I like books where it is hard for me to mark anything up because I am so busy devouring it to pieces I do not have time to stop with a pen to underline a sentence for the .04 seconds it takes. But I will recap with the few underlines I have that might not make sense without knowledge of the surrounding text, but oh well. I love this book.
"It is hard for us to rest in God, because it is hard for us to trust."
"...life where we walk with the God who is surprising, dangerous, mysterious, alongside us though we fail to recognize him, then disappearing the minute we do."
"Of course he isn't safe. But he's good."
"There is no other stream."
"What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us."
"Disciples follow Him, bewildered as they often are"
"When all God intends is for us to speak friend and enter."
"Wait, God says. Be Patient. It will all work out in the end."
"The only people for whom this comes as a word of consolation are those who are not presently suffering."
"The righteous, he says, will live by faith"
"I've learned from Justine one of my best and deepest lessons yet as a pastor, as a Christian, as a man: the need to know God so well that, even though He slay me, yet will I worship Him.
Because He's good."
I just read the title for the next chapter is The Testimony of Leaves God's Faithfulness.
I am so itching to read it!! This last October I experienced my first "God Leaf". I just loved it so much and everytime I hear anything about leaves I think of the glory and beauty of God. It made me re fall in love with the season of Fall. That leaf spoke to me on the...
Can I just stop now and tell you I am crying. God is so amazing and beautiful and ohhhh! Okay. I have to share this is so amazing and it may be so mixed up but I will share anyways. Oh I love my God and all he does and shows me. Seriously. Let me begin by writing my journal entry word for word from October 26, 2008 while I was on the Watershed retreat with a group of girls from Lighthouse.
Jeremiah 32:16-35
God yesterday on our walk you made a leaf stand out to me. I placed it in my Bible knowing full well you would speak to me through where that leaf was placed. It was as I was praying to understand who I really am. Than as I went to read it later that night I saw the title Jeremiah Prays for Understanding. I was thrilled with joy and excitement to read yet you told me not yet. This morning as I opened up my Bible you allowed me to read that passage and I am moved. The way you responded to Jeremiah felt like you were speaking directly to my heart and I praise and adore your active and living word for that. Nothing is too big for you God! Nothing is too hard for you God. I feel humbled and amazed by that knowing in that you are questioning me. "Is it too easy for me? Is it too small for me?" I love having the confidence that nothing is too big for you God and nothing is too small either! Glory and Praise to you! That is a beautiful and assuring thought! I will cling to that.
Backtrack to the middle of the sentence I stopped in. I peeked and I just read a page into that chapter I was so anxious to read and come upon this...
"I have never thanked God for a single leaf. Which is the problem with faithfulness: We hardly notice it. Faithfulness is, by definition, the predictable, the habitual, the sturdy, the routine."
Then I cried at how many times God can speak to me through one single leaf in the past three months. I love him. So I went back into Jeremiah to find exactly what it was and I read the underlined verse of 32:41 "I will rejoice in doing them good, and I will plant them in this land in faithfulness, with all my heart and all my soul." (ps. last chapter was that God is good if you didn't pick up from the quotes). Than I cried more and sought out my journal entry for that date and found it and that is why I love journaling! I love my Jesus. I cannot get enough of him. I have ten hours with lovely children tomorrow and need my rest but oh how I hate closing my bible and calling it a night........Plus a refilled on tea and have some more to finish :)
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