Just Empty Boots

Just doing

some reading

and thinking

and praying

this morning.

"66 Love Letters" by Dr. Larry Crabb.

66 letters

starts with

Genesis

ends with

Revelation.

Read his first chapter about Genesis.

Started my journey through Genesis.

I read Genesis 1:1-2.

2 verses.

Yep, that's it.

Looked up cross references to Psalm 102:25, Isaiah 40:21 and John 1:1-3.

Wrote a response of about 4 pages in my journal.

Two verses.

It is going to take me a long time to get through the 50 chapters of Genesis.

Let alone all the way to the last verse of Revelation.

But I don't have a deadline.

But this is what I am left with:

without God, just empty boots.

{Actually much worse than empty boots

because empty boots don't fail miserably

and make little and catastrophic messes

and have minor and traumatic troubles on their own.}

But really, even with God, I'm still going to fail and struggle,

but the point and purpose will be found in Him

. . . eventually . . .

maybe on the other side.

The struggle will be here.

Life is like child labor

death the delivery

and

heaven

is embracing the new life in my arms and heart,

as the pains of labor-life diminish and fade.

At least, that is what my faith is, that is what my hope is.

For all the things I cannot do, or explain.

Without Him I am hopelessly insecure and selfish.

Me without Him is incomplete.

That's why I've found that

"believe in yourself"

is incomplete.

That "Believe in Me instead"

is a weight off of my failing and limited shoulders

and restores

my confidence and strength and belief in me

because Christ is ultimately

the

confidence

the

strength

the

believed in.

"I can do all things"

is incomplete without

"because Christ is my strength."

{Philippians 4:13}

A house built

is in vain without

the Lord as builder.

A house-life built

on the foundation of God

will stand through the inevitable storms,

but built without Him

will wash away into the sand

and the fall will be terrible.

{Psalm 127:1 and Matthew 7:24-27; Luke 6:47-49}

"Desires of my heart"

are not fulfilled without

delighting myself in the Lord.

{Psalm 37:4}

Basically,

apart from Him, I can do nothing.

{John 15:5}

Just empty boots.

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