Surrender conference (Mick Duncan)

Was a very inspiring weekend. Loved all of the messages. Loved being with such a great crowd of people. Loved getting to share some of my own journey.

I thought I would share a few of the highlights for me, the first being Mick Duncan. Mick spent ten years of his life in a Manila slum. He speaks from a platform of both integrity and brokeness. He always, everytime, challenges me deeply. He is a great speaker, very powerful, but not always very fun to listen to. My friend Jon Owen described listening to him speak this way, "its like he smiles and then stabs you with a knife... and then twists it... and when you think you can't take anymore he pulls the knife out... and jabs it in again" Which isn't always true, but I think you get the picture.

In the first session Mick talked about our mind, and what we have mentally decided was our non-negotiables. He talked to us about God being the only thing allowed to be in that non-negotiable space, and anything else put there becomes an idol. At the end of the talk he asked us to take a time of confession. He asked us to kneel before God and confess the areas of our life that were not in obedience to God.

In actual fact, I believe that in my life I didn't think anything was intentionally above the line. I actually think I would do whatever God told me to do. But it is the nonintentional, as it is much of the time, that was and is giving me problems. My confession is one that probably won't shock you in the least, but I desperately look for the respect and admiration of other people. Particularly older men, or peers that I deeply respect. I really want them to be proud of me. And sometimes, well perhaps more honestly often, I am motivate by this rather than by my love and devotion to God.

I sat down with a brother in the Lord and told him about my struggle, one that has gone on for as long as I can remember. And he told me that Henri Nouwen also struggled with these things. He advised me that like Nouwen, I may find my struggle with this sin in my life, helped by times of solitude and silence. This confirmed my own thoughts about my need for this.

The problem is silence and solitude scares the hell out of me. I do not know if I can do it. But I need to. So when I am done writing this post, I will start looking for a place to have a time of silence and solitude. I am not sure if I will get a tent and just go to Wilsons Prom by myself, or go to a monastery of some sort. But I will do this in the next month...

unless one of you can suggest some really good excuses for me not to do it. Please!!!

rev