Abandon.

I was in the desert last week.

I said I was in Utah, and I was. And there is a part of Utah that is a desert. And that is where I was. In the desert.
I don’t live in the desert. It is very green where I live. Lush, easy to breathe, black dirt. The desert is the opposite. I can imagine that it would be exceptionally difficult to live your life, to work forever, in a place like that.
There was evidence of this being true.
Scattered across the land you would see settlements; houses that once were but are no longer.
Mills and factories that work no more.
Abandoned. Houses and homesteads and industries abandoned.

What is the story behind that? For surely all houses and industry are built at one time. Full of hope or potential for money.
But no longer. They have been left.

I have mentioned it before and feel no compulsion to hide the fact that I have, what I would call, trust issues.

It doesn’t matter how close I am to some people, there is this small little fear deep in my heart telling me that they, too, will leave. Walk away, be there no longer.
This is probably irrational for me to feel in addition to being just not nice for me to think about the people I love. They don’t deserve me to fear that about them. They weren’t the ones who left. They are the ones who have stayed so far.
But alas, the fight to kill the fear in my heart remains in heavy heat.

On my trip last week (the one to the desert) I was listening to tunes one morning during my quiet time. Do you know the song “The Stand” by Hillsong? Yeah, I have known it since college. Have sung it probably 100 times, at least.

How the Holy Spirit is so great just boggles my mind. Don’t you love how he can take something mundane, like doing dishes, or some verse that you have known since before Sunday school days, and all of the sudden make it new? Give you a completely new perspective on it? Such was the case with this song.

I was just bobbing my head along with it, I am sure my hands were flying all over the air, when the line, “I’ll stand, with arms high and heart abandoned…” rung through.

A heart abandoned.

What an interesting thought.

Let me ask you: What is in your heart? What drives you? What keeps you awake at night, not letting your mind rest? What fears you most?

Then let me ask you this: Are those fears rational? Do those fears line up with the gospel? Are those fears lies? If you would let Jesus, would he dispel them?

One of the main struggles women deal with is this belief that we will be left. Walked away from. I know I am not alone this struggle.

We fear we will be abandoned.

But that is irrational. Insulting to God. Untrue.

Why?

Because unlike us, humans, he doesn’t abandon. He doesn’t walk away.

What would happen, though, if we abandoned? Our heart, that is. Absolutely, without question, walked away. Left those fears, refused to return, ran away from? In like, if the fears in our heart were a house, people who came to visit those fears would find dirty dishes in the sink and cold coffee in the pot.  We didn’t try to tidy ourselves up, we didn’t try to hide them in a junk drawer, as if we planned on returning and didn’t want to come back to a mess, but just RAN AWAY.

Abandoned.

With a resolve never to return.

Because it will take a resolve. The devil hates runners-from-fear. He hates the ones who choose to run to Jesus, the ones who walk away and go live at Jesus’ house. Why? Because deep-seeded fear is what runs us, it will be what we believe most. And that is how the devil can control us.

For those of us who have given our life to the Lord, can he take away our eternity in heaven?
No.
Can he drag us to hell?
Negative.
But can he make us live life in fear?
You bet he can.
Can he nullify the power of the gospel in our life and in our ministry here on this earth?
He will and does.
That is how he gets us: He gets us to make a home with our fears.
Wolfies, that is not where our citizenship lies. God has rescued us from that and brought us into the Kingdom of Christ (Colossians 1:13-14).

What is something else is that even if humans walk away from us, because they do, and they will, and you know that, HE NEVER WILL.  He will never abandon. Never walk away. Never forsake. (Deut. 4:31; I Kings 6:13; Neh 9:19; Neh 9:31; Ps 16:10; II Cor 4:9) Even if he should. Even if what we have done is worthy of him leaving us in the dust, nothing can separate us from that love, even ourselves (Romans 8:38-39).

Him not leaving us is not a license to abuse grace, as I hope you know, it is a license to live outside the snatch of fear.

If you get nothing else out of this, believe it as truth when I say this:
We can abandon our FEARS, our lying heart, because He will never abandon US.
Run away from them, kids. He has already killed their power, don’t let them take you over again (Gal 5:1).