The Thin Places, and Our Intended Vocation

We talked at home group recently about the thin places. The places where we feel God is near, where we feel life is effortless, unburden some. This is where God wants us. My thin places are many:

• In community with other believers, or were talking about real things ... no posing, no small talk, no fakeness ... just raw reality, with the failures and flaws exposed and on the table.
• In service, or none of it is about me, but all about others what they need.
• And it's and worship - singing specifically. Worshipping God in thanks and appreciation for how he's done and all he's promised to do. I sing to him, for him, because of him... all day. But mix it with community, and my thin place becomes extra, extra thin. Mix it again with service, and I'm in heaven. No burden, no effort, no apprehension. It's where he wants me. Loving him and loving others, is 

Jesus clearly said and Matthew 22:37-40, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. And... Love your neighbor as yourself.' All of the law and Prophets hang on these two Commandments."

These thin places - and they are different for everyone - lead to or intended vocation. God wants us to serve effortlessly. And this effortlessness comes from the simple fact that this is what he intended for us individually all along. No legalism. No treasury. No feelings of unfairness. Are intended vocation should and will bring us the joy God wants for us. But it must be HIS vocation for us, not what we think it should be.

Lord, I ask you to make my vocation abundantly clear - even more so than you already have. Then, give me the courage to pour myself into it, so much so that it's all I do: surf, worship, and be in community. So much of my time is spent with the other things that are not my intended vocation, usually because of a misdirected concern about worldly things like comfort, money, control, etcetera. 

Lord, help me to find and stay in my fin places with you. Help me to embrace my intended vocation and eventually shed all other activities. Help me to be a better husband, a better father, a better neighbor and friend and brother. Let it be about you and others alone. I asked this honestly and with full confidence that you'll deliver in full. You are good. Thank you, thank you, thank you for the cross. In Jesus name. Amen.