How to be radiant

She lived in a dark place. She knew Jesus, loved Him, walked with Him every day, but inside there

was this place of fear. This empty place, a place she didn't truly believe could ever be filled.

In that deep empty place, she was alone.

And so she raged against all the things that couldn't fill that place. Things she cherished but things that were not enough. Nothing was ever enough.

And of course those things failed her. People messed up. Those who loved her most disappointed her the most profoundly.

Everything failed her. Everything.

She longed for more of Jesus. She began to cling to the word, to eat, drink, and breathe the word, maybe more from desperation than from actual belief that it would help.

But there's this thing we discover when the word suddenly becomes our only lifeline.

It saves us.

Because Jesus, He really IS the Word, and when we breathe it in, we breathe in Him. And the word really IS power, and life, and light, and bread, and water, and it really saves us.

Why don't we believe this?

She went to the word and just started living there. And one day, in the midst of one of the greatest conflicts she had ever known, she thought, What if I just responded out of His love--right now, right in the mess? What if His love came out of me NOW instead of afterward, after I screw it all up, when I am looking back with regret?

And she opened her heart, and the most amazing thing happened. Love came into the empty place, and it filled her completely. And Jesus whispered, I can even do this. I can be enough for you in this place you thought would never find enough. 

Her heart was softened and it stayed soft. And the darkness around her did not get better. It got worse. But in that darkness she was this blazing light shining this Love that had changed her heart. I saw it, and I've never seen anyone so transformed. So filled.

Radiant.



That's what happens when we live in His word. Really abide. The word fills us up and floods out of us and we become what Jesus wanted for us all along. We become love.

He said that people would know by our love that we follow Him. But the thing is, we are all so full of fear and failure that we can't love like He did. And so the world sees just a bunch of messed up, prideful, fearful, angry folks who say they know the way but don't truly walk it.

Who would want to follow that?

His way is the way of the cross, and He bore that cross because He knew a Love great enough to overcome it.

The cross is nothing without the Love.

And we are nothing without the Love that is His word, that is Jesus Himself.

I have tried so hard to be His. But I wonder if I'm just a clanging cymbal. I wonder if I am carrying a cross, trying to be like Him, but doing it all on my own. Doing it without the Love that overcomes all the crosses.

What if we really believed that Jesus is the Word, and what if we filled ourselves up with that Word until there is no room for anything else, and all that flows from us is Him?

That's what we all want, but do we want it enough to let go of everything?