Learning

I have prayed for a while that God would bring me friends with whom I could truly worship Him.  The type of person with whom time together draws me to my knees before the Lord and into a deeper knowledge of His person and His love.  

Here's the thing.  My God is faithful.  My God is strong, and He sent His son that I may live life to the full in abundance, lacking no good thing.  "Good", meaning things necessary to live a life in honor of His sovereignty and love.  His love endures forever, a statement I can scarcely comprehend.

To the point:  God has gifted me with a group of incredible friends-two new ones in particular with whom talk of spiritual things is constant.  When I walk away from time with either of them, however, I very seldom have the fuzzy feeling I have many times come to associate with the picture I had painted inside of me of what it would be like to truly have friends who constantly draw me closer to Christ.  Reality check.  They are, to a deeper degree than I can yet comprehend, exactly what I have prayed for.  

Where I obtained the assumption that these friends that I have so long prayed for would lead me to feel that "warm and fuzzy" or thoroughly exciting feelig within myself, I am not sure.  This I am learning:  friends that draw me closer to the Christ I so dearly love are many times going to leave me feeling broken, slammed, and with a fuller understanding of the explicit sinfulness that riddles my fleshly nature.  

At first this puzzled me, and frankly it still does at many moments, because it's sadly far from what I anticipated.  I'm getting it, however slowly, that this is the perfect place for me.  My Lord has detailed plans for me and He is sovereign.  I want to understand Him more, and however it uncomfortable and vulnerable it may lead me to feel at many moments, I believe this is truly the work of the Holy Spirit in us.  How great is it that the same being that lives and reigns within me is the same great being within these friends that I am coming to love so dearly.

Lord, you are truly fascinating, puzzling, perplexing, yet the most incredible thing I have ever experienced, and I believe I ever will.