Further Up, Further In

Last week was an exciting one in our journey with the Green Book.

First, Aaron got to spend an hour or so last Sunday evening leading a sort of reading circle/group discussion at Ashton Church of the Nazarene based on excerpts from Week 27, "Receiving Direction." Afterward, four or five different people asked how to order copies for themselves! That was exciting.

On Monday morning we came across this reading from Emmet Fox's Power Through Constructive Thinking:

"The most secret, sacred wish that lies deep down at the bottom of your heart, the wonderful thing that you hardly dare to look at, or to think about - the thing that you would rather die than have anyone else know of, because it seems to be so far beyond anything that you are, or have at the present time...

"That is just the very thing that God is wishing you to do or to be for Him. And the birth of that marvelous wish in your soul - the dawning of that secret dream - was the Voice of God...telling you to arise and come up higher because He had need of you."

Wow. That really got us thinking. 

It reminded us of Pastor Brandon and our friends at OKC First Church of the Nazarene's Overflow worship nights, who first taught us to love the All Sons & Daughters' song Called Me Higher (which we've been streaming pretty much non-stop for the past week).

It reminded us of one of Aaron's all-time favorite (fictional) C. S. Lewis quotes from The Last Battle, the last book in his Chronicles of Narnia series. "I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now…Come further up, come further in!"

It made us wonder what God is calling us to next, long-term, big-picture.

Next up was Monday's Scripture reading...which turned out to be Matthew 28:18-20. Uh-oh. 

"And Jesus came and said to them, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.'" (NRSV)

Wow. We don't have the clearest idea what this means for us yet. Probably something like bivocational ministry, with lots of teaching and loving people and cooking and reading on the side.

But where that calling might eventually take us? Back home to the States, or around the world? We haven't a clue. But we do know that we are called!

So where God leads, we'll continue to follow...
higher, deeper, further.