Can’t get up.”  I don’t know anyone who has actually bought a life alert necklace, but we’ve made fun of the commercial for years, used it in skits, quoted it when we’ve fallen ourselves.  I thought of it this week from a new perspective.  It came to my mind as I was thinking about Christ and His ministry on earth. I thought of all the people He encountered who could not “get up” by themselves.  Sometimes it was a physical condition like the man by the pool of Bethesda who was lame. Others had actually died – Jairus’ daughter, the son of the widow of Nain, Lazarus. Then there are others who “fell” spiritually – the woman caught in adultery and thrown at Jesus’ feet, Peter losing faith as he walked on water…and later as he denied that he even knew who Christ was.   Some of them went looking for Christ (like Jairus), others He simply encountered (the widow in Nain) as He traveled.  The adulterous woman didn’t have any choice- she was thrown at His feet as her captors picked up stones with which to kill her.  Their stories are all so different, and yet there is one common thread – Christ raised them up when they were unable to do anything for themselves.  One after another, as you read through the Gospels, you encounter person after person after person who needed Christ to lift them up. What’s amazing to me is how compassionately He did it. He never complained, never said, “Again? Really???” We read no accounts of His begrudging healing, or forgiveness with a dash of condemnation.  I think it is the ones who had fallen spiritually that give me the most encouragement.  For the Lord of Creation to heal His creation is somewhat natural.  To me, that makes sense.  For a holy, righteous Judge to forgive sin makes no sense.  He could have picked up a stone and joined in the public condemnation of the adulterer.  He could have let Peter sink…or conveniently overlooked him after the Resurrection. I probably would have said something sarcastic like, “I thought you didn’t know me.”  He could have let the Samaritan woman get her water at the well…and let her know who He was while watching her squirm with guilt and shame.  But He didn’t.  And that is grace. It makes no sense, but that is the record we have of Him.  I think, of all of them, the one I identify most with is that woman at His feet.  I know I’ve failed Him. I know I have no excuses and nowhere to hide before Him.  I see others circling with their stones of judgment, ready to slap a label on me and carry out the punishment they feel I deserve for my failures. But then I look to Him, and He says, “Neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more.” The thought is staggering.  I identify with Peter too. How ashamed he must have felt!  You know what? There are times when I’ve failed Him so badly that I’m not even sure how to pray, how to tell Him all that is in my heart. But you know what else? I think that there is a prayer that He will not refuse – “Help. I’ve fallen…and I can’t get up!”  I think that perhaps this is His favorite prayer. His power is revealed in our weakness. His amazing grace is best revealed when our absolute depravity is obvious.  You know, when you boil it down, the fancy sinner’s prayers we quote during soulwinning or invitations, are basically that thought.  Isn’t that what the salvation decision is? Realizing that we are sinful and have no righteousness of our own and are unable to save ourselves? It’s not about the exact words we pray – the thief on the cross only said, “Lord, remember me when You come into your kingdom.” But Jesus said, “Today you will be with me...” He lifted that man up too. He wasn’t baptized. He didn’t go to Sunday School. He didn’t go to the “right”Christian college and carry the “right” version of the Bible.  He just looked to Christ in His final hours acknowledging that he had no hope apart from Him. He had fallen and couldn’t get up. Even as He died on the cross for our sins, Christ was ready for Him.  And He is ready and waiting to reach down and pick us up. In the Life Alert commercials, the woman who pushes the button and calls for help must lie there hoping that help will come quickly. We don’t have to wonder if He will come to save – there’s no question, no “I hope…”  He will save. He will forgive. He will heal. It is His character.  What a comfort that is!  Have you fallen? Have you let Him lift you up?