Day 3695 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

Hebrews 12:11 NIV

Later on.

For such is where love looks as it seeks incessantly the very best which is always but a belief in something better than the already. Yes, all such things as love and the mercy which makes it so mighty and too the grace that changes not nightly are evidence of the evident in that there is a reason for all of this for we’d have neither such good works by which to strive nor then a better place toward which to fight were it not for the better that He’s placed within every human heart.

But that it’s always there says to me that so is He.

For why else would any try? Why would any drive any further down what’s often felt such a dead end street that we’ve often times found our feet feeling this fear that’s found us running home to the same shame known from all those times we gave up and got scared before? Considering such fear as found within our frowns refusing to turn upside down unless the clouds disperse and our dreams roll in, what then are we to make of the many more moments in which our dreams are lost in the desert and our doctor says we need to ease up on the dessert for our longevity’s sake?

What is any such worry as that commonly won upon our life’s longevity if this life is nothing more than just a misery meant to keep coming in those many ways we wish not to win anymore?

Yes, if all of this is nothing but the struggle we feel and the strife we feel cut daily a knife right to the heart of nearly our every hope, well then why continue to go? Why keep pushing ahead punching at the air that is this dare to do this all over again should tomorrow be as presumed as our penchant for assumptions prove once more? For indeed, we all daily do the same things as the many days before assuming then that our every tomorrow will prove but a repetition of this today in which we know we’ll feel fear and face failure.

And if so, well, how then can anything mean anything more enough to measure up to that distant hope that is always held just a little out of sight within that night that we daren’t swim for out of the fear of our fascination with the darkness proving us wrong once again? For we all know that all who do wrong are preferential toward those shadows which say they’ll help to conceal that which we want not any to see, leaving us among those all of us who love the dark and refuse then the light for its plight back toward an honest humility.

Yet so too do many fear that very same darkness for all the deceit and danger it may well hold in wait for that coming day when all that’s so concealed is too seen by all.

Yes, we both love the dark for the ease it affords in covering our tracks into those choices we can’t take back, but we too fear it so as we know it goes only deeper into the worry over it letting us down as everything else in this life seems to have by now. For that, I think, is the grandest expectation of this life spent far from the vacations and vocations that we’d so violently prefer. It’s that worry awarded within our warding off the inevitable despite that we know it impossible to accomplish.

The inevitable in life being both struggle and strife as seen by all already a million times or more. And thus then our assumption of tomorrow proving but today all over again must mean then that our lives are bound to remain in what is this far from better that we’ve already found on this side of the whether.

Because that’s a harsh reality itself seen inside our fear of the dark and thus dancing for joy only in the light of day. It’s that which seems to say that we’ve found the easiest of paths as fancied for its comparative ease as found in living a repeat of the already known and long enough been. But then our continuing to do nothing new leaves us making the same choice we’ve always made at the then continued expense of those many we’ve never had the interest in even admitting an option.

Thus we know only this side of every whether or not, meaning then the not is what all we’ve not ever known.

What could it have been? Where could it have gone? Who might we have become by now if we’d not known all those worried reasons to not go where the narrow road asked us to try? Yes, what haven’t we tried thinking that our ride here was supposed to be as deceptively easy as everyone else fights to make theirs seem? And haven’t we yet seen the irony in this? That we fight so hard to make our life look easy? So much effort given unto making our journey seem to others effortless?

Kind of playing ourselves for the fool, are we not?

Indeed, I dare say we have because I know we have dreamed up so many excuse seeking to excuse our refuse of anything that seems even in any way hard or heavy or any other such measure of hopeful. Yes, we’ve become a people who can quite easily be convinced that hope itself is a burden too heavy to bear. Either because it’s just too far from near or because it asks us to walk then ever-toward it along whatever paths He’s promised it waiting.

Then there’s that.

Yes, from waiting to worry we’ve won a wonderful many ways to remain dazed and confused as to the paths we lose for the sake of the trees we see. I always wondered what that little figure of speech meant whenever I heard it as a kid. Losing the forest for the trees. And yet as here I sit upon this bettered side of many such a grove I’ve come to know that it’s about missing the message for sake of the meanings we assume along the way.

Mistaking then the destination for the discipline that makes us ready to arrive.

Indeed, we do seem to hate that heaviest of idea too, discipline. In reality it’s nothing more than the devotion to do what’s needed in regard to any matter or measure of growth, potential, purpose even. For in truth the word discipline is but an idea defined as an effort to “train or develop by instruction and exercise especially in self-control.” Just seem to lose sight of all the first part of all that because of that blasted last word.

For control is the one thing we want whilst always the one we lack most.

Leaving us then only to know the other version of discipline which is a similar effort, only one given unto the understanding that to develop often entails the need “to punish or penalize for the sake of enforcing obedience and perfecting moral character.”

Yes, we like the idea of training as we like how it looks to those many we seek to please by our efforts given unto the vanity of looks. And too we equally despise the way of life lived obliged to uphold obedience as offered He from us in the effort we effuse unto “perfecting moral character.” Confusing refuse and effuse perhaps the problem. Effuse being the giving off of something we thus have to give whereas refusing is the denial of something we don’t have and clearly don’t want either.

Thus leaving us once again quite the confused batch of doubters and dreamers in that we want to look good to those who live life looking for what they see but alas we don’t want to feel as bad as punishment always seems. And so what then are we to do when we’ve left to a choice such as this in which we haven’t a clear winner to pick? For both sides of this eternal divide have their own share of issues. Either we’ll do less and thus less find or we’ll find more but only by more enduring.

I guess then you really do get what you pay for.

And this is right where my own walk seems to have struggled mightily in the past in that I’ve proven myself time and again to be of them who run away when life gets hard. I get angry, upset, frustrated at the wheels set in motion but also against me sometimes. For in truth such is truly how this life works, always moving forward into the unknown and thus bound to bring about a great many lessons and growths, but alas their pains too.

Thus we live as if discipline might actually inflict physical misery should we try even a little too hard for what all we can always only hope.

For such is what every better is, is it not?

Just a hope? A goal? A getting of us to that somewhere else that we’ve never seen, never known, never been? But how do we get to those places we’ve never been and those people we’ve yet to be if not but by some path we’ve never taken or an effort we’ve never tried? And how can we so see something unto its finality if not we embrace the chase that comes always to waste our want to stay the same for the sake of the trees we see? For when we see struggle we also see reason to avoid it.

When does that mean then for all that’s just beyond it?

That’s always where better is, isn’t it? Just beyond the breaking of a broken life? Just beyond the darkest of a darkened night? Just a little past the passed away by then? Indeed, such is truly what every measure of better means for every such growth is always but a hope held beyond the hardships that every hope is willing to welcome if they mean us closer to where we’ve the faith to believe. But just how much of such a faith do we have to show?

Or can faith be seen by a people blinded to any hope held out longer than a day or two? For we seem always well at the ready to give up on just about anything and everyone anytime any of it or they ask of us more than we’re willing to wager upon the winning of what may seem just not worth the fight that all faith truly is. But yet is not faith also in a way a matter seen inside the every discipline that we’ve come to assume as only punishment?

Is it not inspiring to see someone keep trying despite all that’s stacked against their success? Are we not encouraged by those with stories told of overcoming addictions to anything from alcohol to anger? Do not those little kids on the Shriner’s commercial bring something of a joyful tear to the eye knowing that they’ve not yet found that why in regard to their giving up and not trying anymore?

Does not that same tear tear to the marrow when met in that measure of such a quit that we’ve found despite our not going through any of what they have to?

Yes, such things inspire me in ways I never knew I always needed them to. Same then said of the rain, the storm, the struggle, the strife, the many desert places designed into this life through which He calls us to come unto the dare that there really is something better out there. Somewhere. Somehow. Some day. Yes, it’s always something that asks us to try more, to do better, to come just a little further into the juts and gists of life lived so often in mists of mayhem and misunderstanding.

But friends, the truth is that we can only ever know what if only we’ve the guts to go where it is. Problem is that we always want to know what it is before we set out. We always ask for a sign of sorts that seems to show that something we think we need to know in regard to the outcome before we’ll agree to the input of our effort unto the reaching for what may often be impossible to find or feel along the way. And yet the only sign we have is that of Jonah.

It’s just that we’ve long been the ones swallowing the whale of what is a weight of worry in regard to every having to wait, having to wonder, having to wander away from where we are into everywhere we never wanted to be. Thus we are the belly of the beast as borne of doubt and disbelief in any measure of discipline being but determination in action.

That is all it is, you know that right? Discipline is but our doing what needs done so as to reach the dreams we have of things bettered and thus us too. It’s just the doing of what we need to if we’re to get through all that’s only there to help us learn such things as focus and faith. And it is a hard road indeed as a mustard seed is hard to see, especially when held at such as distance as Heaven often seems from where we are right now.

Do we stay? Will we go? Can we grow into that hope that doesn’t believe in such a blessing but in fact knows that this is just the very beginning of that immeasurable kind of everything better as promised unto all those few find that they cannot find the way there, but that even still they needn’t fear because they know that the Way found them already.

And all He asks is the discipline to both be and then go make disciples.

See the forest now?

It’s that found in that a disciple is but a student of a specific study as taught by a particular preacher. It’s those who know that they’ve found something worth fighting to know more about. Thus a disciple is but one who’s of the discipline to keep learning, to keep listening, to keep loving this living and breathing opportunity at the growing in knowledge of everything this teacher has to share.

Alas they also then must have the courage to not care where the teacher leads them but only the trust which believes that they’ll be that better for which they’ve dreamed once they arrive.

Thus we see that discipline is but the audacity to focus on the destination as opposed to the doubt and danger that we’re all going to face no matter where we go. So when do we leave? For honestly friends, that seems just about the only thing we have any say in anymore, same as ever before to be truthful. For life’s never been ours to decide or determine, or even deny for that matter. No, all of this is in fact already unfolding well within His will.

Do we trust said promises as those He’s given us enough to follow them through whatever they lead? Or will we just give up when they bring us to something we don’t want to see?

For make no mistake, giving up will always seem a perfectly reasonable choice to make when the going gets hard and the hope wears then thin. But may we always remember that the ride is about the harvest, not the hardship known in bringing us to such a home as those hopes we have that we didn’t even have to plant.

No, He gave us that freely. But friends, when then should we be willing to give as those to whom so much is given?

Hopefully willingness is worth more than we thought.

#LeaveNoSoulUntold