My Jesus IS captivating
I had An unplanned mini-retreat with God today.
so i re-read some of "Captivating" today...about wounds, satan's special hatred for women, and God's healing for me.
Because clinical was canceled and my roommates were all out, i was able to cry.
I just let the tears come as they would, and I was able to be honest with my God -- I re-visited the hurting memories and points of my life, from childhood to last year.
I cried so much! But it was so healing -- I had been telling this stuff to other people, but not to the One who made me....and it was great to finally tell him how I percieved my situation, and what I felt and thought about it.
And then, after I had expressed how I felt that everyone was being ripped out of my life, I read the section on "hemming in"....and it suddenly dawned on me that the people who seemed to be "ripped out of my life and heart by God" were not done to spite me, but to awaken me to the underlying lonliness I'd had all along -- the emptiness that can only be filled with His glory and prescence.
And also brought back to my mind was a conversation I had at the begining of summer, with my "older adopted Gothic" brother, who spoke a message to me from God -- that I had an emptiness - a void-- which I was keenly aware of -- and God wanted me to know that I needed to be aware of my attempts to numb that or fill it with something else. But in reality, that void was to be reminders -- whispers -- of God's lonliness for my friendship and company.
and I listened to Dr. Anstine online at www.ekklesiafellowship.org about Romans Chpt 4 and works ...and was strongly reminded in a new way that it is nothing that I do...and really, God affirmed to me through Dr.A's message that I was seeking my worth from things-- doing well at school, being choir, helping my friends, being in ministry clubs -- and all of these tied into my deep-seated wounds I have carried for a long time and mostly refusing to have God look at them --
And well, now, I am NOT in choir, I haven't been able to go to more than one Saturday of Hope House Ministry Club, Prison Fellowship is something that hasn't gotten clearance yet, I am failing or barely passing my nursing classes, and my friends go to other people for help -- and really -- I have felt more alone, and more abandoned in general than I had expected for this year.
So in all of these, God told me today : "You can not find your worth from these things. You can not fill your love tank with these. You can not turn to these first. Its all about me (God), and not about you (Mindy). I have to come first. Counseling is not enough to fix the problem. Friends are not enough to fix the problem. You turning it over to me is what HAS to happend first, not second."
so, I just thought I would share this with you, my dear friends and brothers and sisters because of the Lord!
I hope it is encourageing to you. Share what the Lord is doing in your life.
Build up the body of believers.
"May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you (all)."
2 Corinthians 13:14.
Mindy Warren