This year started with a rough re-entry to the States from Africa. Although it was great to be home, it took me several months to fight back the tears, transition into working as nurse and catching God's plan for me back home. He blessed me with a brand new car, and a great paying job. This was the start to a year of work and getting a feel for the "normal" American life. That to me is one if the hardest struggles. I was trying to stay on fire, desperate and poor in Spirit even though I was being blessed with all materialistic things I could ever want. The Lord, as he so faithfully does, was testing me and continues to do so. I feel like he blesses us and gives us the desires of our hearts and stands back, smiling and watches with anticipation to see what all I am going to do with that blessing. He wants us to unashamedly enjoy it. Am I going to horde it? Become unsatisfied and ungrateful? Bury it in the ground in an attempt to save it? Will I waste it? Or will I bless others? Will I freely give as I have freely received? Will I ask Him how I can bless the multitudes with what He gave me? There is so much joy in giving. The Lord has been teaching me that "it's not so much about how much I own, but how much my possessions own me" - Loren Cunningham. We don't have to be ashamed to have great blessings, but how tight are we hanging onto those?
As the other posts from earlier this year give a deeper insight into what the Lord has been doing the last couple months, I will jump ahead to where I am at now and the clean slate of 2012. I will start with a question that has been burning inside of me. Do I serve the Lord for results or do I genuinely want to just find Him in the process? I am reading a book called, "66 Love Letters" by Dr. Larry Crabb. This book is a dialogue with the author and God as the Lord reveals his loving heart through each book of the Bible. Can I really say, " all I want is You?" Am I willing to lay everything aside...loosen my grip on EVERYTHING? Learning to be unconditional in my love to Him has been then biggest theme this year as he has brought me into very uncomfortable, unfamiliar vulnerable places to show me my weaknesses so that from there I may find my true joy and worship with a heart that is leaning hard on her Beloved.
Plans for 2012? Well, I feel a strong desire to go back to Mozambique this year to volunteer as staff for the school that I went to fall of 2010. I am looking to apply mid- January and pray into that more. If it's the Lord's will, I will leave end of May for 3 months or so. If I go, I really want to lead an outreach team to possibly Sudan or maybe Congo if the Lord wills. With that, my dear friends are adopting from China and really want me to join them in picking up their precious package!!!! I am more than honored and plan to pursue this as well as possibly visiting Jacky Pullinger's ministry while I am over there. We shall see what the year holds! I am very excited for whatever it may be. The Lord has great great things ahead and I want whatever He wants for my life.
In the book that I mentioned before, you really feel the heart of God as he understand how in Chronicles he freed his people to return to Jerusalem after years of exile and ungodly kingship with one mandate, to rebuild the temple. In the dialogue the author has with God, he hears God's heart saying,
"When my people were released from captivity and permitted to return home, they arrived in Jeruselum with one mandate: to rebuild the temple. But they had no king, no homes, and limited resources. They were strongly tempted to reorganize themselves with the wrong priority in mind, to rebuild their lives, I told them first to rebuild the temple. I understand- as you do as well- how emptiness and hardships can lead people to redefine worship as living right now in the hope that life will go right. But I want my people to live right now for the joy of knowing Me and in anticipation of what I yet will do. When you find yourself in the desert, draw near to Me, not with an entitled spirit but in confidence and hope. You will discover that hope only in My Presence. Therefore, devote your first energies to rebuilding the temple, not your lives. "
I walk into the New Year with only one resolution. I want to find Him. I want to rebuild my temple, my inner place of worship, my eternal being so that holiness is my desire. I want to be purified, refined, brought lower still and confident that I am in the center of His will for my life. I don't want to fool myself into thinking that what I think is best is really what He thinks is best.
His grace is sufficient for me and for you. May you all freely and confidently lean on Him this year as you travel the narrow path to eternal Joy.
Happy New Year!
