Discovering what is hidden

Isn't this picture amazing? I took this from my car last night. The closer we came to it, the smaller I felt. What was even more amazing was the crazy lightning within these 2 colliding clouds. I wish I could have caught some of that. This picture doesn't even capture what we were watching. This was one of those things that you just couldn't stop looking at! When we got to where we were going I wanted to go inside and bring my kids and my in-laws out to see it, but it was tucked behind trees and not visible. Isn't that just how the Lord is? He makes himself known to us in huge and powerful ways when we are seeking Him, but when we try to tell others our words don't do Him justice, they have to see and discover for themselves. They have to be looking for Him. Then when they "taste and see that the Lord is good" for themselves they will understand our joy. I am learning that we can't expect results until we are committed. I think I tend to go for things that are second hand, instead of from the giver Himself. I will read a great parenting book with the best of intentions, and neglect the one thing that will change me and transform me into the person, wife, mother, etc. that God desires me to be. I neglect Him. I neglect the word of God. I want results without commitment. It is through the word and through prayer that we are changed. It is spending time with Him first, chosing Him first. My preacher preached yesterday on this very thing. We want knowledge from a great sermon, speaker, or book (second-hand) and we believe it will carry us through. But it doesn't. Those things are good, don't get me wrong, but they are nothing in comparison to what the Lord wants to show us in His living and active word. It is relevant today just as it was in the beginning. I under estimate what He can reveal through it. I underestimate how He can even speak to my children through it. It is how He reveals himself to us, so that we can be changed and filled to the point of overflowing into the lives around us. It is how our lives can point to Him. I am guilty of wanting kids who love the Lord, but in my search to make this happen, to "get it right", I have made my children my idol (that's a whole other post!). I implement parenting styles that assure me if I do "this", I will produce "righteous"children. So, I go full steam ahead, and then when I don't get results, I crumble and I fall hard. But God has shown me that I can not have the cart before the horse. Things change only when I change, and I will change when my time is spent knowing and loving Jesus. That is real change, that is genuine--not manufactured. Believe me, your kids know when it is manufactured. They are smart. John 6:63 says "The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life." But this means discipline and sacrifice. It means giving up an extra hour of sleep, it means turning off HGTV, it means saying to my children--it's time to "Be still", it means shutting off the noise in my life, it means saying to myself "I am not entitled to an hour of self-indulgence"--whatever that indulgence might be. It means commitment and self-lessness. And boy, that is hard. Isn't it? But He just wants me to come to Him. He just wants me to abide in Him. I can't get this life "right," but if I allow Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit to live through me by actively living in the Word, He can move mountains. And that is Good News.