One common misconception
I've recently realized some people may have is
that being a Christian means
I'm exempt from all things any non-believer
experiences.
Not quite.
I am still a sinner.
&&
I still doubt my faith at times.
I am able to share this
for God has given me a humble heart.
In the past few months,
God has shown himself to me
in ways that blow my mind.
How selfish of me
to keep them to myself.
[ 1 ]
In early July,
I really felt God's calling to step up,
to be bold and be a leader.
"A leader? Me!?
I didn't want to be.
But the call was stronger than the resistance.
"God doesn't call the equipped,
he equips the called."
And He was slowly equipping me.
This year, I've been asked to share my faith
more than I ever have in my entire life.
Friends, family, relationships.
I was asked to be a coach for the youth group's
upcoming Youth Camping Trip.
There, I led a group of 8 Freshman girls.
I was able to tell them they're accepted and loved.
That they're perfect in God's image.
I was asked to lead worship at the upcoming
Woman's Great Banquet at the end of October.
And each week I've been attending the meetings
to further my knowledge and allowing God to equip me.
Then, God strongly called me to start ministering more
through ali's Corner.
So, I made this blog.
Have you noticed an upsurge in God related writings? =]
The amount of inspiration flowing from God to me
is almost overwhelming. In a good way, of course.
A few weeks later,
my Mom had to find her high school diploma
for her job as a teacher's aide.
This forced her go through her closet.
And upon searching, she found
pictures, drawings and letters, hand-crafted
by my brother and I when we were in grade school.
She'd laugh, cry and then lay my artwork in my room for me
to see and do as I pleased with it.
It was far too hard for her to throw them away.
She'd rather me do it =].
[I love my Mom, so much by the way.]
One day,
she laid a two foot by one foot piece of fabric on my bed.
It almost looked to be the size of a pillowcase.
On it, was a drawing I made back in Sunday school with markers.
It said "Peace, Love and Jesus" and had a bible verse written on it.
I smiled and tried to remember actually making it.
Knowing I wouldn't do a thing with it,
I tossed it in the garbage.
Upon tossing it, I sat down and logged into facebook.
a saw a video posted of a man
who spoke very angrily of the Christian faith.
I replied in a comment to the video,
I did not tell him that he was wrong.
Instead, I corrected and educated.
Just as Christ asks us to do.
"Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction - 2 Timothy 4:2
In response,
I had never read anything so hurtful.
It was not an attack on the Christian faith,
but a personal attack on me and what I believed.
My heart was sad.
How angry this man was towards me.
He wanted answers as to why I was so blind and stupid.
He wanted to fight and argue with me.
I literally did not have a response.
What I wanted to do was to rip this man apart through my words.
How rude was he to put down my faith and beliefs like that?!
Now I was angry.
I went to take a shower to try and clear my mind.
My faith was starting to slip.
"Maybe I've had it all wrong all this time?
Maybe God really doesn't exist
and every feeling of His presence I thought I've had
was just some coincidence or supernatural power
of this world I had blown out of proportion
to make me feel something larger than life."
I asked God to fight for me.
To give me knowledge.
What was I to tell this man?
Just then,
that two foot by one foot piece of fabric entered my mind.
The bible verse struck me and I knew I needed to look it up.
And this wasn't an
"Oh, I'll do it when I get out of the shower"
kind of prompt.
It was like God dragged me out of the warm water,
my body still soapy, into a towel
and led me to my room, where my bible lay.
I pulled the fabric out of my trash and looked at the
book, chapter and verse I was to look up.
2 Timothy 2:22-24.
I laid on my bed and read the exact words my heavenly father
wanted me to hear at this exact moment in this exact place:
"Flee the evil desires of youth, and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart. Don't have anything to do with foolish and stupid arguments, because you know they produce quarrels. And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Those who oppose him he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will."
My
heart
wept.
I still tear up when I write this
because the presence of God was so
prominent that day whilst laying on my bed.
I cried for a solid ten minutes.
Telling God how sorry I was to doubt Him.
But, God was not angry.
His arms were so inviting.
I physically felt
them wrap around me.
It was a sense of warmth.
Even though I felt naked.
I was safe.
And even confident.
Lifted up,
like wings on eagles.
My response,
to my facebook friend
was the exact words God had just
shared with me.
2 Timothy 2:22-24.
His response?
Nothing.
For, whatever he could have responded,
Rather than arguing with me,
He would instead be arguing with God.
This battle was no longer mine.
[ 2 ]
Upon the feeling of losing my faith,
In early August,
I felt like God was calling me to take a break from
ministering on ali's Corner. for a while.
The series I had previously started,
called "Tackling the Toughies"
was put on hold.
I needed to heal.
I needed a mentor.
Someone smarter, older and wiser than me.
A spiritual guide.
I began to pray.
HARD.
I needed someone to help me back onto my feet.
Please remember,
God does not always answer prayers right away.
This was over a course of a couple months before
I got my answer.
Several people entered my life.
Both, people I had known previously
and complete strangers.
God continued to lift me up
through revealing His works to me.
Gary Stump,
the assistant pastor of Heartland Church
received some horrible news.
Of his children,
two of them both help
lead worship on Sunday mornings.
But on a Friday night they received a call
that his 2nd to youngest son, who lives in New York,
had been in a horrible horse riding accident.
The horse had thrown him off and Graham hit
his head very hard on the ground.
A broken neck and back were a main concern.
He was air lifted to the hospital.
He was not conscious.
Upon many trips for the family out to NY,
scares, doctor updates, tests and scans,
Graham was still in a coma.
Knowing the Stump family for so long,
just coming back from Youth Camp
with the daughter and her husband,
it was difficult to see the family struggle so much.
A few weeks after the accident,
Graham still had not woken up.
The doctors, verbatim, told the Stump family
that Graham would not make it.
That they would need to begin making tough
decisions, including, when to take him off life support.
The stumps were heartbroken.
After days of praying, they had another way
to deal with this struggle.
And it was not of this world.
We have a heavenly father who is so much bigger
than the doctors' knowledge.
He is the ultimate physician.
They have a blog that they write in almost everyday
to update everyone on Graham's status.
And people all across the nation,
who had access to internet and came in contact with their page,
began to pray.
Heartland Church had a special Sunday night service
to come together and simply pray.
Aloud, silently and with other followers in Christ.
Everyone just, believed.
Positive thinking could not save us now,
only the power of Christ.
The improvements that Graham's lifeless body started to make
were so subtle and small each day, I don't have nearly the time to
type out all of the small miracles, struggles and scares
this family has gone and is going through.
But I will say,
that today, weeks from the accident,
although he and his wife, Randi still have a long road ahead of them,
Graham is awake.
Alive.
Talking.
Laughing.
Crying.
WALKING!
SINGING!
And the doctors thought that
he would never be able to EAT again
on his own.
Never be able to sit up on his own.
This family could have had a very worldly
view on their situation, just like the doctors had
but instead, they gave it to God.
They accepted death,
if that's what God was to bring them.
But God's plan was so much bigger than this tragedy.
Graham is on his way to recovery and restoration.
What a story Graham and his family have to tell.
[ 3 ]
Early September,
my search for a spiritual guide continued.
I wanted someone to literally just
take me under their wing.
I attended the Women Of Faith concert
at Conseco Fieldhouse.
I got back in touch with a friend.
A customer from work I had
gotten to know really well.
Let me just say that when you have the same
spiritual feelings as someone else,
there's this connection that makes you feel like you
have known each other for years.
Strangers feel like best friends.
She updated me on her life
and I updated her a little on mine.
We decided to get together for lunch soon.
Upon meeting, I told her about all of my
recent struggles.
I told her of my search for a spiritual guide.
Before I even finished,
her eyes lit up.
It was like Christ lit a candle in her heart
and she was enlightened.
She said.
"I'll do it.
I'll just take you under my wing."
Oh, My Wonderful God,
how you have a sense of humor.
We meet weekly.
She reads to me.
She lifts me up and gives me books to read
they just so happen to apply directly to what I'm struggling with.
How great is our God?
[ 4 ]
I started school in late August.
I was to study at ISD for two years
to get my associates degree in
American Sign Language.
Literally, 2 weeks upon starting,
my mind started to doubt.
"Why hadn't I thought of this before?
what if this isn't what God has planned for me?"
Upon realizing that I'd made the conscious decision
to go back to school for ASL based on my own desires,
I feared that God didn't want me here.
My parents had already paid my tuition.
All that was left to happen was physically going.
I asked God to reassure me that this is what he wanted from me.
My faith still wasn't at it's greatest
I feared school would pull me even farther away.
Since starting,
I've met people upon people with the same
beliefs as me.
My ASL 1 teacher is an incredible woman of Faith
and I'm constantly lifted up each time I'm in their presence.
He has given me a restored passion for ASL.
I didn't know you could be so in love with a language and culture.
God was verbally taken out of other schools recently,
but I find it incredibly uplifting to know that God CANNOT
and WILL NOT be taken out of mine.
He lives inside of several of my classmates
and there's a true presence of God at the VU program at ISD.
I'm taking a class called "Introduction to Multicultural Studies".
Class discussions have revealed to me just how differently people can think.
95% of the classes so far, I've left with a speechless look on my face.
Several times I've physically wanted to get up and leave.
But why on Earth would I do such a thing?
God let's everything happen for a reason.
There's a purpose for this.
1. to educate myself on the absolute amazing diversity that God created in this world.
and
2. every paper I've written so far, I've shared my faith. All eyes that read my papers will see a perspective from a person who walks down the road of life holding God's hand.
[ 5 ]
Last Monday in class we had a guest speaker.
It was a trans-gender person.
I was uncomfortable at first,
I asked God to be there.
God loves this person more than anything.
Who am I to judge?
I've always been one to strive to love the person
and hate the sin.
At the end of class, he drew a diagram
on the board about how
Humans begin with ACTIONS
our actions impact the WORLD.
in turn, the WORLD impacts our CONNECTION
and our EMOTIONAL feelings.
our EMOTIONAL feelings impact our SELF
and our SELF impacts our ACTIONS.
It's one big circle.
the circle of life according to him.
My mind began to race.
Do people really think this way?
How mundane! There's so much more!
I was angry.
My mind began to doubt my own faith, even.
Then, among my internal monologue,
I heard a quiet voice,
"I am the way, the truth and the life.
[John 14:6]
I exhaled.
Give thanks in all circumstances,
for this is God's will for you.
[1 Thessalonians 5:18]
[ 6 ]
Last Saturday was one of the best days of my life.
I cannot go into detail.
It's for another time.
But I was confirmed of God's existence,
His love and His faithfulness all in one day!
He has begun to repair a relationship
that has been broken for over a decade.
And not just fix it, but fully restore it
through Him.
I completely believe that when God delays,
He's working on something better.
If my heart could physically dance,
it would be long exhausted due to the amazing
things He has blessed me with lately.
I think it's easy to overlook the small
and even forget about the big wonderful
things He does for us.
[ I N C O N C L U S I O N ]
Many people base their attitudes toward God
depending on if He's being "good" to them or not.
Who are we to judge what good is?
God made the standard.
We'll never live up to it.
That is why He calls us to repent as sinners
so that we can be saved and forgiven.
So we can live eternally after we leave this Earth.
When God puts us through trial,
He IS being good.
it is for our benefit.
and in turn, for the glory of God.
We must "suffer" well,
in order to live the blessed life.
Whoever said being a Christian was easy
is beyond me.
But it is THE best,
most difficult thing I have ever indulged in.
No comments:
Post a Comment