I guess I shouldn't call this "caramel-macchiato-induced self-realizations" because technically, it was a simply cup of coffee (two splendas, one non-dairy creamer). but this, right now, what God is laying on my heart to peg out on these computer keys, is exactly what the title implies: a HUGE self-realization.
type now. title later. I tell myself. my mind is WHIRLING, beyond what I can explain, and in a better sense than I've ever experienced. let me start with this:MY GOD IS AMAZING.
HIS LOVE IS UNEXPLAINABLE AND UNCONDITIONAL AND OVERWHELMING.
now let me tell you what has brought me to this decision.
I would pretty much have to tell you my WHOOOLE life story to get you up to speed, and I don't want to waste time doing that. so, let's just say God has worked in awesome ways to accomplish His desires in my life. sometimes I love it, sometimes I hate it. it's life.
well, I'd been told several times within the past couple of weeks that I needed to read Redeeming Love, by Francine Rivers {if you haven't read it- READ IT NOW. Number two favorite book, not counting the Bible.} so I picked it up, and it obviously changed my life. actually, God USED it to change my life. let's say that.
well if you know me even a little bit beyond "just friends" you probably know that I am a hopeless romantic and really just LOVE love. and not just earthly love... I ADORE real, everlasting, Agape Love. well... God knows just how and when to work things out to bless my heart.
I'm telling you, my heart is so brimming over with excitement and joy and that tingly-God-thing-feeling that I don't think I can even convey the depth of this moment to any of you readers.
ok, so since this is my blog, and no one ever really reads it or cares, I mostly use it as an outlet for those deep emotions that shouldn't be posted on facebook but have to get out there somewhere past just my head or my prayer journal. you know? so I'm about to be brutally honest with myself & you. here we go.
I've always had this deep, bottomless fear that I will never be loved. or that I will be abandoned. the second one is definitely worse, if you ask me, but that's not what I'm confessing right now. I'm confessing that for the longest time, I doubted that God would provide for my life. I doubted that he would provide friends that truly love me. I doubted that he would sustain my heart and will. I doubted that he would ever bring a man into my life- and still often struggle with that doubt. as I see it, at the core of every girl's heart is the yearning for love. it's unbreakable, impenetrable, and no matter how many times we have been hurt or used or how strong we think we are... the walls will come down eventually when True Love comes in the picture. but because we doubt that Love will ever find us (fall of man's cause, maybe?), we pretend we don't yearn for love. we pretend we aren't insecure about our bodies and our reputations and how others view us, period. we ALL like to play that game pretending to be perfect and extremely confident.
can I PLEASE shatter that myth?
I AM INSECURE. I HAVE NO IDEA WHY ANYONE WOULD EVER LIKE ME OR WANT TO ME MY FRIEND OR FIND ME ATTRACTIVE BECAUSE MOST OF THE TIME, WHEN I LOOK IN THE MIRROR, I DON'T SEE THAT. I SEE UGLY, FAT, WORTHLESS, UNLOVEABLE... AND ALL THOSE OTHER WORDS THAT SATAN HAS SOMEHOW FORCED INTO MY HEAD.
I AM SCARED THAT I WILL NEVER GET MARRIED AND THAT NO ONE WILL EVER LIKE ME, LET ALONE LOVE ME. I AM SCARED THAT IF A MAN EVER FALLS IN LOVE WITH ME, THAT HE'LL EVENTUALLY SEE THE REAL ME THAT I LIVE WITH EVERYDAY AND GET SCARED OFF.
I don't know why God wants me. I don't understand how he desires to use me. I don't understand him at all, and it scares me, but without his support and encouragement and peace and joy and straight-up love, I would DIE. literally. on my own, I am incomplete and dirty and worthless and all that other junk that Satan loves to tell me.
But I have a message for him:
HE FORGETS THAT I AM NOT MY OWN. I AM NOT THE OLD CREATURE I ONCE WAS.
I AM A NEW CREATION, I AM GOD'S OWN. HE HAS REDEEMED ME AND HE TAKES GREAT DELIGHT IN ME. I AM HIS MASTERPIECE.
I know I'm probably making a total of... ZERO sense, and I'm really sorry, for anyone who might actually read this. but you have little to no idea how freeing this moment is.
See, I run away from Him all the time. His unconditional love that makes no sense to my tiny human brains SCARES THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS OUT OF ME, and I tend to run from it, when it's exactly what I need. just like the woman in Redeeming Love. it was like God sent me that book at exactly the moment my heart was becoming most vulnerable to Satan's fiery arrows. He sent me that book to remind me just how unfathomable his love and passion for me is.
How did I ever get that? I am nowhere NEAR to deserving it, and it he just GAVE it away- perfect love. he's just handing it to me on a silver platter. again, just like in the book. it brought me to tears so many times, simply because it reminded me of my past, or gave me hope for my future, or convicted my heart in the present.
That book has got to have some SERIOUS God-anointing for it to move me that much. the ONLY thing that can explain the way my heart has been softened is by the Holy Spirit. end. of. argument.
He (as in Jesus) gave me this verse, while reading RL. It's Proverbs 19:21- "Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the LORD'S purpose for him that will stand."
can I reiterate the fact that God is FILLING MY HEART TO OVERFLOWING WITH LOVE & HOPE? that verse takes me straight back to my fear of never being loved/accepted/married... all that. See, my human plans are to live the single life and pretend to be content while really I live in bitterness and try to be happy while all my friends marry and move away and leave me to make coffee for the Single's Bible Study every tuesday night. not kidding, sometimes I resolve to live that life- when I'm living in my flesh, that is.
but God's plans are so much bigger than that, and I am certain of that fact. once, a little over a year ago, God did some major remodeling in my heart. let's just say it needed to be done, BADLY, and I finally gave Him the chance to mold me. well He did. and can I honestly say that this is the only time so far in my life I have been CONVINCED that God breathed a promise straight into the depths of my soul & spirit? and would you like to know what that promise is?
You will have a husband, beloved. You will not live alone.
I will say that with the way God works, there is a very good chance that I still may live a single life. But not the bitter single life. The full, passion-of-God-has-overtaken-me, I-am-filled-with-His-love kind of single life. and that kind, I will be glad to live. I will live anything, as long as I know His love is always there to compel and sustain me. which it will be.
and that brings me to another point. this past week, in my quiet God-time one morning, I was reading from My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers. Mr. Chambers was commenting on how Paul confessed that Christ's love compelled him. My heart voiced a cry out to Jesus at the very moment those words jumped into my spirit: "COMPEL ME WITH YOUR LOVE, OH GOD!"
and He began to do that. it's been the most exhausting week. so many small trials have blocked my path that would usually make my day that much worse... but today, it just made me that much more thankful for Christ's love. I'm not really sure HOW, even. It just hit me tonight, as I was eating my semi-warm food from the Value Menu at Wendy's. I was pondering why it was that I had no money when I worked so hard at my job and I put so much effort into it. I was wondering why God hasn't provided my funds for London yet, and if I would ever make enough working 4-8 hours per week to save up for it. I asked Him if I needed to change jobs, and find something that I would earn more money doing.
The work I have assigned you now is worth much more than dollars and cents. You are influencing girl's lives. You are being a role model and sharing your heart with them, as you always wished someone had done for you. You are in my mission field, and are exactly where I want you. Keep working.
Could He have made it any more clearer? It's not that I minded ordering from the value menu, at all... it was the fact that it seemed like God wasn't supporting me financially at the job I was in. and then was when the hitting I mentioned happened.
When God is holding your heart in His hands and flowing through you and COMPELLING you, and exhausting you because You're working so hard to bring glory to Him, the rest of life dims in comparison to the importance of that fact. Just as the old hymn says:
"Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full on His wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the Light of His glory and grace."
I've never realized until JUST NOW how true that is.
So, I said all that to get to this point:
My God is indescribable. He works in wonderful ways.
His voice thunders in the most marvelous ways and he does such great things that are beyond our understanding (gotta credit that one to ol' Job). H
He is filling my heart more full of Him that it ever has been.
He is compelling me with His love, and it's the most amazing and exhausting thing I've ever experienced.
TO GOD BE THE GLORY, GREAT THINGS HE KEEPS DOING. :)
