Jesus Wild Thing I think I Love You...because You First Loved Me!

This past week has been an interesting week the Flu I came down with last Saturday continued to kick my tail most of the week. However when I wasn't sleeping and making sure I got some nourishment and plenty of fluids I got to spend some time reading blogs I learn from and others I simply enjoy. I found Milt Rodriguez's blog and read an entry he wrote on November 16th of this year titled Lions Set Free which resonated with much of what I am learning to live daily. Milt Rodriguez is also the author of several books, but the one I recommend every one read is The Butter Fly Within You.

These last several months I have been learning that I do not have a clue about what it really means to live in unrestrained, completely free, and totally abandoned relationship with Jesus. I have also begun seeing or perhaps acknowledging what I have always known and that is that Jesus is wild not tame. He cannot and will not be contained in the cages or kept in captivity (institutions, systems, and programs) that we/I attempt to put him in.

Jesus is the Lion of the Tribe of Judah not a domesticated house cat (See: Revelation 5:5) ! I am learning that doing activities like prayer at a set time, reading the Bible, and all the other so called spiritual disciplines do not by virtue of doing them constitute relationship with Jesus. He does not play nice and come be part of our rituals.

I am not married, but if I were and if my wife had to discipline herself daily to spend time with me, talk to me, get to know me I am certain I would not feel loved. Those are the things that prayer, Bible reading/study/meditation, etc. are for in our relationship with God folks and if we have to discipline ourselves daily to do those things I do not believe Father, Son, and Holy Spirit want that anymore then we do from spouses, family, friends, or neighbors. Just thinking about that frankly gives me the creeps. YUK!

For several years I believed that God wanted me to set aside time everyday for prayer, Bible, meditation, etc. I spent a season lasting several years in my late teens and early 20's getting up before 5:00 a.m. every morning to pray 3 hours or more a day and do all that other stuff. Yet I was still living a self-indulgent habitual destructive secret lifestyle. I had continued until approximately 6 months ago to practice "spiritual disciplines" according to various systems and programs I had learned in church and Bible College and when I did not do those things, I felt shame and fear.

I still have a tendency toward religion instead of relationship as a result I actually am tempted to not openly admit the following for fear of man and temptation toward shame and fear. For the past 4 months I have grown in authentic relationship with God more then I have in years and yet I no longer practice spiritual disciplines matter of fact I sometimes go days without reading my bible, having a "quiet time," studying/reading/meditating scripture and I have had no set time for prayer daily. However, my communication with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit has become far more constant. I now experience far less shame and fear of losing Fathers love, favor and approval. Matter of fact I have even felt led by the Holy Spirit not to do those things when I start feeling a sense of obligation toward them.

There is nothing you and I can do to earn relationship with Father that was accomplished by Jesus at the cross. We do not now, never have, and never will deserve it however if we have placed faith in Christ and are therefore in Him we have relationship with Father as fully loved, accepted, and chosen adopted sons and daughters and are co-heirs of the Son's inheritance. We are in Christ, and He is in us we simply need to learn to live in that way. True relationship cannot be built in captivity it is built in the wild by simply learning to remain in increasing communication with God in daily life with Christ being the Center of everything. We are meant to do things with God instead of for him. (See Romans 8:1,17)

No genuinely deep relationship with anyone happens by disciplining ourselves to spend time with those we love. Regardless whether with a spouse, family, the Body of Christ, neighbors, or God meaningful and healthy relationship does not develop by following a system. It grows by spending time together, enjoying each other, doing things together, and going through things together in the wilderness of living, playing, working, etc.