When God says Bring Me Into It

I had a rough day Tuesday. It was long and a little discouraging. At one point I just wanted it to be over so I could start a new one. After I got home, I crashed into bed hoping it would be all over. But when I woke up yesterday morning, it still felt like Tuesday…

I slowly got up and moved to get ready to go to the pool to swim. Maybe I could swim it off? On the drive to the pool, I got stuck behind a school bus that was stopping very often. One of the stops was at a very rough looking, singlewide trailer. On the stoop stood two little children ready for the school bus to arrive and a very unkempt looking mother, smoking in a bathrobe. When the bus stopped, the children sprinted in the fog towards the bus and the mother flicked her cigarette and shuffled back into her trailer. No kiss goodbye, no waving children – it just looked like a bedraggled existence.

Now, I don’t know anything about their living scenario. Any of a number of things could have been happening here. All I saw was a brief snapshot into a family’s life, but it made my heart hurt. And I said to God, “What do I do with this?” It wasn’t really about this poor family. It was broader in its reach. “God, what am I to do with this world?” He said, “Bring Me into it.”

Our world is filled with desperation. And we do many things to mask and silence the need but still it remains—a gnawing hunger demanding to be satisfied. We cannot escape it; it’s the human condition. In the Garden, we opened a cavern by excavating God from our hearts and that void requires filling like a vacuum. And nothing satisfies my attempts to fill the void, because God is its only satisfaction.

What did God say?

So God said, “Bring Me into it!” When I grieve at life situations, God says, “Bring Me into it.” When things look despairing, God says, “Bring Me into it.”

If I am the dwelling place of the Most High, then when I see something, He is seeing it through my eyes. When I feel something, He is feeling it through my heart. So if it is Christ in me, then I can bring Him into the world, and leave it with Him.

“Let go of your concerns! Then you will know that I am God. I rule the nations. I rule the earth.”
(Psalm 46:10 GW)