Punching Through

Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi.  I originally posted this as a Facebook note, but decided to put it here, too...

2nd service today, we were singing the bridge 'Show us, show us your glory, Show us, show us your power, show us, show us your glory, Lord...'  and somewhere around the third repeat I heard in my spirit:

Do you really know what you're asking for here?

Suddenly, I experienced one of those moments when I realized that what I thought I was doing wasn't what I was doing at all. Of course, I was earnest in my desire to see God's power and glory, but how blithely I was expressing it...as if a revealing of God's glory and power would be something to see; as if the measure of God's glory and power that I have experienced in my life were the total of what He has and I'm just asking for a second helping.

Do you really know what you're asking?

There was a dangerous edge to that, a 'count the cost' connotation.

Because when we really see God's glory and power, nothing about our lives will be remotely the same.

'Show us your glory/show us your power' is sort of the same as saying 'take my life totally apart and turn it inside out and throw away anything that makes me feel safe and remind me just how NOT IN CONTROL OF ANYTHING I really am.'

And that's putting it mildly.

I remembered an article I'd recently read about a storm chaser, a article that had a bit of the science of severe weather in it.  "Warm, moist air rises until it hits warm, dry air --the cap.  If the moist air becomes warmer than the cap, it can punch through it explosively." 

In a flash, I saw that my requests to see God's glory and power were hitting a cap.  "It's unbelief, isn't it?"  I prayed. "Help my unbelief!"

But the response I got back knocked me back.

No, it's not unbelief.  The cap is your comfort zone.  When your desire for God's manifest presence becomes greater than your desire to keep life safe, simple and comfortable...that's when the punch through will come.

As I related this to My Sweet Babboo on the drive home from church, he reminded me of a story that teacher Steve Thompson related about asking to see God's glory...and actually getting the tiniest glimpse of something supernatural.  As Steve told the story, he came to himself about two hours later, driving down the road repeating, 'God, don't kill me!  God, don't kill me!'

Do I really want to see God's glory and power, knowing it will take me to places I can't imagine and cost more than I can calculate in terms of anything the world values?  Recognizing that the folks who DID see God's glory and power in biblical days were misunderstood, judged, outcast, abused and even killed?  That to whom much is given, much is required...and the glory and power of God comes with profound responsibility to handle the revelation correctly?  That the concept of 'comfortable' will become foreign?

Do I really know what I'm asking?

But, having seen the choice, how could I choose anything other than to tell my screaming selfish nature to talk to the hand, put my head down and say, 'No, Lord, I don't know.  But I want it just the same.  Teach me how to punch through to the other side of comfortable and walk where I don't care if I'm comfortable or not.'