Confession #3

Or I guess more of an experience. Expectations are hard to meet. Especially the ones we give ourselves. God didn't give us expectations, he gave us choice and also demands. He demands that we love people and reach them. He also gave us freedom and love. There is not a certain level to meet for God. No level of worship or serving. God doesn't expect us to be perfect. He doesn't expect the same level of worship or serving from everyone.
I expected my worship to be met by God in a radical way. And when I wasn't met, I was frustrated. I wondered why, I was trying so hard to hear from God. So I fell and almost gave up. But then I realized, you can't try to hear from God. You just hear him. In the right time. God told me to get back up and keep worshipping and that he would meet me if I just got back up. I wasn't met until the end when I processed everything that had happened.
I expected to move to Africa straight out of school. I had the expectation of being a missionary and my perspective of mission work was changed with just a conversation. Mission work isn't about the future or the places you go to reach the nations. It's not about the needs that are met or how many people are brought back to nourishment. It's not about how comfortable you are. It's about ministry and ministry is now. It's about people and their lives being radically changed by God. So many people diminish and twist what missions actually is. It's not always about helping people. its about Jesus and watching his glory fall across the nations. Watching nations give their hearts to Christ and raising up generations for the call.

Deeper In Love

Two songs have stuck out to me today. They're Deeper In Love by Charlie Hall and Never Once by Matt Redman. The lyrics just stuck out to me. Because tonight was a night of realizing how much I want to love God and how loved I am by him. I get so frustrated because I want to hear so badly from God. I want him to speak to me about people and about my life. But I haven't been hearing from God. Then I realize that He doesn't want me to have revelations or hear extraordinary messages from him. He wants me to see how much he loves me. He wants me to fall in love with His son. He poured out his love and I was totally in awe of how much he could love a person like me.
I'm falling deeper in love with Jesus. I see more and more of his unfailing, sacrificial love for me day by day. I see him as my dear loving Father who never once has left me. He never once let me walk alone. He never once let me stray for too long, he always brought me back. My eyes are being opened to things I have never noticed. My heart is being stretched to make room for new depths that His love is taking me to. I love every minute of where he is taking me.

Confession #2

And it may be quite blank: I have been struggling and I haven't even known it.

Once things became such a pattern and part of my routine of life, they began to cover up my true self. A temporary veil was put in front of my eyes and I was blind to everything. Everything that God tried to whisper to me through people and even what the enemy was speaking to me. I have believed one huge lie that could've completely destroyed me. And that lie is that I'm fake.

I have always strived to be everything but fake. I've always desired to be authentic. Not to stand out or get attention but because I have seen the hypocritical world and was almost sucked into it and God scared me away from it. I was not meant to be in that world. None of us are. But that lie snuck into my heart so fast and completely overwhelmed my thoughts. Anything I did I thought it was fake and without true meaning.

Up until about last year, I was one of the most depressed people you could ever meet. I was a pawn of the world, I did whatever it told me. It got to the point where I didn't want to live. And for the longest time I thought I was alive only so the devil could toy with me, because he did. He penetrated my mind and completely warped every single one of my thoughts to be of how unworthy, shameful, disgusting, lost, and dangerous I was. But I didn't want any of that, I hated who I was. And God saw how much I desired to serve him and be completely transformed by him. He made me new. From then on, I became genuine about everything I did. My heart swells with passion for the lost, the hurting, the depressed, the oppressed, the poor, the sick, the orphans, the trafficked, and the people just like how I was. I long to be loyal to God. I desire for God to change people's lives like he changed mine.

And I was reminded tonight that if my life has changed that much, there is no way my heart is fake.

Fragile

One of our pastor's little girls every time I see her looks at me and tells me I'm beautiful. Usually it's early in the morning when she comes into class and it's just after I worked and look absolutely disgusting. I feel so dirty and ugly. But this precious little girl has the sweetest soul to tell me that. I guess that's God's reminder that when I think I look horrible that day that He thinks I'm beautiful.
After that she smiles and says, "You're fragile." She's only two so I don't think she knows what that word means. And I wondered why her dad taught her that word. But I think it's because her dad wants her to know that she is fragile; Jesus holds her carefully in His hands. She is a princess and can break really easily. But Jesus can mend her back together. Frailty is not always bad, because no matter how fragile something is, it can be put back together. He wanted her to know she is gentle, she's light-hearted and is God's precious daughter that he will never leave broken. She is fragile like a flower that grows new petals every season.
And I have been very fragile. But that is exactly what I needed to know.