Loving Union + A Couple Of Confessions.

"If it was necessary for Jesus to have...an ongoing relationship with the Father, we'd have to be delusional to think we could skim on investing our hidden life in God without experiencing long term consequences." Peter Scazzero, The Emotionally Healthy Leader

I know I've made numerous comments against the book reports that I'm required to do for my internship, but I now publicly retract those distasteful comments, because I find that the majority of my blog post inspiration comes while I'm working on those book reports.

Am I making that public confession because both Joey and Norton read my blog posts? Yes. Hahaha, not at all, actually. That's really just a bonus of the fact that this is public.

My view from the chalet on Mont-Royal (in Montréal) on Sunday.

As someone who's interning for a church, I'm constantly having to remember that there's a difference between spending time with God on my own, and spending time with Him for something that's work-related. 

This truth was made known to me multiple times over the four years that I was at Bible college. Those of you who attended the same college as me can likely remember Dr. Barker saying, "There is no substitute for a genuine relationship with God". Or it was something along those lines that he would always say.

The second public confession in this post is that I struggle with that.

And I struggled with it during my four years at Bible college! I'd fall into the skewed mindset of 'I'm in Bible college, for goodness sake! I'm learning about God in my classes and reading the Bible for my homework assignments. It's all good. 👍🏼' 

But it was not all good the narrator said. I quickly forgot the words of Dr. Barker; I was substituting work-related spiritual things in place of personal loving union with God.

I'm (still) reading through The Emotionally Healthy Leader for an internship book report and I was recently reading a chapter that was all about having loving union with God. Scazzero defines "loving union as":

"to lovingly allow God to have full access to your life." (Scazzero, 120)

And he goes on to say,

"We allow the will of God to have full access to every area of our lives, including every aspect of our leadership - from difficult conversations and decision-making to managing our emotional triggers. Cultivating this kind of relationship with God can't be hurried or rushed. We must slow down and build into our lives a structure and rhythm that makes this kind of living surrender routinely possible." (120; emphasis added) 

For the past few weeks I've been working on building into my life a structure and rhythm that makes a full surrender relationship with God and loving union with Him possible.

I charge my phone across the room so that I can't reach it in the morning when I first wake up.

I have my Bible and journal right next to my bed so that I can reach for them in the morning when I first wake up.

Smart, right? It's funny because those are such small and simple things to do, but it's made my loving union with God just that much more effective, because spending time with Him is the first thing that I'm choosing to do as soon as I wake up.

It's true however, that in order to still get out the door for work on time in the morning, I have to wake up earlier than I initially intend to. I've still been a little bit late for things a few times over the past few weeks because I didn't plan into my morning routine that I'd need an extra half hour. I'm workin on that though.

And suuure, I could still be sleeping for that extra half hour, but I find that once I spend that half hour with God, I feel awake and energized and I'm like, 'Alrighty, lets get up, get dressed, and GET READY FOR THIS DAY.' Because being in loving union with God is the most energizing and joy-giving thing that I can do.

Oh and also, it's called I-plan-ahead-and-go-to-bed-earlier-so-that-I-still-get-the-adequate-amount-of-sleep-that-I-need. Duh.

And if you feel like this "build into [your] life a structure and rhythm that makes this kind of living surrender routinely possible" is a huge thing being added into your daily routine, consider this (120):

"I am not asking you to add one more item to your already over-burdened schedule. I am asking you to make a U-turn and rearrange your life around [in] an entirely new way." (133)

That's what I've been doing and as I said before: it's such a small and simple thing to do! You need to prioritize and manage your time well in order to rearrange your life in a way that gives you time for loving union with God.

To conclude this post, here are a few more things that Peter Scazerro said in chapter four of The Emotionally Healthy Leader that I found to be helpful/motivational/inspiring:

"I seek to be silent in God's presence for twenty minutes a day. When I do it, I am calmer and less anxious when I am active. If twenty minutes seems too much, consider starting with two to five minutes and work your way up from there." (139; emphasis added)

"In my own practice, I meditate each day on a passage from one of the Gospels so I might know Jesus better." (139)

"Unless I am receiving and relying on God's love all through the day, I have nothing of lasting value to give." (136; emphasis added) 

"Stopping three to four times a day for brief times of prayer creates a meaningful rhythm for my days." (136)