Steps of Authority.

What is this life I've stepped into?

For the first time, I'm running my own race. Not striving to be like anyone else in particular, not following in anyone elses footsteps, but making my own. Step by step with Jesus' instruction, I'm becoming who I'm supposed to be in Christ. Not modeling myself after anyone except my Savior. Not comparing myself with anyone else. I'm just being me. Being who I was designed to be in Christ. It's a glorious freedom.

I love Paul's testimony in Galatians 1:11-24. Notice that he didn't immediately turn to flesh and blood or other Christians or apostles for authority, but received it strictly from Christ, for three years in a desert of Arabia.

This is my life, now. I feel like I'm just visiting, but this is really it. For the next three years, ironically, I'll be here practically on my own. Allowing the Lord to instruct my ways, allowing Him to prepare me for my Damascus - for wherever it is He'll take me to next. God wants us to mature. He wants us to grow up. He wants us to be wise and discerning. He wants us to be full of the Spirit, to walk in the Spirit, to be changed by the Spirit, and to have a blast doing it all for His glory.

 What the heck is going to take place in three years?! Who the heck am I going to be in three years?!

My typical school day so far has been: get up early, make my bed, walk to DeMoss, order my coffee, pick out a table, pray and then study the Word before my day begins. Do you know how much of a miracle that is? Do you know how amazing it is to start your day off like that? Not out of obligation or routine, not because so-and-so does it that way, but just because you can't help but do anything else until you've invited God into your day that way.

I have such a strong desire to learn worship. To learn what it really is from a biblical point of view, to learn more about Who it is we worship, and why. If there's one thing I've learned about worship, it's that it's all about Christ and His Word. That's it. It's not about feelings, emotional highs, or hitting the praise button. Those things can become our god so easily - they can become our authority, what we seek, what we desire, what we use to determine our hearts, and our standing with God - but God says our hearts are deceitful above all things and that we can't trust them.

I want Christ. For whoever He has revealed Himself and His Father to be within the Scriptures. I don't want a spiritual high. I want truth. I want something permanent and everlasting. I just want Him. To walk away and say that He alone is good and never simply, "worship was good this morning."

Oh, how much different the world would be, how much different we would be - if we never took our gaze off of Jesus' face - if we ran our own race, with Him and Him alone guiding our every step. With Him being our only authority. Would the world see us and hear us and glorify God because of us, just as they did because of Paul? (Gal. 1:24)