This morning I walked by the ocean. The sun had just risen and its orange-yellow rays shooting from behind the clouds spoke of hope—of a new day—a fresh start. Those rays bridged miles and reflected on the mirror-like sand by the edge of the sea. The ocean's ceaseless waves rhythmically rolled onto the shore, keeping time with some melody that I could not hear. I wished that I could walk in the edge of the water, but I had kept my shoes on. Once in awhile a particularly aggressive wave would come frolicking up the shore almost seeming to laugh that I would be fearful of a little bit of water around my feet.
This morning I sat by the ocean. It was the ocean in particular that caught the attention of my mind this morning. It is so big, so powerful, so vast. Most of us only ever see the very surface part of it, except in some documentary or photo journal that some fortunate person puts together so the rest of us can get a limited glimpse into something so much bigger than us that we really cannot even comprehend it. There are life forms that we don't see anywhere else on earth. There are depths to which man cannot even venture without extremely specialized equipment. There are so many places under the sea that have not even known the presence of men. Who's to know what is left unexplored or undiscovered?
And then God brought a thought to my mind. How many times do I walk along the edge of the ocean of I AM—the ocean that is God in all His glory, grace, love, power, strength, presence and everything else that composes such an immortal, intangible Being? How many times have I scurried to get away from God as He reached out with a particularly generous wave of His grace or mercy? How many times have I "had my shoes on" and wasn't ready to receive what God had for me right then? How many times was I unprepared or scared of what might happen if got wet?
It is a strange thought that God would allow Himself to be limited…. Surely if He wanted He could just send a extra large wave and wash me right into Himself. And He could, but He has given me, and you, and everyone else a free will. By doing that, God has, in a sense, placed a limit on Himself at least for the time. Anytime you give someone other than yourself a say in anything you are doing, you place limitations on yourself, and that is what God has done with us. It's not that God couldn't just pull us in and make us go the way He wants us to; He could. But He is duty-bound to honor our free will because He gave it to us.
And so, we can go through life jumping every time a wave of God comes near and running up the sand of life any time God reaches out to us.
God will let us do that, but each wave is an invitation—an invitation to step into the water, to go deeper, to allow ourselves to be submerged in the power of Who God is. See, the interesting thing about the ocean is that if you start messing around with it and getting wet, the tendency is just get keep getting wetter. It's some irresistible pull about the ocean that just asks you to come in deeper, and then suddenly a wave comes along that is bigger than you expect….
God is like that. If we will walk closer to Him, close to the edge of the ocean of I AM, He will begin to wash over our lives. And the longer we spend with Him, the more of Him we want. If we will surrender to the power of that ocean, we will be pulled deeper and deeper…. And as we go deeper, we will find things we never knew about, places we have never explored, truths that had never occurred to us, blessings that we had never experienced, grace that we had never needed before, love much greater than any we had ever known, peace that passes all understanding, holiness that we had never previously comprehended or been able to attain; we will be immersed in I AM—an unbounded, infinite, never-ending ocean of holiness and power and awesomeness.
But it all starts with the first step of surrender when I let the ocean wash around my feet and invite me deeper—that first step where I surrender my will to have my way and stay dry….
Beautiful.
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