Jesus once proclaimed to His disciples: “I AM THE WAY, THE TRUTH AND THE LIFE.” ~John 14:6
So, the only way forward in this life is JESUS, the Way Himself.
DAY 21: You know you are on the way when we choose the vulnerability of cruciformity. Because this is the very real way of intimacy. And intimacy is always the way forward.
What is the posture of your hands today? Are your hands clenched tight? Are your arms folded across your heart, like you can guard that precious heart of yours that has been cracked and chipped away and fractured deep? … Wayfarer, can you move into a posture of curciformity, hands and arms wide open? This work of surrender - this is a daily hard and holy work.
Sometimes surrender feels like an “undoing” - because, in a way, it actually is. It is an undoing of ourselves - an unfurling of our hearts - an opening up of our hearts, our hands, our arms, our lives.
Sometimes surrender is exhausting. And we fail and fall, and falter, and flail around in our attempts to surrender. We open up our hearts, and then recoil from vulnerability with others and our Lord out of fear of being rejected, being forsaken.
The life we are always looking for is one of connection, of intimacy: intimacy with our ABBA Father - intimacy with His children… The way forward is always intimacy - and the only way toward intimacy is through the vulnerability of living with the open heart and open hands and open arms of cruciformity.
Just as we could not fulfill our own salvation upon that cross, we cannot fulfill a life of surrender and cruciformity on our own. Jesus died with arms wide open so that you could too. We are safe to live into a wide open cruciform surrender because Jesus’ arms are always stretched wide open to wrap us in cruciform love.
Jesus, today, into Your hands we commit our open hands, our open arms, our open cruciform hearts.
