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UNDAUNTED
For a few very hard years this word was my mantra.
The word means
-undismayed; not discouraged; not forced to abandon purpose or effort
-undiminished in courage or valor; not giving way to fear
But the truth is, I was often dismayed by everything that had taken place, and I did battle discouragement. I battled fear and doubts. I hurt and was angry, and sometimes "undaunted" sounded more like a mockery than a mantra, and I was determined to be real about all of it in these posts, thus the name, Undaunted Reality. More than that, though, I was determined to live undaunted, not because I'm so great or strong, but because my God is, and no matter what this world looks like, He is the only reality that matters.
I pray I live the reality of Him beautifully undaunted.

Saturday, December 15, 2012

Finding Relevance--What is Relevant?

When I finished writing that last post, I sat here awhile and thought about Jesus finding people. I just kept thinking about the woman at the well (story below). She was a Samaritan, which meant the Jews thought she was trash, and she shacked up with a list of men, so her people thought she was trash. This woman who was the community gossip column.

She was so tired of the stares and jeers and cutting comments that she waited until all other women had come to the well and gone home before she snuck up there by herself. I doubt she strolled up there, whistling a happy toon. I think she probably walked with her eyes down, her body rolled in trying to make herself small, trying to be as small a target as possible.

I think she was used to feeling man's hands on her, but she never really knew the feel of love.

I think in many ways she was a shell, numb, empty. She had given the best of her, and now she was simply a person trying to get through the day until...she didn't know what. Things were never going to get better.

Then this Jewish man shows up at the well one day and asks her for a drink, and her world is rocked.

Not only does He not care that she is a Samaritan, He doesn't care that she has lived with multiple men and is living with one now. In fact, He is unconcerned with her past or her present circumstance.

His only concern...she is empty...and He has what it takes to fill her.

So why did He mention her past?

Because He wanted her to know He knew her. He wanted her to know He already knew the worst and darkest. He already knew the ugly...and it had no relevancy at all.

He wanted to silence that voice in the back of her mind that likes to torment with, "If He really knew...If He knew everything...There is no way He could want or love someone with a past like that. He could never love or want someone like you."

He told her right up front, "I already know everything, and I want you anyway. I knew all that when I started walking toward you, and I came here just for you. I know how empty you are. I know how life has drained you. I know what you have given away, and instead of making me turn the other direction, it made me walk right straight to you."

For Jesus, the only thing relevant was her need.

The very thing that made others walk away from her is what made Jesus go find her.

We are strange critters, we humans. We go to doctors when we are sick because they are doctors and we are sick. Their whole purpose is to make sick people well. It is what they want to do, so when we go to them sick, we never expect them to berate us, "You know it is flu season. You didn't have the sense to get a flu shot? Then, honey, you are on your own. I don't have time to deal with idiots who know better than to skip a flu shot and then get sick because they are dumb. I only take care of people who do all the right things--like wash their hands, wear masks, get immunizations, take vitamin C, exercise daily, eat right--and don't even get me started on that number on that scale out there. YOU have obviously not gotten it right or you wouldn't be sick, so no, I have no desire to help you."

Sure. We expect them to mention the blood pressure, the weight, the option of a flu shot, but good grief, they are here to help us. Even if it a lifelong smoker battling lung cancer, we expect the doctor to try to help us.

That is what they do. It is who they are!

All of the other stuff is irrelevant.

THE ONLY RELEVANT FACT IS WE ARE SICK AND IN NEED OF A DOCTOR!

But when the Great Physician shows up, we get ashamed of the fact we are sick because we didn't take the flu shot. We're ashamed of the cancer our lifestyle has caused. We are ashamed of how sick we are, and surely, if He knows...

He knows what we forget.

The only thing relevant is that we are sick...and HE is the cure.

 And when He seeks us out, when He sits down at our place of loneliness, when He walks into that place no one else will go with us, it isn't because He doesn't know us...It's because He does.


......

John 4

New International Version (NIV)

Jesus Talks With a Samaritan Woman

Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John 2 although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. 3 So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.
 
4 Now he had to go through Samaria. 5 So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.

7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)

10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

16 He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”

17 “I have no husband,” she replied.

Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. 18 The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”

19 “Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

21 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

25 The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”

26 Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”

39 Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. 41 And because of his words many more became believers.

42 They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”

2 comments:

  1. Jerri, I sit here sobbing as I read this. Today, this message, the way you unraveled it with words from your heart the way He loves us. How He sees us. How He wants to fill us and not hold all the secrets and hurts against us... You have blessed me abundantly today and broken these chains that started to form again these last few days. So, thank you for this Truth. His Truth! Love you bunches & tons! xoxo

    ReplyDelete
  2. MizzBrizz,
    Speechless.
    In awe of Him.
    I am sit-down-and-just-be-amazed-speechless.
    LOVE YOU WHOLE HEART DEEP

    ReplyDelete