Jim’s Reviews > The Pressure's Off: There's a New Way to Live > Status Update

we can accept His invitation to sit with Him, for now perhaps in darkness, and to seize the opportunity to know Him better and represent Him well in this difficult world.

93%-95% has an extended example of what a papa prayer is.

“God, here’s where I am. I sense You here but not there. I’m aware that this keeps me from hearing Your voice. But I declare again, right now, my desire to come to You whether You bless me or not in other ways I want.”

Papa Prayer: Present yourselves to God as you are. Attend to where you notice God’s presence or absence. Purge yourselves of whatever, at that moment, might be keeping you from noticing more of God. Approach God with abandonment and confidence, dedicating yourselves anew to coming to Him to know and enjoy and reveal Him, not to using Him to make your life better.

I am wrong for wanting the trouble to go away more than I want to draw near to God, more than I want to enjoy Him and reflect Him in this situation. Desiring my blessing more than His glory should occasion brokenness, not petition for more blessings.

“Lord, I come to You, just as I am. One thing I ask—let me see Your beauty. And seeing Your beauty, let me love like You and live like You.”

Depend on the Spirit. There is a list of appropriate things to depend on him for, at the 90% mark.

Dealing with difficulty: Admit where you are; find the red dot. Identify the two paths before you, the Old Way and the New Way. Make it your highest ambition to encounter God, to participate in community, and to become like Jesus. Learn dependence on the Holy Spirit and expect those three ambitions to be granted as miracles. Pray as a pilgrim on a journey?

But the Spirit continues to do His work. And the more we see all that He is doing, the more the pressure falls off. Dependence deepens.

Three miracles will take place in every follower of the New Way: encounter with God, community that survives honesty, and surprising transformation into the likeness of Christ.