i want.

I want to be like a willow tree with its roots firmly planted; planted in God, in the Word, in the Spirit. To stand tall and be happy when the sun is out; to bend but not break when the storm comes, my roots firmly in the ground.

I feel like - I feel like a vine on the ground, sometimes able to find solid purchase in the ground, but so often blown around, and then lying on the ground to wither and die.

My own desires blow so hard at me. My sins, my lusts, things like that, suck at me and pull at me.
It's hard to believe i can even someday stand firmly, every day, consistent and faithful.

Dear Father God; dear Jesus, who died for me on the cross that I might be free of slavery to sin:
tear sin's roots from me and write the Father's laws on my heart; engrave them there; discipline me, scourge me that I might learn.

I am so unteachable, my soul is full of black rebellion. Punish me that I might be clean; fill me with Your Spirit that I might walk tall; heal my wounds, cleanse the poison, fill my heart to focus on You.

Give me wisdom, Father. Wisdom to control myself, to spend myself struggling for mastery in every situation, to take up my cross and never put it down, no matter how difficult or tiring it becomes.

Cut me to the quick, cut me to the bone and the marrow and the spirit with Your Spirit and Your Word, God. Cut me down, help me to find death for my body, death for my sins, so that I can live in Christ alone.

to live in Christ alone; to live in Christ alone! To live and not perish, to bend but not break, to stand in the gap not just for a week or two weeks but day after day after day, a man focused on God, a man desperate and refusing to give way in pursuing God and the ways of Christ.

my dream, my dream, my only dream; help me to spend everything i am for it, God.

on my knees I pray. please let it be, Father.

amen.