(To Live Full This Missional Life) Open the Door
Who doesn’t want to live full, to savor this actual life, to experience joy and peace that transcends the here-and-now and not-yet-right? Yet the full life seems insistently just beyond reach. The immediate weighs heavy on hope, and it can feel like swimming slow is the best we’ve got.
I remember summer days in a hot Illinois cornfield that nestled the training camp for a youth mission organization. Before we’d fly as a team to Scotland for the next month, we had to set the groundwork. During one part of the drama we rehearsed again and over again we were asked to swim as if swimming through malt-o-meal. I’ve never forgotten the feeling of being sunbaked and sweaty, pretending to swim slow through something heavy.
Perhaps today you feel a bit like you’ve been swimming in malt-o-meal too—like every stroke is slow, like every bone is weary. Through the haze you hope for relief, but it’s hard to see forward when right-now is all around us.
In the drama we learned that summer, there was a way out of the fog. There’s always a way to stop treading in murky water and swim strong in clear water.
Psalm 145:10 tells us that “everything [God has] made will praise [Him], fulfilling its purpose” (TPT). Could it be that pointing to God in praise is what we were created for? Could a grateful heart that directs adoration to Christ be the key the unlocks me from the slow and fruitless swimming?
Where I look determines what I see.
I can look at my right-now, see only what pulls me down. Or I can look up and let Him pull me up.
Our eyes get to choose—and gratitude, it’s choosing to open eyes see the only One who can pull me up.
I need open eyes to see the glory above my right-here-and-now. I need open eyes to fulfill my purpose to praise.
Live full our purpose
Here in Psalm 147:1 (TPT) I read,
Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!
How beautiful it is when we
sing our praises to the
beautiful God,
for praise makes you lovely before him
and brings him great delight!
Gratitude-thanks is a gift for both recipient and giver. Our gratitude brings great delight to God’s heart and transforms us into something more beautiful.
And there is more. If the purpose of all is to praise, are our lives not fulfilled if we open the door for others too to praise, to live full their purpose in presenting their own adoration to the King?
I’ve spent months reading the book of Psalm in a paper copy of The Passion Translation, and this morning I reached the final verse:
Let everyone everywhere join in the crescendo
Psalm 150:6
Of ecstatic praise to Yahweh!
Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!
Perhaps this is how we live full the missional life—we praise God in the presence of others. We let our own freely-offered praise open the door of our hearts to God and the door of our lives to those around us.
Open the door for God
I have the honor of hosting a series on The Uncommon Normal to share stories of how gratitude has been adopted a practice, and this practice has transformed lives. My vision for Begin Within: A Gratitude Series is that these stories will inspire more of us to practice gratitude year-round. It’s one thing to do a 30-day gratitude challenge, feel the change, but then press hold until November comes around for another time.
But what about in January, when live events are still being adapted to virtual, violence and unrest still tears deep into the heart of our nation, and there frankly doesn’t seem to be a long list of obvious things to be thankful for? What about in April and May when an awakening world beckons us to open the door and come outdoors—do we pause then to whisper our thanks?
My own gratitude journey, perhaps like yours, was inspired by Ann Voskamp’s book One Thousand Gifts. Much of my life I’ve been described as a positive person. Perhaps it’s part of my Enneagram 9-nature to see all sides, including the bright side. But I’d found unwelcome negativity creeping in and felt like I was going through the motions of faith but missing the vibrancy of relationship with God I had long known.
The hours I used to spent with just Him dwindled as I added marriage, a full-time job, and kids. I was trying to fit God into my left-over time instead of coming to Him daily because I couldn’t stay away, and there just was never much time left-over at the end of the day.
Perhaps you can relate to losing a little of yourself in the midst of adulting. Like me, you may have put on hold some of the things that once made you come alive, traded life-giving rhythms for ones that made sense in the moment. But you’ve noticed, as I did, that your rhythms follow rather than lead your priorities.
After years of trying to find a spending-time-with-God rhythm that would stick in the midst of interruptions and a schedule in constant flux, I picked up a book: One Thousand Gifts. Ann’s poetic words spoke straight to my soul, and I knew I had to try for myself—know for myself—what keeping an ongoing gratitude journal would do.
So I started numbering thanks:
1 – early morning stillness lingering
6 – starting small
7 – gf pumpkin spice muffins
8 – the bus stop so close to our house + school
11 – I have You to look to—“my God [Who] hears me” (Micah 7:7)
12 – time with You first
Before long this writing of my thanks to God became a highlight of my day. Then my time with Him early didn’t feel like such a struggle to prioritize. I was finding a rhythm that would shape, rather than trail behind, my day. Practicing gratitude helped me deepen my connection with God.
For me and for each of the guest writers for Begin Within: A Gratitude Series, a practice of gratitude has led to greater freedom. Every story I get to read has been such a gift. It’s a front-row seat to witness lives being transformed through the power of gratitude, and they each, in different but all incredible ways, encourage me to keep up my own practice of gratitude.
If you’ve been feeling like you’re swimming weary in thick malt-o-meal, I invite you to read these weekly gratitude stories. Let them help open your own eyes to see that there is another way—a way to see through fulfilling your own purpose to praise. You can sign up here to get the stories delivered straight to your email inbox each week.
Open the door for others
A beautiful dichotomy of gratitude is that it doesn’t just open the door for God, it also opens it for others because a heart soft and open to God welcomes those He loves—which is all of us. Something happens inside of us when we fulfill our purpose to praise: we can’t keep our praise silent. It seeps into our conversations, softens our facial expressions, rearranges our priorities, and ripples out into our relationships.
When we speak our thanks to God it dissolves the things that cloud Him from our vision. And when we speak our thanks to God in the presence of others, it opens the door for others too to have clearer vision.
Gratitude primes our hearts to love both God and people—to love God in the presence of people, to invite people into the presence of God. Practicing gratitude does not affect just God and the one giving thanks—gratitude is the spark that begins the ripple, that opens the door to live full a missional life.
A prayer to live full this missional life
Open the door and let God in, then let people in—this is how we live full the missional life. Gratitude postures our hearts as soft and open before God so we can gain open eyes, eyes that see. Then we freely offer God our praise in proximity to others, opening first our lives then our homes to our neighbors.
Friend, may I pray a blessing over you before we close?
May you have eyes to see right now that God is right next to you, and He offers you His hand. You’re not alone in the middle of all that’s been pressing in. As you offer Him your small thanks may you find the door open wider to let in a flood of God’s presence. And as you practice giving God thanks in the presence of others—living full the missional life—may you continue to hold open the door to shared life with your neighbors. In the precious and holy name of Jesus, I pray. Amen.
P.S. Did you know The Uncommon Normal is also a podcast? Tune in on Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, or Spotify.
Change your actual life in less than 5 minutes per day!
You can change your actual life in less than 5 minutes a day because baby steps truly can change the trajectory of your life. If you want 2021 to be the year you actually start living on mission in your neighborhood, this little book (available as a paperback and on Kindle) will help you get there. Each of the 30-day devotions takes but a few minutes to read, but they will lead to lasting life change.
If you’d like to check out Part 1 of the devotional FREE and also gain access to the rest of the missional living resources I’ve created for you in the new For You library, let me know here where to send the unlock code!
