I found a scrap of paper in my bag a while back1 with thoughts I know I’ve felt but don’t remember writing down. I’m sure it came in prayer, a time of prayer when I was stronger than I am now, readier to beg for suffering and less weary of the plodding pain of the everyday. I put it aside with the intention to finish it someday. And maybe I will. But tonight, I think I’m going to offer it to you half thought out, simply a plea for God to break down the idols I’ve made of him and be God in my life.
I don’t need a nice God, a safe God, one who leaves me comfortable in my complacency. I need a God who knocks down the walls with a trumpet blast and leaves me to be ravaged by grace.
I don’t need a God made in my image and likeness but a God who breaks me and molds me into his.
I won’t give my life to a God who exists to approve my plans and validate my will but a God who leads by fire and cloud and sends a great fish to swallow me if he must.
I want the God of the whale’s belly, of despair and broken pride, who opens the sea and shuts the lions’ mouths, who floods the world to send a rainbow.
I don’t want a nice shepherd but a good shepherd, one who knocks me upside the head and drags me from danger.
And though he slay me, still will I trust in him.2
Stop settling for a plaster God and start worshiping the God who breaks hearts and makes them new. Knock down your idols of comfort and security and let God be God. Let him move and speak and shake you. Give him permission to ruin your life. I promise he will rebuild it into something more joyful and glorious than you could ever have imagined.
If you are plagued by mediocrity, ask God for something better. But be warned: if you offer him your life, he just might take it.
