He's All In! (... aka Ya Gotta Love a God who quotes Luke Danes!)

I have this phrase... this thing I say often, when I am talking with the Lord - or when I am encouraging others to press in to Him... it's "All In" --and I am! 

I am All In with the Lord... He gets all of me! There is no more holding back! (Oh... there was a time... but those days are over!)

He gets all of me... all of my heart... all of my hopes and dreams... all of my successes and failures.  He gets me on my best days and on the days I don't even want to crawl out of bed and adult at all... He gets me when I am feeling pretty good and when I am feeling all the feels and am, let's face it, irrational and broken and feeling pretty bad... He gets me on those days, too! (Yeah... I'm a real treat sometimes!)

He gets me... because I know He's got me.

So "All In" is a saying I know all to well. I tell others to give in and give up and just go All In, too! I remind friends as well as myself of it when the temptation to pull away or hide is strong or when our hearts feel vulnerable and scared.  

I've never regretted going All In with Him! He's never let me down, and He won't start now... because, here's the thing:

He's All In, too!

How do I know? Well... lots of ways, really! But I know for sure because, this week, He told me so! (Twice, really... and then in a million other ways, too!)



So Sunday at church during our worship time, I had my eyes closed and hands raised and head back and oh my goodness, His Presence was strong all around me. It was Wonder-filled...  

***
I can't remember exactly what song we were singing but I was pouring out my heart to Him and suddenly in my mind I saw a To Do List.  

It took me off guard because my heart was engaged and I was not stressing or worrying about things I needed to do at that moment. But I let my imagination go with it and I tried to focus in on what was written on the list... thinking maybe it was important. 

Just as I saw myself leaning in to look closer, Jesus playfully grabbed my Bossy List and looked it over!  He found it quite amusing and I noticed He began to rearrange it a bit. He even crossed a few things off, implying that those were not things that I needed to do after all. He acted like He was going to hand it back to me, but then pulled it away out of reach and without a pen in His hand, He 'wrote' something on the bottom of the To Do List, winked at me, and He was gone.

I looked at the list once again and at the bottom, written in red, it simply said this:

I'm coming for you! I'm All In!

***

Now, you gotta love a God who can quote a little Gilmore Girls, am I right?

Like Luke (you know, only not... only better... WAY better!), God is All In with us!  

He told me after that encounter to brace myself for the Love of God to come running for me... and I could feel it far off, quickly coming closer!

He's not holding back or holding out on us, friends!  When we say yes and we ask Him into our hearts... He brings All of Who He is and He comes in... He, as Eugene Peterson says, moves in to the neighborhood. 

He's All In, no matter what! There is no shadow of turning... His Light and His Love is always facing toward us... always running for us... always longing for us to be All In, too!

***

Then, on Tuesday morning at my Bible study, we practiced a little Listening Prayer and in the quiet, again I closed my eyes and in my minds' eye I could see Jesus across a crowd.  I saw Him see me and Joy and Light flooded from His face. 

I ran to Him, only to meet Him halfway, as He was running for me, too!  He pulled me close and kept whispering into my ear, "Oh how I love thee!  It's so good to have you here in My arms... in My heart!"  We held on to each other for awhile and as I pulled away to look at His face, He said, "When I won your heart, it's like I won the Lottery!" (...which, let's be honest, cracked me up, because who talks like that? And also... like HE won the lottery?) 

I laughed and said, "No, no! I am the one who hit the Jackpot!" and He smiled, leaned in closer and said, "Then just IMAGINE what our hearts are like as One! ...just think of what we can do together!"

***

My prayer for you, as we enter the busyness of the Season, is that you will not only know that He came... but that you will find Him coming for you still! ...that you will feel and know and see and trust that He is All In with you... and that you will be All In with Him, too!  I pray that you will reflect and remember the story of Jesus... and know that from before the beginning of time, He has been coming for you. From before you were created in your mothers' womb, He hid you in His heart... when He burst forth from the heavenly realm into this fallen world - He knew at the first gasping for air limited to lungs, that He would pay any price to win you.  When He learned to crawl, to walk, to run - He did it in flesh and blood, skinned knees and growing pains... and somewhere deep inside, the Spirit urged Him on in His pursuit of you.  He chose His Words, His path, His price... because from before there was you --there was the idea of you+Him and before you first gasped for air, He grasped for your heart and longed for you to be His Bride.

He is, and has always been, after your heart and tis the season to prepare Him room... for He desires to reside within you... to move in to the neighborhood... to abide with you and have you abide with Him... to live and love alongside you, creating and recreating and recreating again the Greatest Love Story ever told... 

He's just so romantic, y'all! He feels like He has won the lottery when we let Him love us... but we?  We are the lucky ones!

He's All In... are you All In, too?

P.S.  I'm linking up with these lovely writers:
JENNIFER DUKES LEE FOR #TELLHISSTORY

HOLLEY GERTH FOR #COFFEEFORYOURHEART