Day 3887 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

Isaiah 1:21 NIV

What left?

For you see, it’s entirely commonplace to within this place focus on only what we’ve found with our efforts and intrigues as given unto getting what we want from this place. All of life is anymore a matter of an almost deliberately debilitating determination to do as we please seeking only what pleases us. And as this approach to life has become our life, as well as that being lived en masse by the masses around us, what we seem to have found is that we assume life is to be defined by what we find in life.

Leaving then the living of to be at best an afterthought thought about only after the aftermath of what our arrogance can never see coming on the backside of what is our way of living our life.

No, all our arrogance can realize is just the way of life we’ve come to live but through only our eyes looking to satisfy what is a depth of delight so very deep that it’s both defended and defunded by all that we see. And indeed, this approach to our existence makes it an undertaking that is in pretty much every way quite relatively easy when compared to the alternative simplicity of having nothing and being happy. And it’s easier because we can no more fathom having nothing than we can the fact that we’re losing something in order to have what we do.

Simply because we’ve become quite perfectly convinced that life exists as something of a bottomless pit into which we can throw our every trophy and triumph seeking to amass enough of them that they can then come to become what life is all about. It’s about the filling, this feeling of the emptiness inside sent reeling as it sits seeing all of this more of something more that we fight to ensure every new day has in store. We just want more and the wanting has overcome, overruled our ability to realize that such is not life.

For life is neither about what we have nor then this now general approach to our living of it seeking to find within it the places in which to put all the prizes and prosperity that we seek so clearly.

Rather it’s about what we believe in as such is what we’ll be judged by when upon that day we’re found face-to-face with He who is our Father and that whether or not we’d ever lived like He was. And this is where our gluttony and greed have come to spring from what were at first planted as seeds of things seen inside scenes consistently shown of all of the lives amongst whom we’ve grown that have themselves grown so wild and wide that we too have come to assume that such is what we too should do.

To seek the very same ever more, and that but forevermore, that everyone else is too seeking to seek and then store inside of their souls which have thus had to sell what was inside in order for their to find all of this room that has come to be defined as the emptiness which both propels us if not impels us to continue ahead in this thinking in head of all the ways to get all the things that our hearts have come to hope we’ll have.

Life here is all about how much we want and our days then a daily fight to find as much as we might.

But when the focus become the more we want, it’s altogether easy to forget that we’ve not any room left in which this more can fit. It’s easy for us to overlook the overfilled when all we hope to find is something we apparently perceive as being better than all the whatever that we already have. And that’s the problem. It’s that in order for us to continue to want, well what we have to do is to come unto this ability to discount what is already.

We have to reach this place in which that which was once itself a prize we prioritized becomes but an expendable accessory that thus means nothing near as much as this other stuff that all at once means so much more.

Because, again, such is the definition of nearly every life’s purpose anymore.

It’s nothing more than that constant search for so much more.

But friends, the issue is that we’ve but only so much time, so much attention, so much effort and intention to be given away before we’ve simply run out of all the above. Because contrary to how we’ve so clearly come to live, life is not this bottomless pit that we’ve made of it. Our hearts are not to be hotels in which things check in as mattering but for a moment before they leave and are replaced by other things that then matter more simply because they opened the door or we opened it unto them.

Indeed, our hearts have become these most fantastical freeways along which we pass by so many stories that become then strangers as we’re so focused on where we’re trying to go in order to get what we’re filled with hope in our coming to have that we have left no ability to really even care what all we miss along the way.

We just keep going as if so firm within our knowing that this next ideal idol will be finally the one that is found in firmness in regard to meaning that we’ll never again be needing to head back out and come back down into that constant searching for something more.

We’re all so adamant that life’s only best lived when our houses, our apartments are so filled with stuff that we can barely get inside them ourselves.

But friends, as I asked yesterday, what’s left of us now from all of this working in worry and want as is done seeking to win what’s wanted within what is a world that is indeed filled with so much that so many want so badly that they too think it a need? What’s left of what we once had before we had this idea planted in our hearts, in our heads that led us to become so convinced that more is better and thus lesser is nothing? What’s left of the hopes we had as were once not defined by what we have but rather who we could be and where we could go?

Indeed, what’s left of all those places and people we’ve never been as we simply didn’t see reason to keep hold of them back then?

And perhaps even worse, what left along the way to where and what we are today?

Because you see, all along this way in which we’ve walked so wearied by want, what’s happened is that, as our focus has shifted unto the sifting through what are ashes in progress, we’ve progressed well past the point of no return. And that simply because our every inkling is anymore unto this tinkering with our understanding as to what matters most. And indeed, this very idea is anymore so allowed to shift that it does just that all but every day.

For every day we in every way come to think of something more than what we have which then becomes the something next that we seek to fill our nest assuming that it will prove to both matter and thus mean so much more than what we gave to get it that we’ll perhaps never even have to wonder as to what was given to have it. No, for that too is a symptom of our by no means new direction.

And it’s not new because this has been the way of life lived by all of mankind throughout all of time. It’s literally the Garden of Eden story. Man has always wanted that something more that someone else told them they should. And yet nowadays the devil doesn’t even have to slither around whispering in our ears about fruit and stuff. Instead he can just sit back and let us continue watching tv commercials filled with novel ideals that would indeed probably make living life something done far more simply if we had it in hand.

Then all of the sudden you look up and find yourself having garage sales in which strangers rummage through what you’ve determined is garbage that’s no longer worth being had.

And all the while all the time that you spent trying to find what you’re now just hoping someone else will buy so that you can feel a little better than you probably would just throwing it away is something that we’ve all so come to forsake that we have all but no recollection of it slipping away at all.

Rather, to us, time is itself something of a bottomless pit from which we can continue to draw however much we need in order to find ourselves unto that one day of our coming to be finally able to live this life as fully as we’ve ironically never been able to find just yet. And that despite all we have found within it. And that, you’d think, would be enough to cause us to pause our many pursuits for our many priorities just long enough to ask ourselves if they’re truly worth whatever it is to which we hope they’ll lead.

But no, no rather we just continue to go all but full-speed ahead in our ongoing willingness to sacrifice, surrender, leave all but dead whatever it takes to get us wherever we need to go in order to get whatever we today hope to have.

And every day is just the same.

Because all of life is all about what we have, and that so much that we’ve all but forgotten all that we’re losing or leaving behind in order to continue to find whatever it is that we’re still looking for. And oddly enough, as if for once, my question for today isn’t what it is that we’re hoping to find but rather if we’ve any idea as to what all has left along the way to wherever we are today in this journey to whatever we hope to have and whomever we expect to be.

Or, better yet, do we even care?

And in honesty, no, I don’t think we do. And I say that because, honestly, I don’t think we can. For this seems something of one those issues of serving two masters. It’s a trying to walk in two directions. It’s something of a life spent trying to reach so many outcomes that, in the end, nothing really comes from it because of an attention and effort so divided up amongst the many diverse ideals that none of them then have anything much upon which to lean or from which to glean what all they might actually need in order to actually be whatever we hope they can become.

Because, again, we’ve each of us only so much to give, so much to lose, so much to let go and leave behind before we look to find that what we’ve found is neither worth what we thought it was nor then nearly as much as what we lost to find it.

It’s much the same as this verse for today. The faithful city. The beautiful people. The children of hope as held in He who was their head before they so proverbially lost it to filling it with so much stuff that is neither Him nor then able to lead us unto the same.

And you know what’s truly strange? It’s to witness this unfold in real time within one’s own lifetime!

For sitting here I think back to what was in so many ways such better days. And yes, I fully understand that the wisdom of Ecclesiastes teaches us that it’s not wise to think like such. And indeed, I with that fully agree as it is a waste of time, a meaningless pursuit to try and hold tight that which is already gone as doing so will cost us the ability to grow as we go toward whatever is still to come. But still, I don’t see it as fully unwise to realize that the world we’re in and the lives we live have taken some really bad turns along the way.

Because if we never come to see what all we’ve gotten wrong, as perhaps only measured by what we can know of as being better, well then we’ll never know what not to do in order to find what we’ve found but should by no means want to keep nor stay. No, we have to sift through the ashes of all our actions so that we determine the good ones from those nowhere near. And that simply because we cannot learn anything in life nor of life if we never look upon the wrong turns we’ve taken.

We have to know where we’re coming from if we’re to prove able to get wherever we’re going.

But to do that we have to also admit that we’ve lost a lot to get wherever we are. Because, again, life itself is not a bottomless pit nor then are we so filled with what we’ve all lived giving away so liberally. No, for while we were all made in God’s image, there are a vast many who are living a way of life that looks nothing of Godly. While were all created to honor Him and bring Him glory, there are a vast many who are doing nothing of the sort.

While we were perhaps at one time a faithful city, a chosen people, a bride meant for Christ, the fact is that but all of life has become nothing more than our seeking to wed ourselves to whatever we want for ourselves.

And the evidence of this is increasing by the day.

And it’s all so easily found in what is a simple comparison between who we’ve been and who we’ve become.

And sure, this is by no means anything this world inspires us to do as it demands a humility to sit and sort through the wreckage of what’s proven a life so baseless that we’re anymore all but each of us faceless. No, we’ve indeed all but given away our identity in search of this idolatry that’s found in such a daily furthering that it’s truly amazing not only how little we’ve found in terms of meaning or worth but what all we’ve both lost and simply allowed to leave so that we could have more room free to find more of whatever this is that we have.

But friends, that’s just it! What have we found? Who have we become? And, more than anything, is any of it worth anywhere near as much as all we’ve lost or left behind or let go along the way?

And, in what is in every way a horrifying kind of humbling, can we even know when odds are we don’t know what all has left?

Because how can we? How can we know what all we’ve given away when, in order to give something away, you have to arrive at the frame of mind that tells you it’s no longer worth keeping? Indeed, how can we even pretend to care what we’ve so clearly come to care so little about that we allowed it to simply walk out the door? And, well, if what we’ve allowed to leave, or has elsewise just left because there was no point in it sticking around waiting any longer for us to get our act together, if it didn’t matter then how can even begin to imagine it might now?

Indeed, how can we care when we’ve so learned not to?

And just how little have we learned to care? Well, seeing as how we’ve arrived at what is this time in which we’re all but daily bombarded with stories of suffering and hatred that we’re all but used to them seems something of fair indication, a decent way to measure. For if we’ve become a people able to be numb to such things as murder and lewdness and this now general lascivious way of living that so many are so clearly loving, well I think it’s pretty easy to see just what all has left us.

For ask yourself, where is morality? Where is decency? Where did modesty go? Anybody seen holiness lately? Any leads on the whereabouts of contentment? No, but we sure know where to find resentment. And unholiness. And immodesty and indecency and immorality. Those are all easy! Just go outside. Or, even better than that, save you a trip, turn on the tv. Listen to the radio. Grab your phone, that’s probably the best to go to find all that we’ve apparently found of so little worth that it simply doesn’t exist anymore.

Indeed, what of everything better no longer exists because it just finally gave up on us and walked away from our daily walking away from it?

Friends, as easy as it is to find things to want in life I dare say it’s far easier to find ourselves entirely unworried as to all we’re losing in life in order to focus on what we’re trying to find. Because we can’t focus on two opposing things at once. And so, when our focus is placed on what we want in this place, all that isn’t in this place or of this place becomes all but ignored. It’s allowed to become a ghost as we go on our way walking away from any semblance of any care about whatever else might be there for us to care about.

We simply cannot follow both God and this world, and thus nor can we desire to have both housed inside the same heart.

We really do have to choose, and no, it’s not easy because it’s a choice we’ve all so clearly made already. And thus it’s a choice that will in every way ask us to turn away from the way of life we’ve come to live. And indeed, this will likely mean that we’ll then have to leave all we’ve learned to love so that we can learn to love what never left and will never leave. And that is He who has promised to never leave us nor forsake us.

But learning that He never has demands we come to see that we’re the ones who did. Because, well, if He didn’t create this distance between us, that means we’re the ones who let it happen.

And realizing that will cause us to wonder as to whatever else we’ve allowed to happen to what was once a life created to be like Christ that instead became the life that knew so little of the same that we threw our loyalty to those who blaspheme the Name.

And yeah, that’s as humbling a meeting of humility as anyone can imagine.

But friends, let it hurt. Let it sting. Let it burn, all of it. Let it go wherever it needs to lead so that you can finally come to see all that you’ve lost to have all the little that you’ve managed to find.

Because in the end it won’t matter what we managed to amass in and of this world. No, what will matter is only if He is still able to recognize any of Himself in us. And yes, that’s a scary thought to think in light of how much time we’ve lost to not worrying about Him at all, and just how little we’ve left in which to start what is a journey to an entirely new way of life.

But the simple fact is that we can’t possibly find any of all that’s left if we never find ourselves shattered at the realization of all we once had that we simply allowed to leave as we sadly learned to love what could never amount to all that was left unrealized.

#LeaveNoSoulUntold