But God

Tags

bitterness, But God, Circumstances, Control, faith, Family, foundation, Heart, Husbands, Jesus, John 10:10, Kyle Idleman, Life, Marriage, Matthew, mom, Prayer, Pride, Refine, Relationship, Selfish, Spite, Steven Furtick, Testing, Trials, Truth, WIfe

Life for me these past few months have been like a very unpleasant roller coaster.  It’s like all the dirt, all the yuck that I have tried to stuff down for years… just exploded.  I’ve tried controlling the way my life should look as opposed to trusting God and letting Him guide my steps.  Everything that I had put my faith in has been taken away and the only person I have left is God.  When  you reach the end of who you think you are as a person… you can only look up, and see God.. standing there on top of the water reaching down to pull you out.

This is my new favorite picture.  I see it all over the place and it is now the lock screen picture on my phone.  So when I go onto my phone I see Jesus standing there, just reaching down to remind me to grab a hold of him every single day… every single moment.  I have allowed my circumstances to determine the course of my life.  I have allowed my circumstances to define who I am as a person.  I have allowed my circumstances to forget God and his merciful grace.  My circumstances cannot change who God is. But God will use my circumstances to change who i am.  He is just reaching down waiting for me to put aside my pride, my stubbornness and see that his grace is in full force, wanting me to grab on.

Having been a “Christian” since I was a young child, I grew up in the church.  Grew up “knowing” Jesus and what all of that means.  These past few months have shown me that I literally know NOTHING.  I thought I knew what grace meant, I thought I knew what forgiveness meant.  But I knew nothing.  I thought my life was built on the solid rock, the solid foundation of Christ, but he has been slowly taking apart my foundation… and when I wasn’t getting the hint… he ripped my foundation completely away to show me that I was living a lie.

There have been some themes that have been reoccurring in my life these past few months…

1. John 10:10 “The enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy…”  My enemy doesn’t want me to be in God’s will.  He wants to destroy everything in my life that will bring glory to God and further His kingdom.  He wants to destroy my family, my marriage, my self-worth, my everything.  And because I am putting a stake in the ground and refusing to let him have those… he is pulling out all the stops.  It’s a draining battle, but I KNOW that God is on my side… sending out his warring angels ahead of me to fight the battle that we have already overcome.

2. Do not quit.  Do not exit too early – the miracle is right around the corner.  I have no idea what that miracle will look like.  But I trust that God is working everything according to his good, and perfect will.  God’s timing is perfect.  He is the only one that knows why we go through what we go through.  And I am learning to release my circumstances to Him so they don’t bog me down.  Now, don’t get my wrong… I have really bad days.  Days where my circumstances envelop me and I don’t know how to breathe.  Days where I say stupid things and let my tongue get the best of me.  Days where I just don’t care.  But I’m learning to not give in.  I pray.  I take deep breaths. I put one foot in front of the other.  I cry.  I pray.  I read the Bible.  I journal.  I pray.  And then God reminds me He is here.  He’s got me in the palm of his hand.

3.  I can only control myself.  It’s something that people have been telling me for years…literally YEARS.  And I just sit there nod my head, say “yeah, yeah” and don’t change.  I hurt people due to my pride and my stubbornness. I truly believe that when you hear something over and over again, from different people, that is God’s way of trying to get through to you.  I refused to listen mainly because I just wasn’t ready to hear those truths.  I wanted to keep taking control because my ways are better than God’s ways, right?  I mean that’s what this world wants us to believe.  HA!  Oh my word, I can’t believe I fell for it! How much heartache could have been avoided if I had just listened in the first place?  But God…

He finally got my attention when everything that I held close to my heart was taken away.  I had to reach my rock bottom to realize that I hadn’t been looking up.  I hadn’t been listening.  I refused to see.  I hadn’t been who He had destined me to be.  I continued down a path of selfishness and spite, and it killed me. To quote Pastor Steven Furtick “The grind (the day to day life we choose to live in) makes us forget what is really important.  The grind can make us lose a sense of priority so that you start giving your best energy to your lowest priorities… God will clothesline you if you are going in the wrong direction.  He loves you too much for you to waste your whole life – headed for a destination that will ultimately disappoint you.”  I had been so focused on me, and what I wanted from this life… that I forgot to look out and around to see what’s most important: my relationship with God, my husband, my kids, and everything else… in that order.  I started living in negativity every second of the day and took it out on God, on my husband, on my kids… and I sit here and wonder why God clotheslined me and ripped out my foundation.  My foundation was being built on lies, NOT on the truth, the grace, the blessings that God has given me.

“When we miss grace, a bitter root begins to grow.  In Hebrew culture any poisonous plant would be called a ‘bitter’ plant.  The author of Hebrews uses ‘bitter root’ as a metaphor to make it clear that when we miss grace things become toxic. Religion without  grace is poisonous.  A relationship without grace in poisonous.  A church without grace is poisonous.  A heart without grace is poisonous.  The bitter root may be small and slow in its growth, but eventually the poison takes effect.” –Grace is Greater, Kyle Idleman. I let my misunderstanding of grace poison my life.  I let bitterness, anger, record keeping pollute my heart.

I now have to go through the fire of refinement to get out all the dirt and ugly that I let live in my heart for so long.  God is disciplining me for my sins…my lack of grace and my unforgiving heart.  It’s no fun being disciplined.  It hurts, I feel the shame like I should have known better, and at times it literally sucks me dry.  I hate having to discipline my kids, so I can’t imagine how hard it is for God to discipline us when we are making unwise choices.  But I am learning that I am not beyond fixing.  I am not beyond his grace.  God is restoring me to be the daughter, the wife, and mom that he created me to be.  Is it painful?  Hell yes it is.  But in the end I KNOW without a doubt that I will come out as the woman God destined me to be.

And until that time… I will wait.  Sometimes not patiently, but I will wait.  I will, to the best of my abilities, do what God wants me to do.  I am human so there will be screw ups, but I can’t let that get me down.  I just have to pick myself up, brush off the dust, and take another step.  God’s got this… and I’m looking forward to see what will come of it.