Key Rings

Here's a little something I've been thinking about for the past few days.

Keys.

I'm working through this amazing book called "What Happens When Women Say Yes to God". In a nutshell it's about radical obedience to God. No, not necessarily selling all my belongings and moving across the world to Africa to spread the gospel to the "utter most parts". But sometimes to change the world all you need to do is walk across the street to your neighbor! More along the lines of keeping myself in a posture of complete surrender and obedience to God.

So, I'm showering and thinking about what I've been reading. Hey, as a Mom, you take the quiet times wherever you can get them...even in the shower! Actually, now that I think about it, it's usually in the shower.

Anyway, I think to myself...AH-HA, the key is obedience. The key to God is obedience.

But wait, haven't I said the same thing about love? If I just had more love then my behavior would be more Christ-like.

And the more I think about it...I realize, I've said that about many things.

The key is faith, just have more faith and my relationship with God grows more intimate.

The key is trust, if I just trust God a little more then that's where I finally get it!

The key, the key, the key.

Like I need a key to unlock the great padlock on the mystery that is God. God says I don't need a key...I just have to knock and He'll open the door.

Okay, then the key is knocking, if I knock a little louder then I'll finally get it.

My thoughts are interrupted....Oh, Dawn, Dawn, I hear a little whisper in my heart. God always says my name twice when he's tickled with my way of thinking. I can just imagine Him sitting(standing, floating, being--however He exists) there slightly shaking his head and saying oh, Dawn, Dawn...there you go again. Bringing me down to your level. I'm much bigger than a key, Dawn.

Isn't that what we like to do? Try to bring things down to our perspective, our understanding, our way to understand it more, to grasp it more. I don't even realize I'm doing it most of the time. Putting God in a box, a neat little box that allows me to pretend I understand His ways. But he tells us clearly that His ways are not our ways, so why do I do this? What compels me to search for the key that is going to unlock the final door to the mystery?

I feel productive when I'm doing that, in all honesty. I like feeling productive. I feel validated when I'm productive. I feel useful and secure when I'm productive. I feel worthy when I'm productive.

Humph, well, there you go. When I'm able to put God in my neat little box of understanding or I'm able to put another key on my key ring of who God is, then I feel in control and I feel worthy.
But when I do that, I miss it all. I miss everything. I'm worthy simply because He calls me His own. I'm secure under His protection. I'm validated because He chose to die for me.

So I whisper back to Him, you're right God. Just like I shouldn't try to fit you into a box, I don't want to put you on a key ring either. There's so much more to who you are than that.


And because God is really funny....He says right back....And Dawn, don't you always lose your keys anyway?