canvas to canvas.

So the other night i was about to go to bed and i pulled my friend Tozer off the shelf...
sighing out of slight desperation i opened that book as if it held the last drop of water in the arabian desert.....

I LAUGHED. out loud.

looked at the ceiling and said,

YOU are FUNNY.

i had opened to the beginning of Chapter 9 - labeled "Meekness and Rest" Matthew 5:5.
This is what i learned through Tozer and his thoughts:
He spoke of the beattitudes... you are looking at someone who has traded poverty of spirit for pride, mourning for pleasure seeking, meekness for arrogance....corupt imaginings, quarrelsome, resentful, fighting. I am reflecting this world. These are the worst kinds of diseases.

This is the same atmosphere Jesus entered. He spoke Truth. He didn't share his opinions - he knew. he knows. He said, "Come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and i will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me; for i am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light"

This burden is not the burden of working 40 hours this week.
it is a 'heavy and crushing thing'... a load carried to the point of exhaustion.
rest is the release from that load. it is not something we do but what we receive when we cease to do. His meekness = rest.
Pride is my first crushing thing that i need to cease to carry. I have endured too much sorrow because someone spoke slightingly of me, it was not acceptable to this altar of myself that i had built.

"The heart's fierce effort to protect itself from every slight, to
shield its touchy honor from the bad opinion of friend and enemy, will never let the mind have rest."

whether actual or imagined. a meek person doesn't care about that - he decided long time ago that it was not worth the effort. "He has stopped being fooled about himself...He has accepted God's estimate of his own life. He knows he is as weak and helpless as God has declared him to be but paradoxically, he knows that at the same time that he is, in the sight of God, more important than angels. In himself, nothing. In God, everything....until our true worth is revealed, he attains a place of soul rest. As he walks on in meekness he will be happy to let God defend him. The old struggle to defend himself is over. He has found the peace that meekness brings".....

looking back tonight at my canvas and its damn line that taunts me still....
I asked the line... now what?
it wanted to be turned on its side...
then i read zeph 3:17.

I only used fragile charcoal.

and things that are used to fix things...

tape. wood glue. staples. sand paper.

The LORD your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing. -Zeph 3:17