I am constantly amazed at how God just reaches into your life and completely changes the direction of everything … without notice … and what a blessing it turns out to be! Freedom is the unexpected gift and life will never be the same.
Misunderstandings and distorted perceptions of others can be so damaging to all persons involved … people say things they shouldn’t … others listen … the pile gets out of hand and pretty soon you believe things about someone that aren’t even close to the truth. Its painful and can be so devastating … but your reaction, no matter where you are in this small act of a much bigger story, is what counts.
Will you allow what others say to affect your perceptions? Will you choose not to respond? Will you choose not to get involved in the first place? I’ve definitely been on both sides of the equation and in the past have made some not-so-great decisions that I hope I’ve learned from. That is part of the maturing process and today I am grateful for those lessons from the past because they are a part of what dictates my response today, and will also in the future when I fail to recall the lesson in time to follow the right path.
Now, with my feet firmly planted in the knowledge and absolute understanding of the Father’s love for me, I experience deep joy in spite of pain. The two can coexist BECAUSE of this understanding and knowledge of His love. I trust Him … implicitly. I am confident that He is in control and as I am able to surrender to this process, I am given this amazing gift … complete and utter peace … and freedom.
If you have the chance to listen to “Utter Relief of Holiness” by Ransomed Heart Ministries (John Eldredge), I encourage you to do so (www.ransomedheart.com in the Store under Audio recordings). Life transforming teachings on freedom.
I am so grateful for those of you in my life who believe in me. It is a blessing and a pleasure to be on this journey with you … keepin’ it real!
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Monday, September 7, 2009
What happened to joy ...
It is truly incredible how quickly we can move from a moment of such pure joy, back into the morass of life… what is that about? Why does it happen? What causes this? Where did that joy go?
I don’t want to live like that for one more moment. We are meant for joy … here is what Jesus has to say about joy:
John 15:11 - I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow!
John 16:24 - You haven’t done this before. Ask, using my name, and you will receive, and you will have abundant joy.
John 17:13 - “Now I am coming to you. I told them many things while I was with them in this world so they would be filled with my joy.
Abundant joy … joy overflowing … filled with His joy. YES! That’s what I want … it is my deepest desire to live in this joy in every moment.
But then life happens and I forget that He walks ahead of me to prepare the way for me. I forget that He desires the deepest intimacy and then … somewhere in that time between when I open myself up to Him in the morning and walk in the front door at work … I forget that He is there … walking ahead of me … waiting for me to follow Him … and I head off on my own.
Oh, I still have an awareness of Him in my life but I don’t rest in His presence. I walk out on my own as though I am my own god, and make my own way through the day. No wonder the joy goes away … actually it doesn’t go away – my joy is complete in Him and I make the choice, however unconsciously, to walk away from Him and go on about my day “as though” I can do anything well, on my own! I walk away from the source of that joy … and this is what breaks my heart. I am fully aware in this moment, that I have made the choice to walk away from His presence and joy. This is new revelation for me. Yup, 42 and still growing up! : )
This morning after reading a bit in Walking With God, the Lord directed me to Psalm 57 … and I was blessed to read of His protection for me in this passage:
1. Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy!
I look to you for protection.
I will hide beneath the shadow of your wings
until the danger passes by.
2. I cry out to God Most High,[a]
to God who will fulfill his purpose for me.
3. He will send help from heaven to rescue me,
disgracing those who hound me.
My God will send forth his unfailing love and faithfulness.
4. I am surrounded by fierce lions
who greedily devour human prey—
whose teeth pierce like spears and arrows,
and whose tongues cut like swords.
5. Be exalted, O God, above the highest heavens!
May your glory shine over all the earth.
6. My enemies have set a trap for me.
I am weary from distress.
They have dug a deep pit in my path,
but they themselves have fallen into it.
7. My heart is confident in you, O God;
my heart is confident.
No wonder I can sing your praises!
8. Wake up, my heart!
Wake up, O lyre and harp!
I will wake the dawn with my song.
9. I will thank you, Lord, among all the people.
I will sing your praises among the nations.
10. For your unfailing love is as high as the heavens.
Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds.
11. Be exalted, O God, above the highest heavens.
May your glory shine over all the earth.
I don’t want to live like that for one more moment. We are meant for joy … here is what Jesus has to say about joy:
John 15:11 - I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow!
John 16:24 - You haven’t done this before. Ask, using my name, and you will receive, and you will have abundant joy.
John 17:13 - “Now I am coming to you. I told them many things while I was with them in this world so they would be filled with my joy.
Abundant joy … joy overflowing … filled with His joy. YES! That’s what I want … it is my deepest desire to live in this joy in every moment.
But then life happens and I forget that He walks ahead of me to prepare the way for me. I forget that He desires the deepest intimacy and then … somewhere in that time between when I open myself up to Him in the morning and walk in the front door at work … I forget that He is there … walking ahead of me … waiting for me to follow Him … and I head off on my own.
Oh, I still have an awareness of Him in my life but I don’t rest in His presence. I walk out on my own as though I am my own god, and make my own way through the day. No wonder the joy goes away … actually it doesn’t go away – my joy is complete in Him and I make the choice, however unconsciously, to walk away from Him and go on about my day “as though” I can do anything well, on my own! I walk away from the source of that joy … and this is what breaks my heart. I am fully aware in this moment, that I have made the choice to walk away from His presence and joy. This is new revelation for me. Yup, 42 and still growing up! : )
This morning after reading a bit in Walking With God, the Lord directed me to Psalm 57 … and I was blessed to read of His protection for me in this passage:
1. Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy!
I look to you for protection.
I will hide beneath the shadow of your wings
until the danger passes by.
2. I cry out to God Most High,[a]
to God who will fulfill his purpose for me.
3. He will send help from heaven to rescue me,
disgracing those who hound me.
My God will send forth his unfailing love and faithfulness.
4. I am surrounded by fierce lions
who greedily devour human prey—
whose teeth pierce like spears and arrows,
and whose tongues cut like swords.
5. Be exalted, O God, above the highest heavens!
May your glory shine over all the earth.
6. My enemies have set a trap for me.
I am weary from distress.
They have dug a deep pit in my path,
but they themselves have fallen into it.
7. My heart is confident in you, O God;
my heart is confident.
No wonder I can sing your praises!
8. Wake up, my heart!
Wake up, O lyre and harp!
I will wake the dawn with my song.
9. I will thank you, Lord, among all the people.
I will sing your praises among the nations.
10. For your unfailing love is as high as the heavens.
Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds.
11. Be exalted, O God, above the highest heavens.
May your glory shine over all the earth.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
The Battle ...
I am realizing every single day now, how unbelievably phenomenal our Father is. One of those really cool things He is doing is completing a process that began three years ago. At that time it was a simple prophetic word given to me in a small group. Now, I’m not one to simply trust every word that is spoken over me. When I was in Bible College I had a person prophesy over me in a wacky voice (in a charismatic bible college you get all kinds) and I immediately called my Mom to ask how you know if it’s God or not, feeling strongly that it wasn’t but also guilty at the same time… her response is one I live by yet today --- “When it comes to pass you know it was from God.” Enlightening, eh? : ) Mum is nothing if not practical!
Anyway, this was a rather innocuous (at the time) prophecy in the fall of 2006, about the Lord having me in a period of learning some big lessons with three years being the time frame for completion of that work, and then the beginning of something bigger in my life. I resonated with it as well and felt a peace about what was said. There were some other aspects to this prophecy but this was the basic gist of it – some of those things you just have to hold close to your heart and wait and see what the Lord will do. I’ve sat with this over the past three years and had times of anticipation, times of anger, times of confusion … you know, just life happening and me, as usual, being impatient!
Then last year at our National Conference God placed me beside one of our camp leaders on the bus ride back from Epcot – in hindsight I realized this was a God thing as there was only ONE seat left on the bus and I was the only person in line not “with” someone else waiting to board … yeah, my fun people ditched me when I had to help direct others for a bit : ) … but the Lord was at work and placed me next to an older man who had a “one year” prophecy for me about the completion that the Lord was bringing to my life (I did not know this man but did know/trust his brother). I was floored at the time because when I looked at the timeline for the prophecy from 2006 and what this person shared, they coincided timing-wise and NO WAY that those two people had any contact or knowledge of what the Lord was doing --- but it was HIS way of encouraging me to stay the path … chills up and down my spine BIG TIME!
And then it happened … the battle … it was huge, I was unprepared, and I was taken out BIG TIME!
In late January/early February of this year some pretty major hopes/dreams that I had begun to open up to were lost to me. I had placed a lot of hope in them and the lack of fruition simply devastated me … and so I killed my heart – I felt I had no other choice. The message was that there’s no point hoping for the future when the same thing happens over and over and over and over and over … you get the picture, and I definitely got it that time. You see, there has been this same pattern in my life ever since I was a child, and the enemy does this to ALL of us. We all have this message or theme to our lives that just never seems to change … it is reinforced over and over again by our circumstances. Think about it – what is it that has haunted you for your entire life? In your childhood and high school; academically; in sports; in relationships or not having them; in your family or lack of family; in career opportunities that happened or didn’t; in friendships or lack of them… what is that “theme” for your life that just seems to always be the same? For me it was simply “you will never be the chosen one … you will never be good enough … you will always be on the outside.” Simple, straightforward and very believable, which is just the way the enemy likes it … and I have spent my life making agreements with those messages. Believing the lie and agreeing with it insulates you against the truth and you become ineffectual at best.
Yesterday on my way home in the car I was listening to the second CD in John Eldredge’s series, “The Four Streams,” on spiritual warfare, and he prompted the listener to really think about what your theme is, and walks you through all these times of life and asks, “What is it? What is that one thing that is constantly being reinforced about who you are, through your circumstances?” … and it HIT me so hard … and I got MAD… I’ve never been so mad at the enemy in my life and I spent a good chunk of time telling him off right then and there… seriously telling him off! Ticked does not even begin to describe it! This morning on the way in to work I went back to the beginning that track and listened to it all over again, just to reinforce my freedom! I don’t believe I will ever forget this lesson … and how I approach the rest of my life can now be very different.
You see, it is a battle we live in every moment of every day and if the enemy can take us out or decommission us, we will never be the men and women of God that we were created to be. There IS a plan for each of us and the Lord wants to be so intimately involved in our stories that we walk with him moment by moment and look to Him for all our answers … HE IS LIFE!
I have a choice to make: will I continue to “take” life for myself in any way that I can, or will I embrace the Lord and allow Him to be that LIFE for me? To be that life IN me … I am bound on a different path and His hand will rest upon my head and envelope my life this day and the next … there truly is JOY in the journey in spite though the process is often hard…
Anyway, this was a rather innocuous (at the time) prophecy in the fall of 2006, about the Lord having me in a period of learning some big lessons with three years being the time frame for completion of that work, and then the beginning of something bigger in my life. I resonated with it as well and felt a peace about what was said. There were some other aspects to this prophecy but this was the basic gist of it – some of those things you just have to hold close to your heart and wait and see what the Lord will do. I’ve sat with this over the past three years and had times of anticipation, times of anger, times of confusion … you know, just life happening and me, as usual, being impatient!
Then last year at our National Conference God placed me beside one of our camp leaders on the bus ride back from Epcot – in hindsight I realized this was a God thing as there was only ONE seat left on the bus and I was the only person in line not “with” someone else waiting to board … yeah, my fun people ditched me when I had to help direct others for a bit : ) … but the Lord was at work and placed me next to an older man who had a “one year” prophecy for me about the completion that the Lord was bringing to my life (I did not know this man but did know/trust his brother). I was floored at the time because when I looked at the timeline for the prophecy from 2006 and what this person shared, they coincided timing-wise and NO WAY that those two people had any contact or knowledge of what the Lord was doing --- but it was HIS way of encouraging me to stay the path … chills up and down my spine BIG TIME!
And then it happened … the battle … it was huge, I was unprepared, and I was taken out BIG TIME!
In late January/early February of this year some pretty major hopes/dreams that I had begun to open up to were lost to me. I had placed a lot of hope in them and the lack of fruition simply devastated me … and so I killed my heart – I felt I had no other choice. The message was that there’s no point hoping for the future when the same thing happens over and over and over and over and over … you get the picture, and I definitely got it that time. You see, there has been this same pattern in my life ever since I was a child, and the enemy does this to ALL of us. We all have this message or theme to our lives that just never seems to change … it is reinforced over and over again by our circumstances. Think about it – what is it that has haunted you for your entire life? In your childhood and high school; academically; in sports; in relationships or not having them; in your family or lack of family; in career opportunities that happened or didn’t; in friendships or lack of them… what is that “theme” for your life that just seems to always be the same? For me it was simply “you will never be the chosen one … you will never be good enough … you will always be on the outside.” Simple, straightforward and very believable, which is just the way the enemy likes it … and I have spent my life making agreements with those messages. Believing the lie and agreeing with it insulates you against the truth and you become ineffectual at best.
Yesterday on my way home in the car I was listening to the second CD in John Eldredge’s series, “The Four Streams,” on spiritual warfare, and he prompted the listener to really think about what your theme is, and walks you through all these times of life and asks, “What is it? What is that one thing that is constantly being reinforced about who you are, through your circumstances?” … and it HIT me so hard … and I got MAD… I’ve never been so mad at the enemy in my life and I spent a good chunk of time telling him off right then and there… seriously telling him off! Ticked does not even begin to describe it! This morning on the way in to work I went back to the beginning that track and listened to it all over again, just to reinforce my freedom! I don’t believe I will ever forget this lesson … and how I approach the rest of my life can now be very different.
You see, it is a battle we live in every moment of every day and if the enemy can take us out or decommission us, we will never be the men and women of God that we were created to be. There IS a plan for each of us and the Lord wants to be so intimately involved in our stories that we walk with him moment by moment and look to Him for all our answers … HE IS LIFE!
I have a choice to make: will I continue to “take” life for myself in any way that I can, or will I embrace the Lord and allow Him to be that LIFE for me? To be that life IN me … I am bound on a different path and His hand will rest upon my head and envelope my life this day and the next … there truly is JOY in the journey in spite though the process is often hard…
The Dream:
In 2008 on the night of November 2nd I had this dream and it is so prophetic for what is happening now in my life, that I have to post it too… God is SUPER-KEWL!
So, in this dream I was in a room with a set of large curving stairs. They were wide enough to pass people on and I knew that I had to go up to get to the next level in what was a huge open area inside an airport. It didn’t really look like an airport (more like a mall) but I had luggage with me so that’s why I say airport … when I got near the top I stopped about two stairs from the end because the stairs ended in the middle of the air and you couldn’t reach the next floor – I had my luggage with me but wasn’t actually hauling it – it was just there … disjointed like a lot of dreams can be.
I had a suitcase and a carry-on with me that I “knew” I had to have, but both were heavy and unwieldy and when I saw the stairs end just before I got there, I dropped to my seat in stark fear … refusing to go up further because I knew I would fall if I did.
Then in the next moment of the dream I was back at the bottom of the stairs. Some women who were standing there behind the stairs near some of those joined seats that all airports have, told me that the rest of the steps would appear as I stepped out onto them, about two steps ahead of me every time. They insisted that if I had gone one step further I would have seen the first one appear.
Of course I didn’t think that was true so they pointed out another woman who was just then taking the steps that caused the new ones to appear as she moved forward … but she had no bags with her. The new steps were small round plate size steps with only a railing on the right side of the person and they were no longer wide enough for more than one person. I knew that taking those steps would be impossible if I had to carry my bags with me. Then one of the women told me she would hold them for me until I was done.
That was the end of the dream then but WOW! What a great picture of the process the Lord had me in and the freedom (letting go of the baggage) that He was preparing me for …. As I said … SUPER-KEWL!!! ... and the trust - OHHHHHH, the Trust!
So, in this dream I was in a room with a set of large curving stairs. They were wide enough to pass people on and I knew that I had to go up to get to the next level in what was a huge open area inside an airport. It didn’t really look like an airport (more like a mall) but I had luggage with me so that’s why I say airport … when I got near the top I stopped about two stairs from the end because the stairs ended in the middle of the air and you couldn’t reach the next floor – I had my luggage with me but wasn’t actually hauling it – it was just there … disjointed like a lot of dreams can be.
I had a suitcase and a carry-on with me that I “knew” I had to have, but both were heavy and unwieldy and when I saw the stairs end just before I got there, I dropped to my seat in stark fear … refusing to go up further because I knew I would fall if I did.
Then in the next moment of the dream I was back at the bottom of the stairs. Some women who were standing there behind the stairs near some of those joined seats that all airports have, told me that the rest of the steps would appear as I stepped out onto them, about two steps ahead of me every time. They insisted that if I had gone one step further I would have seen the first one appear.
Of course I didn’t think that was true so they pointed out another woman who was just then taking the steps that caused the new ones to appear as she moved forward … but she had no bags with her. The new steps were small round plate size steps with only a railing on the right side of the person and they were no longer wide enough for more than one person. I knew that taking those steps would be impossible if I had to carry my bags with me. Then one of the women told me she would hold them for me until I was done.
That was the end of the dream then but WOW! What a great picture of the process the Lord had me in and the freedom (letting go of the baggage) that He was preparing me for …. As I said … SUPER-KEWL!!! ... and the trust - OHHHHHH, the Trust!
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