I would be triggered and I would panic and I would jump into the car and drive and drive and drive for hours.... until some of the panic abated, then I would come home.
I would go and buy the biggest bag of peanut M & Ms, the largest tub of ice cream, bags of milano cookies. Or I would starve myself for days until that feeling came and live off the high of feeling what it feels like to be wasting away.
I would go to the drive thru and order the jumbo sized diet coke.
I would race to a friends house, furiously make phone calls, etc etc etc......
No these moments were not before I have been healed.
They were the patterns I had learned to cope and they needed to be unlearned and life giving practices learned instead.
So it's Easter... Today is a celebration that things are restored, death has been defeated and hope has arrived.
The resurrection of Jesus brings the reality of Heaven bursting forth upon the earth. No longer are we slaves to sin and no longer does death have a hold on us. But have you looked around? I understand the ever expanding aspect to our Kingdom.
Let's apply this to all I have been sharing lately.
I have walked with the Lord for over two decades and within that time I have been graced with moments that have thoroughly altered my life. From salvation to moments of healing and moments of pure beautiful grace.
Can I be honest?
Those moments have been amazing. I wouldn't be who I am without them. I cherish those moments.
But there are moments that I cherish even more.
The moments aren't actually moments they are long and they have been arduous but they too have changed my life just as much if not more than the profound interactions with Heaven and Jesus and healing.
It has to do with the ever expanding aspect to the Kingdom. I view some of this as the difference between "take" and "possess." The journey of becoming has been a powerful one for me as Jesus has come and taken over and then more and more continues to possess. I used Exodus 23 to make my point... and then I'm going to do a typical thing for me and share the only way I know how to.....
The verse: I will not drive them out before you in a single year, that the land may not become desolate and the beasts of the field become too numerous for you. I will drive them out before you little by little, until you become fruitful and take possession of the land.
I am so blessed by the amazing healing that has entered my life but its been in the daily walking out and learning about life and people and what it means to live in truth and stand that has brought even more healing. I stood in moments of healing and yet needed to learn how then to live.
We are told that "then we will know the truth, and the truth will set us free." But what happens when our hearts have believed lies for so very long.
What happens when it is actually the way our heart really believes?
What if the lies are firmly ingrained into our beings?
What then?
There are the experiences, moments, words spoken that only serve to confirm and harden the lies within our beings. What then? Deliverance you say? More healing? Yes... yes... and comes the walking out..... The bit by bit and moment to moment making of choices and turning towards truth and replacing lies with truth. Much easier to write than to do... I understand.... believe me I understand....
When I step in and do something for my child I can rob them of the gift of learning something important... it might be easier if I do it... it might be quicker ... but in the long run I've stolen not truly given...
These last few years where it has been moment to moment.. some leaps but mostly moment to moment of learning to trust in really banged up places, learning the truths of heaven instead of believing the lies of hell, having my life filled and my walk under girded in ways that have been so meaningful.. that truly no word could convey to you how I feel right now...
I have walked through hell but have found that its gates do not get to prevail, I have been led into and THROUGH the valley of the shadow of death and watched as light really does command the darkness and fog to leave, and our Father has driven the "enemies" of my soul out "little by little," and I feel oh so much more thoroughly His.
There are some things that the major healings in my life could never give me... they gave me a moment but Father has given me a life.... the time to grow, to learn, to have the Kingdom of God manifest and take ground....
He has rebuilt me upon the rock and these places feel so firm... It is the truth of God that has set me free... It is in teaching my heart that faith comes from hearing the word of God, it has been in having my heart taught in the safety of His loving kindness and the loving kindness as it has been demonstrated by others.
So instead of going for that drive I sit quietly and wait upon Him, "What does it look like for You to Father me here?" I say as I sit.
I still might go for that diet coke.. but even that is being taken care of little by little... food, the lack of it or the gorging of it, is not the place I find comfort... Little by little He has been taking ground... little by little He has been teaching me His ways.. little by little... step by step.. full of grace and life and majestic peace... Full of Him.
Full of the reality of the Kingdom.. Not out of obligation or duty or fleshly desire to walk with Him... Not out of religious compulsion to prove anything... but being born forth of the spirit... being born forth from grace... His daughter... The understanding and reality of is more fantastical then I could have ever imagined.
So He is risen... and He has risen me up with Him and set my feet upon the Rock and is teaching me His ways....
How do I then live... Day by day .. in the grace of the moment.. and when I falter.. and when I misstep.. He is there.. My ever present help in times of trouble.... My ever present helper always in every moment... I have learned not to walk upright.. I have learned that leaning is the best posture... and when I do I walk straighter than I could ever imagine.....
This is what happens next... we walk as the redeemed of our God.... You ARE the redeemed of our God....
No comments:
Post a Comment