God, Why?

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith--that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. -Ephesians 3:14-19

The LORD is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. He fulfills the desires of those who fear him; he hears their cry and saves them. -Psalm 145:18-19

I feel like the past few days I have been really wrestling with the question, 'why?' I have continually been praying for more faith from the Lord because I know that I have doubts about God's plan for my life right now when there are so many options and barely any direction. There are plenty of things about the things God has placed in my life that are a complete mystery. The biggest question as of late has been, 'God why do you have me completely lost when it comes to after graduation?' I obviously know the answer to that question. The Lord is trying to teach me patience....just like every other day of my life.... but more importantly, He is continually teaching me about my trust issues and how much control I like to have over about getting things figured out and planned. I feel as though this is God's humor in answering my prayer of giving me bigger faith in Him and what He wants to reveal in my life. But seriously, why does this have to be so painful? I have definitely been feeling convicted of how much I am dwelling on the future and wanting to just figure things out so that I can know what to expect even in the littlest way. I have to continually remind myself that this is not how God works and that I am creating this pain by not fully surrendering to Him. With this being said, it has also been a struggle because God also still calls us to not just sit and be stagnant. He puts desires on our hearts that we have to continually surrender back to Him and He delights in us continually asking for our desires but He also calls us to take leaps of faith and trust in Him through that as well. Confused? Yea, me too. It is hard to find the balance of when to just sit and wait and when to take leaps of faith. Please correct me if I am wrong but I think most of the time God is calling us to take leaps of faith and just go in a direction trusting that He will close the door if that is not where we were supposed to end up. Speaking of which, I am very excited to announce that this summer I am trusting the Lord to use me through an organization called YouthWorks. It is a mission organization for junior high and high school students. I am SO excited to be involved in this ministry this coming summer. My official role that I am hired as is Program Coordinator. I will be doing a lot of the planning for the evening meeting time including giving the main talks throughout the week. I am so excited to be able to grow in the Lord just through preparing these talks on God's Word and through the Spirit speaking His truth through me. Through this opportunity, I am also praying that the Lord will use it to show me if He is wanting to close the door on the possibility of going into youth ministry after graduation in some aspect or continue down this desired path. My heart has been really set on doing ministry and I feel more and more called to ministry within the church through pouring into youth and women. I will not lie, waiting on the Lord to give me direction in this particular area has been hard but there has been another area of mystery that has been incredibly painful the last few days.

If you have read my blog posts before, you have probably read about my family situation. I wouldn't say that my family life is horrible, but I will say that it is broken and incredibly distant. I was awakened again to the lack of intentionality among my family members there is when I was driving to my grandmother's house across town to pick up a coat for my halloween costume. I actually got lost on the way. Getting lost quickly reminded me of the fact that I hadn't been to grandma's house in probably 2 years. After I left her house, I felt like a horrible granddaughter, a horrible daughter since I never go to my parents' house either, and a horrible Chase/Lodzinski family member in general. Most of all though, I felt so hurt. "God, why do I not have support from the family you have given me?" This was the biggest question that popped into my head while tears ran down my face. I don't understand. Family is such a skewed word for me because I have always considered friends more like family than my actual family members. As I have processed this pain a little bit the past 2 days, I keep realizing how much my past truly does impact my present. I struggle SO much in wanting to control planning and what I am going to do and I can be very good at just doing it myself. I have become way better at asking for help and not depending on myself but I still have so much to learn. I made a connection that I struggle so much with self-sufficiency because I grew up needing to be self-sufficient. Because of having incredibly distant family, I didn't experience deep emotional level love. I know my parents love me and I recognize that they showed me deep love through giving me opportunities in gaining experience in anything and everything but I also recognize that there was still a huge void. I just want to be hugged and actually be told that I am loved by them. I fear the words, "I love you," because I don't know how to react most of the time. God, I don't understand why there are so many walls built up in one single home. I obviously have known my parents my whole life but yet I know more about a friend I have had for 5 years than I do my parents. This is continually an incredibly painful area that God is trying to refine and I truly need to trust the Lord is near as I literally cry out to Him. This post probably has many disconnects in thought process. I need so desperately to be filled with the fullness of God and be rooted in His love alone as stated in Ephesians 3. The Lord is allowing me to grieve this painful area in my life and I am trusting that the Lord will reveal His mercy and grace continually through this.

Needy? Desperate?

He sent from on high, he took me; he drew me out of many waters. He rescued me from my strong enemy and from those who hated me, for they were too mighty for me. They confronted me in the day of my calamity, but the LORD was my support. He brought me out into a broad place; he rescued me, because he delighted in me. The LORD dealt with me according to my righteousness; according to the cleanness of my hands he rewards me. For I have kept the ways of the LORD, and have not wickedly departed from my God. For all his rules were before me, and his statutes I did not put away from me. I was blameless before him, and I kept myself from my guilt. So the LORD has rewards me according to my righteousness, according to the cleanness of my hands in his sight. With the merciful you show yourself merciful; with the blameless man you show yourself blameless; with the purified you show yourself pure; and with the crooked you make yourself seem tortuous. For you save a humble people, but the haughty eyes you bring down. For it is you who light my lamp; the LORD my God lightens my darkness. For by you I can run against a troop, and by my God I can leap over a wall. This God--his way is perfect; the word of the LORD proves true; he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him. -Psalm 18:16-30


If I were to be called 'needy' or 'desperate' I am sure that my initial reaction would not be filled with immediate joy. When we look through the eyes of society, no one wants to be called needy, especially within any relationship. However, we are to live completely apart from the worldly view. I just got back today from our Fall Retreat with CRU. It was definitely needed to get away into God's beautiful creation of nature and soak up community and His Word. The Lord has been teaching me a lot lately about how much I do for Him but I sometimes fail at just being with Him. What does just being with God really look like? Where should my heart be in meeting with God? We have the opportunity to meet with the all-powerful, merciful, loving, compassionate, life-giving Creator. This Majesty is worthy to be praised. If i think about a King, I think about the utmost honor given. I picture honor being given by people kneeling before Him. We need to be kneeling before our Father, the most royal King we will ever find. What emotions come with kneeling before anyone? Obviously, an emotion of humbleness comes as we put ourselves below whoever we kneel before and we are giving up our pride to do so. Pride comes in many different forms but it comes down to trusting in our own independency instead of admitting that we will never have the perfect answer or the perfect plan. So what does this have to do with being needy and desperate?


Psalm 18 above is written by David who brings out some pretty heavy truth in this passage. There are strong enemies that are too mighty to be rescued from by anyone but God. (Verse 16-17) The Lord deals with people according to their righteousness and reward those with clean hands. (Verse 20) We can be blameless and righteous before God when we keep his rules and statutes, when we keep His ways and when we do not wickedly depart from God. (Verse 21-22) God shows Himself merciful to those who are merciful, he shows Himself blameless with the blameless man, and He shows Himself pure with the purified. (Verse 25-26) God saves the humble people but brings down the arrogant (haughty). God's way is perfect, the Word of the Lord is true, and God is a shield for those who refuge in Him. (Verse 30) Look at all these truths. In my own flesh, have I kept His rules and His ways? No. Do I have clean hands? No. Have I been completely merciful, blameless, and pure? No. We are human and have a nature of sin. David wrote these words but they are not true of him. Notice in verse 25, the Word reads, 'with THE blameless man you show yourself blameless.' Jesus is the blameless man. Jesus is also the merciful one and the purified one referred to in this passage. Jesus is the only one who has kept God's ways and did not depart from God even in the toughest temptations. Jesus is the ultimate example humility and the role model to follow in what taking refuge in God really looks like. So what does this mean for me? It means that we all need to be needy. We need to be desperate. We cannot be rewarded nor become blameless with Jesus. We cannot conquer strong enemies and sin without literally clinging to the cross. We ARE desperate for a shield that will help us be guarded from this world. We cannot live this life in these temptations on our own. We will fail and we will fail miserably if our flesh comes before humility and laying ourselves before the throne of God. We need to literally cling to the hope that has come through the cross. Jesus died on the cross to make us clean and whole so that we may even have the opportunity presented before us to come face to face with our Creator. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life and we will not be able to come face to face with God the Father unless we form a deep, passionate, intimate relationship with Jesus. We need and are desperate for Christ. We have no other hope but in Christ. I am needy because I need God's truth to battle the enemy and his lies every single day of life. I am desperate for the peace and comfort that only comes from the One who paid it all. I am desperate to be humbled by the Great I Am so that I may be fully covered by the grace that God alone can give. I am needy because on my own I am completely empty handed with nothing good to give before God in my own flesh. But God's hands are not empty. They bring life to those who are willing to take His hands and swallow the pride that prevents them from proclaiming their desperate need for something greater and beyond this earth. I cannot be sanctified on my own and I cannot live in this world alone. I am needy.

New Creation

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

-2 Corinthians 5:17

If indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. 

-Ephesians 4:21-24

The Lord has been constantly testing my faith in Him when it comes to my future and what path He will be leading me down after graduation. I still trust the Lord will use me in ministry but am still not sure exactly what that will look like. The more I think back to the life the Lord has brought me through, my heart breaks for those young women who still struggle in finding value in what the world has to offer. My heart breaks that I still struggle in finding value in what the world has to offer. I think about my youth group girls who are juniors in high school who still just don't get it. A couple weeks ago we talked about priorities in life and three tiers of how to gauge where our priorities really are. The top tier was those things that were absolutely crucial to our lives, things that we could not live without. The next tier was things that were not necessarily needed but still important. The last tier was things that were cool but did not really matter much at all. The girls were filling out their sheets of where they thought things in their lives should be in their priorities. They wrote down having a relationship with God as crucial, which I obviously was glad to hear at first. However, following God came boys and makeup in the crucial category. I tried not to laugh but then realized that these girls were serious and those things is what they thought were most important. These girls seek worldly attention every minute of their days because they have yet to understand the emptiness that comes with putting priority on worldly attention and beauty. I was very quickly brought back to my own junior high and high school days before truly following the Lord. I was exactly where they were at one point in thinking that a boy pursuing me because of my beauty and talents was one of the most important keys to happiness. I laugh about this now because it is so ridiculous. But, that is where our younger generations are because of media and poor influence in their lives. They have few role models that are willing to stand up and challenge them to think otherwise and load on the truth that they are beautiful even being as broken as they are.

I spent some time today thinking about old friends that I used to spend so much time on. These were great friends in the world's eyes but not in Christ's. They didn't push me to God's hope and promises. In fact, they pulled me away from God's truth. I was accepted by them from the cute clothes that I wore to school that day and how nice my mascara made my eyelashes look. I was judged on how fun I was to be around and how great I could make them feel by complimenting them on the same attributes. I thought about all the fun times I had with these friends that make for great memories but in all honesty, I am glad they are just memories. The world has had such an influence in my life, even after accept Christ's love and forgiveness and experiencing God's grace in my life. I decided to look through some old pictures of my party days. I saw too many bad memories of drunken nights that ended in blacking out on the floor in the apartment I lived in second semester of freshman year. I saw faces of "friends" who were really only my friends because I shared my beer with them or, if they were a boy, gave them attention that wasn't attention the real me would normally give. Pictures from that summer where I had lost control and saw my drunken self almost every night. I saw so many broken promises through these pictures and times that really weren't getting me anywhere in where I wanted to be. Didn't these "friends" understand that the only reason I was in this stage of life and at those parties was because I was hurting with such deep pain that all I really wanted was someone to come along side of me and help me find my way back to who I really was? A friend who would take the time to bring me back to God actually created me to be? Of course not, I was obviously looking in the completely wrong places. I was instantly overwhelmed with joy and praise for the amazing road God has lead me down. "Oh praise the One who paid my debt and raised this life up from the dead!" As I looked through a few more pictures I realized that I was seeing nothing but death. I was so far away from the Lord that I was in nothing but the death of my own flesh. The Lord has come into my life and has made me a completely new creation. From the moment that I decided to fully surrender my lost ways to Him, I saw hope in a way that I had never found elsewhere. I found the joy and acceptance that I had been looking everywhere but to God for. The Lord reminded me today that death can be so consuming in our lives but He promises to make us righteous and holy. What an incredible promise. I am not who I was and when I looked at those pictures, I saw a stranger who had no hope and no direction. However, more than that I saw a child of God who the Lord worked miracles in to change this hard heart and has made it overflow with the only love that truly matters. I am continually brought back to the hurting young people who are exactly where I used to be. I want to come along side of them and have God use me in powerful ways to help them also be brought out of the death that used to consume me. I fully believe that the Lord has allowed these experiences to be part of my story to relate to so many broken women. I desire the Lord to use me in the lives of these women because the Lord has done so much through women pouring into me. We all have flesh that does nothing but create death in us, but we have a Savior who has died our death for us and has replaced it with hope and has used it to make us completely new. I marvel at this miracle that God could take such a broken, lost life and turn it into one that strives after His plan and is used to share His grace. I am so incredibly thankful.

Defeat.

Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him, and he will act. -Psalm 37:5

But for me, I will look to the LORD; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me. Rejoice not over me, O my enemy; when I fall, I shall rise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord will be a light to me. Micah 7:7-8

The past week has been lacking overflowing joy and thankfulness to the Lord. I actually have been feeling quite defeated. My heart aches for the brokenness around me, as well as the brokenness in myself. The enemy has definitely gotten into my brain the past few days. I have felt overwhelming defeat in some of the areas of my ministry and I am not understanding how the Lord is using it all. The prayer ministry that the Lord helped me start last year was such an exciting idea and action. I want others so badly to experience the power my God has to change lives in the ways that I have seen and experienced myself. I want so badly for others to have a boldness to claim this power in the darkest areas of their lives. I saw God do amazing things in lives last year in our 24 hour prayer room a couple blocks from campus. I heard amazing stories of how people were experiencing the Lord is such deep ways. I went back onto our prayer blog (http://uwspprayer.blogspot.com/) and read some of the words of others from last year. There was so much power pumping through our movement and I fully believe that it was our dedication as a campus to get on our knees and pray for God to do big things. So why do I feel so defeated? The prayer ministry on campus does not look the same. I know that it is not necessarily true, but I feel that there is such a lack of devoted, bold prayer happening on our campus. Honestly, there is still lack of truly devoted, bold prayer in my own life. I get impatient easily. And what about all the desires that the Lord has been making overwhelming in my heart the past couple months? The desires to do ministry after graduation, get married, have children, glorify the Lord through it ALL. I feel slightly defeated not knowing where the heck I am going after graduation. But, the most feeling of defeat lies in myself. Why? Because all this defeat revolves around nothing but doubt.

The enemy is constantly taking my weaknesses and putting them back into my life as negative thoughts of, "how can God use me?" or "how come God has not given me answers when I have been down on my knees in prayer trusting Him?" The truth is the enemy uses the doubts that we do not directly see all the time to take us back to lies of worthlessness. The enemy constantly uses my past to try to convince me of the words spoken to me as a child that I will never be loved. I hate this. I hate that there are doubts in my life that are causing feelings of defeat. The Lord has been teaching me how much I continually need to ask for Him to give me more faith, give me more trust, change my wretched heart and tune it to only sing praises of His Holy name. I have to continually remind myself that this is a journey. No one is perfect. I will never be perfect while I remain on this earth. But then my past creeps back into my head and remembers how many people have gone through my life judging everything I do and I bring those people back in my head and let them criticize my flaws and weakness and from their criticism, I am brought back to the lie that "no one would love me with these flaws." I am so thankful that the Lord has revealed these thought processes to me as I look into them and want to vomit. 

The Lord WANTS me at my weakest moments because I am most moldable at these times. The Lord IS my refuge now more than ever. I fall and I stumble and I am definitely learning that I fall and stumble a lot more than I realize and care to admit when I am constantly tempted to compare myself to the world. The enemy tries to convince me that my faith is constantly in need of being perfected and that life will not come together until that time. My faith IS in need of being perfected but perfection will not come until I am face to face with the One who created me in His image. This truth is overwhelming and causes hopelessness at times for my nature of perfectionism. But, God still loves me and calls me to strive for His righteousness and His holiness even though I will not gain those until I leave this wicked world. Life will come together despite my imperfections and despite my lack of direction. Psalm 37:5 promises me that the Lord will act when I commit to Him and trust in His ways above my own. Lord, I need my heart to be broken for Your plans and not my own. I need Your goodness and mercy everyday and I constantly need heart change that follows You alone. This life wants to badly to commit to everything You have for me. Take away these doubts and feelings of defeat because they are doing nothing BUT causing more defeat. This soul will not stop fighting even on my weakest days. 


I am brought back again and again to the desperate need of powerful, bold prayer in my life and full trust that my God can do any and all things. The Lord calls me to step out in steps of faith into His mysteries and acknowledge that He is taking the wheel. The Lord does not want me to just sit and wait for everything to make perfect sense. He doesn't want me to sit and wait for concrete answers and concrete plans. The Lord does not promise peace to us about future plans before we take steps of faith. The Lord desires me to ask big things of Him and to not stop asking before He answers. The Lord expects me to walk blindly and listen to only His voice for me to expect Him to reveal His perfect plans. The Lord gives me freedom to step out into multiple options that all glorify Him and trust that He will work through any of them when I don't feel a strong pull and calling to one particular path. The Lord is good and I need to proclaim this temple is His alone continuously for this body to be used in the biggest ways God has planned. In my weak feelings of defeat, the Lord is the only One who will give me strength to stand strong and courageous for the sake of His purpose.
 

Getting Down on Your Knees Starts in the Heart

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me--practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you. 

-Philippians 4:6-9

It is so easy to lose sight of being content in any circumstance that God has placed us in. Well, I guess I won't make assumptions so it is easy for ME to lose sight of what being content really means. God wants me to continually be content in any circumstance that He puts me in....ultimately contentment comes from truly trusting in the Lord's plan. The Lord continues to bless me in SO many ways and yet throughout each of them I hear Him ask, "So, do you trust me YET?" I feel like God asks me this question a lot and it is so easy to exclaim "YES!" when things are falling into place like I imagine. However, it is just as easy to look at circumstances that go against the plan in my own imagination and take away TRUE trust in the Lord. Why do I do this over and over again? The Lord has continues to prove Himself faithful and good ALL THE TIME but yet my heart still longs for the Lord to show me His goodness more and in bigger areas of my life. I realize that this relationship with God is a journey and intimate trust with anyone comes through learning to trust as we experience reason to be able to trust. The Lord blesses us over and over again so that we will develop deeper trust as we grow in Him. 

Contentment in circumstance takes two parts: God's part and ours. Philippians 4:6 tells us flat out, "do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." Do not WORRY about anything but always pray by telling God your needs and always thank Him for His answers. The first part in the process of learning to be content is pure heart choice. We need to choose to pray rather than worry. Sadly, so many people, including myself from time to time, reverse this and worry about everything and pray as a last resort. It's like God has to literally force us onto our knees. It is obviously so much easier to worry, fret, lose sleep, or yell at others than to humble ourselves before the throne of God and pray. Our sinful flesh automatically goes to worry and trying to fix things in our lives by ourselves. We are already programmed to first be tempted to just worry about anything and everything that comes our way. This is where we need to put on our full armor, especially the shield of faith. Being able to fully humble ourselves and admit that we cannot defeat worry on our own is really putting full trust into the Lord's hands that HE CAN. We need to pray specifically but we also need to pray with thanksgiving in all circumstances. When we come to incredibly hard situations in life like the worry of having cancer or, more personally, where I am supposed to go and what I am supposed to do after graduation, it is SO hard to be thankful constantly. Psalm 116:17 says, "I will offer to you the sacrifice of thanksgiving and call on the name of the Lord." It truly is a sacrifice. We are sacrificing our pride of being able to be thankful on our own strength and calling upon the name of the Lord for the strength to praise Him in ANY storm or even just a waiting period in life. So we have a choice for our part of being content: are we going to pray or worry?

In Philippians 4:7, God's part is stated, "And the peace of God, which transcends all understand, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." If we continually make the choice to pray, God promises peace over and over again. Our hearts without Christ leading are poor and weak. When we choose to let Christ have the power over our minds and hearts, God promises that He will do His part in bringing us peace through guarding our hearts and minds for us. Honestly, it is hard to truly surrender every ounce of worry to the Lord to use and work in with His plan. But, God will not grant the peace that we continually search for unless we choose to pray. Those prayers could be constant prayers through Philippians 4:6-7 and praying for the Lord to give you more faith in the promise of His Word and the Truth that He has blessed us with. Having more faith is something that I have been continually praying for every single day because it is so easy to get distracted by my independent and self-controlling nature and not put every aspect in my life into God's hands and truly have faith that He will use every bit of it for His perfect plan. Being dependent on myself has always been one of the biggest strongholds in my life because I grew up with the need to be independent and rely on my own strength and power to be successful. The Lord sure knows how to knock me down to my knees, though. 

Philippians 4:8 goes back to another aspect to our part. This verse says, "Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things. We need to dwell on the positives in life and the blessings that come from the Lord, even when we do not understand why they are a blessing. God asks us to control our minds and take every thought captive in order to be lead in obedience in following Christ. Romans 12:2 says, "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." God commands us to be transformed by the renewal of our minds. We renew our minds when we dwell on the positives the Lord has placed in our lives. Paul then uses verse 9 to remind us of our part and God's part again by stating, "Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me--put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you." We are called to practice when God teaches us through His Word. Practice means doing something over and over and over again. Practice is hard work but it always pays off. The specific things we need to constantly practice in learning contentment are choosing to give our anxieties to God, choosing to pray specifically, choosing to be thankful, and choosing to dwell on the positive. Again, Paul reminds us at the end of the verse that when we practice these things, God promises peace that will stick with us. 

I am still learning this process of being content in all situations, especially in this season of my life when it seems to be one big waiting game. The Lord has definitely been faithful in bringing me to my knees in prayer. This time has been hard but so incredibly rewarding. I pray that you will be able to humble yourself before the throne in prayer and experience His perfect peace as well!

His Presence Displayed

The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to grant to those who mourn in Zion-- to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he may be glorified. They shall build up the ancient ruins; they shall raise up the former devastations; they shall repair the ruined cities, the devastations of many generations. 

-Isaiah 61:1-4

You are a hiding place for me; you preserve me from trouble; you surround me with shouts of deliverance.

-Psalm 32:7

I finished my last chapter of 'Breaking Free' by Beth Moore. The journey the Lord has taken me on the past couple months has been nothing short of amazing. There have been lots of tears and heartache but many more shouts of praise from joy and peace. This journey has definitely not been what I would call fun but the Lord used it to break my heart in so many ways for what breaks His heart. My sin, past struggles that were still being held onto, and lack of forgiveness for myself and others from years of walls being built up have all brought me to my knees in surrender to Him. God is more real than I have ever experienced in my life. There are still a couple walls in my life that the Lord is continually taking down brick by brick but the Lord has already done so much work in my heart, freeing me from strongholds that I did not even know existed before this study. 

The further we dive into God's Word and surrender all to Him, we see His glory and splendor pour out of our lives in ways we never thought imaginable. One of the biggest ways I have seen God work through me is in my compassion towards others. I have always been considered a compassionate person by my friends' standards but I have seen God's level of compassion shine through me in so many ways that I would not have seen without continually seek the Lord in every area of my life. I have experienced urgency to pray boldy and powerfully like I haven't before and the Lord has used this to open my eyes to how fierce our battle with the enemy truly is. Some of the biggest lessons that I have learned have been how deeply I have been affected by my past. I have learned about my lack of trust in people around me because of putting my trust in the wrong people in the past. I have learned my lack of vulnerability because growing up I felt the need to put up fronts of perfection to not be a burden to my parents. The hardest lesson the Lord has taught me over this journey is that never in my life have I been able to say that I honestly hated someone but yet comparing how we are called to love others by Christ's love, I held nothing but hate for my own sister. The thought of this truth still stings so much. The Lord has slowly chipped away at this throughout this journey and I have seen small changes but the Lord and I have so much work to do after being knocked down from this relationship for 20 years. There are days that I wake up ready to battle anything and everything that comes my way and then there are days of exhaustion. Of course there are days of exhaustion because no one can fight the good fight on our own strength and the exhaustion reminds us over and over again how much we need God's strength every moment of our lives.

Do you not know?

Have you not heard?

The LORD is the everlasting God,

the Creator of the ends of the earth.

He will not grow tired or weary,

and his understanding no one can fathom.

He gives strength to the weary

and increases the power of the weak.

Even youths grow tired and weary,

and young men stumble and fall;

but those who hope in the LORD

will renew their strength.

They will soar on wings like eagles;

they will run and not grow weary,

they will walk and not be faint.

-Isaiah 40:28-31

Fighting the good fight for God's kingdom and His glory is our only purpose. Everything we have been blessed with is to be used for furthering God's kingdom. Everything we have is to be used for fighting in battle. Just thinking about that sounds exhausting...especially when I compare it to my lack of running ability. We have a tendency to compare our strength in battle to the strength of our flesh and we let our weakness and weariness get the best of us. This is when we need to do nothing but put our hope back in the Lord and back into HIS strength. The Hebrew word for 'hope' is qawah. This Hebrew word means "to bind together (by twisting)...to be gathered together, be joined." We literally need to draw close to the presence of God and cling onto our Maker to be joined with Him. We need to wrap ourselves so tightly around God that we go nowhere else but where God is going. 2 Corinthians 2:14 says, "But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place." The only place that God is going is to victory and we have the privilege of going after a goal that is not just to win but to win Christ. Philippans 3:8-9 Paul writes, "Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith." We are put into a battle everyday that we will not win without clinging to the Lord God Almighty. There is even greater reward for those who do cling to the Lord and that reward is gaining Christ and righteousness that comes from no place other than faith in Christ. Paul's words tells us that we can actually be found in Him. Can you imagine being so bound to the Lord that people can only find our true selves through also hoping in Christ? This is obviously not an easy battle because we are still human, I'm definitely still human! We do grow weary and we do stumble and fall. When we get to these points we need to continually seek Christ as our hiding place and hang on to the Lord with everything we have. We will never be more beautiful to God than when He can look down and see us hanging onto Him for dear life.

Peace Beyond Imaginable

How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, "Your God reigns!" Listen! Your watchmen lift up their voices; together they shout for joy. When the LORD returns to Zion, they will see it with their own eyes. Burst into songs of joy together, you ruins of Jerusalem, for the LORD has comforted his people, he has redeemed Jerusalem. -Isaiah 52:7-9


And the effect of righteousness will be peace, and the result of righteousness, quietness and trust forever. -Isaiah 32:17


For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit, because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men." -Romans 14:17-18


Weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning! -Psalm 30:5


It is truly incredible how much the Lord has done in my life, especially in just the past few weeks. The Lord has allowed me to see strongholds in my life and created conviction in my heart of those things that I was still holding onto with knuckles so white. The Lord is still continually teaching me areas of life that I am trusting myself in more than Him but He has done SO much in my heart recently. Have you ever been in a plateau with your relationship with God where it just seemed like you were not getting much deeper than where you were at? To be honest, that is where I felt I was for awhile until the Lord started using 'Breaking Free' to truly break my heart for those areas deep down that were keeping me from His true peace. The Lord has revealed heart issues of trust due to the environment I grew up in, situations that I put myself into, and circumstances that I was completely to blame for. The Lord uprooted deep pain in my life and blessed me with time and knowledge to process how they were still keeping me from the Lord and growing deeper in my relationship with Him. I felt like I was learning submission to authority all over again--even when I felt like I had it figured out for the most part. I have learned how far I am from knowing and paying attention to all God's commands and being obedient in them. I am definitely not perfect. I realize that no one is perfect, but even just that statement of admitting your life is not all together is SO FREEING. I stumble and still think it is a better idea sometimes to put up the front of having everything together rather than being honest about having an incredibly bad week. I still am figuring out how manipulation can set into my mind and how the enemy uses it to convince me that my control over situations is best because I know what is going on and I don't have to sit and wonder. I am definitely still CONSTANTLY learning what it looks like to love others as Christ does. The Lord has definitely showed me how much I fear loving people the way I am called to because of fear of being rejected. This list of things that I don't have together could go on and on and on and on. However, I have experienced the greatest gift of all. The Lord has still looked at me with all the flaws in my flesh and whispers, "Behold, you are beautiful, my love, behold, you are beautiful!" (Song of Songs 4:1) The Lord has lavished his perfection on me that I may be seen as beautiful and perfect in His eyes for His glory alone! Being on this journey the Lord has led, I have seen the peace that comes with true obedience to God's Word and Spirit in my own life more than ever the past few weeks. Obviously, obedience does not come easy because we naturally want to rebel. We want to find our own way and find peace for ourselves so that we can feel a sense of accomplishment. Puke. The Lord calls us to a higher standard and calls us to sacrifice to live for Him and His kingdom. Isaiah 32:17 tells us that peace is a fruit of righteousness. We are filled with righteousness when we respond in obedience to Jesus' words in Luke 9:23: "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it." When we are ready to truly surrender, we are proclaiming that we will remain in His love by being a branch to the vine. The Lord blesses us with this opportunity to cling so tightly to Him so that we may experience peace and joy and that we may be complete. What an incredible blessing! The Lord has taken my heart captive and has filled it was joy and peace that has never been found anywhere else I have looked. I have never found this joy in drinking, controlling eating habits, or dating relationships. I have never found this joy in friendships, in sports, in hobbies, or in independency. There is NOWHERE other than God's loving arms that will allow you to experience overflowing peace in any situation and circumstances. Out of this peace comes complete display of His splendor and promise. I still don't understand how God has chosen me to reveal His love through, but I am beyond thankful for a God who is all powerful and who has taken me out of my darkest days and brought me into the brightest shining light I will not find elsewhere. I will proclaim, "Because Your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise You!" (Psalm 63:3)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YInS5krgB0s

You Do Not Have Because You Do Not ASK

On your walls, O Jerusalem, I have set watchmen; all the day and all the night they shall never be silent. You who put the LORD in remembrance, take no rest, and give him no rest until he establishes Jerusalem and makes it a praise in the earth. -Isaiah 62:6-7

You do not have, because you do not ask. -James 4:2

And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. -Luke 11:9-10

The Lord has been revealing so much truth to me in the area of bold and powerful prayer. A lot of this blog is what the Lord has directly been teaching from watching this youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyxZdpL-xeU 

This video focuses on how we do not see God answer prayer because we do not ask Him and do not ask Him enough. I will let you watch the video and hear God's truth through Matt Chandler's voice. This past week the Lord has been allowing me to wake up and see how much spiritual warfare there really is all around me and how many thoughts are lies from the enemy trying to keep me in mediocre trust in and prayer with the Lord. The Lord has been teaching me like crazy about the desires of my heart having being put there for a purpose. It is so easy for us to look at desires of our hearts and convince ourselves that we cannot have those desires for many reasons. Women may have a strong desire for a future husband but convince themselves that they cannot think about and process that desire because they have to guard their hearts. Guarding hearts is important but pushing desires back into the Lord's face is not going to get us anywhere. If we are following the Lord and continually deepening our understanding of surrender, the Lord promises us that our desires will align with His desires. For these women, the strong desire for marriage is how God created them and it is in His plan. He has put that desire on their hearts for a reason and I believe that the Lord is strengthening this desire to prepare them while God is in the processing of blessing them with answers to these desires. The Lord WANTS to bless His children who follow Him. The enemy twists the truth of guarding hearts and deceives them into not trusting the Lord to bless that desire. That is honestly scary to me. This is just a sample situation but this can even relate to those processing future plans of career. Sometimes we can feel a strong pull towards a certain plan and have such a strong desire to follow it but again, we do not trust that God has placed that desire there FOR A REASON. We need to step up and not continually let ourselves pray for things 'if it is in His will.' If we were honest with ourselves, most of the time when we pray those words, 'Lord, I pray for this if it is in Your will,' we are really saying, "Lord, I want You to bless this desire that I feel is from You but I don't want to be disappointed because I'm not REALLY sure if you will come through for me." Can you relate? I sure can. I know many of my prayers have had doubt that the Lord could really answer my desire so I trick my mind into saving myself disappointment by covering my prayer with "if." No wonder the Lord doesn't answer us. The Lord commands us to GIVE HIM NO REST from bold and fully surrendered prayer until He does answer us. We quit asking for answer to prayer way before the time the Lord was going to bless us. We don't allow God to give us answers. When we fall into this type of prayer, we set ourselves up for attack from the enemy. I hear this happen a lot through relationships and friendships that people have. If we do not hear from our friends who are other Christians in the time frame that we are hoping or in the way we were hoping, the enemy uses that to pull believers and the body of Christ apart. The Lord desires to bless relationships between believers, especially those relationships that naturally encourage, challenge and build one another up. The enemy is fully threatened by these relationships and desires to pull them apart so quickly. This is not the Lord's plan. We need to be ready to fight for praying for each other that we would recognize the deceitfulness of the enemy and start praying with power. It is okay to declare desires as the Lord's when they are rooted in and aligned with God's truth. Do not second guess this. The enemy uses second guesses to twists thoughts and create action of not trusting in the desires God has given us. We need to proclaim, "Lord, I believe this is from You and You have purpose in using this to further Your kingdom and build up Your bride. I trust that You will bless this desire and I will not back down from fighting with prayer for it." 

This may seem intense but the Lord blesses those who seek after Him WHOLEHEARTEDLY. Trust that your desires are of God if they line up with His Word and do not stop asking Him. The Lord delights in us knocking on His door continuously!