Sometimes I sound like a broken record as I write these meditations. The same words keep rising to the top of my reading and writing: love, grace, others, and then more love, more grace, and so on. There is no good work, no anointed task, no Christ service, that is not first touched by grace.
Ephesians 4:7, 11-12a
But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. . . . It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God’s people for works of service, . . .
Anything else I do is still, all about me. I tell my teens and now twenty-year-old that the universe does not revolve around their “sun.” But, am I any different really?
Are any of us?
There is a song from the musical, “Dreamgirls,” in which the character, Effie, is dropped from the group and she sings, in between promises from her boyfriend/promoter, “What about me?” “What about what I need?” “What about how I feel?” This song resonated with me during the performance and I know it resonated with anyone who has felt that sense of being cast aside. Where did we miss it? How did we get sucked into this path?
This is still our fear in the face of stepping out on any new trail. Will God really be there? How will I be perceived? What if I fail? What if I am wrong and cast aside again? What if I am missing God?
During today’s sermon, we were asked if we would be willing to “step into the water” while it’s still rushing (based on Joshua 3). Would we step out in faith and trust in the grace?
I have had my share of disappointments in service to God. I’m pretty sure that most of these disappointments came about because I was walking forward with one part of my body while another part was looking back (just to be sure I could get back if I needed to). I always have a fail safe. If this doesn’t work out, I can always . . . [fill in the blank].
On my recent retreat weekend, a woman shared her desire to go into ministry by attending seminary. At first, she tried to do it part-time with the security of her full-time job. But then, she needed to jump in, head to toe. She needed to abandon the way back in order to fully trust the way forward. That is a form of grace.
That is the kind of grace I want to embrace. I think.
Meditations from Zion 
It is part of human nature to be all about us, that enables us to survive, but it is thru the grace God that we ARE GIVEN THE OPPORTUNITY TO TRANSCEND THAT PLAIN and have a journey of growth and as we follow this we will and begin to understand the essence of our exsistence. That is to be outside our ownselves, change the focal point from self to another and ultimately to our Higher power.It is thru spiritual growth that bone leaves the confines of self and via faith that one opens the boundaries of self to a universe of a wealth of experiences. It is here that the blind man can see all and the deaf man can hear ,not only the voices of himself but of others and the whispers of GOD.
Follow your path and the answers shall appear as to where and how your dreams come to be.