Through it All

"Then Eli said, 'He is the Lord; let him do what is good in his eyes."

-1 Samuel 3:18

He is the Lord . . . I have reflected on this passage of scripture for about two days. I love the Old Testament. I love reading the different stories of the prophets. There is something so powerful, humbling and disquieting about reading the ministries of these great men. But even in their greatness there was a weakness for each them. For Eli it was his blasheming sons. He did not take the time to correct their sinful actions, and his lineage paid for those actions.

But what stuck out to me was not the judgement that God poured out on Eli's family but rather his response to that judgment. He said, "He is the Lord; let him do what is good in his eyes." Those words struck me to the innermost recesses of my heart! How quick we are to judge God or to blame him for our circumstances or even our short comings. and yet here is a prophet of God that so simply owns up to his sin and also acknowledges a profound truth; that God is our creator with all power and all control. But also that this all powerful all controlling creator will do what He wishes.

I was young, naive and way too planned out for my own good. I had the five year plan for college and career success. but most of all i had the five year plan for ministry and spiritual success! I was going to graduate high school, go to bible college, graduate a year early and start my ministry overseas and become the greatest missionary the world had ever seen! i was going to shake the world with my awesomeness!

What happened was that i graduated from high school and God told me that i was going to stay in Colorado springs and study Anthropology at the University for two years and then i would go to Bible college. I was infuriated! that would set me back two years on my five year plan! Outrageous!
Well two years passed and i was comfortable with where i was at. As a result i decided (without God's permission) that i was going to stay in the Springs and finish my degree in Anthropoligy. I mean i was already half way through . . . right?! Well sometimes God has to shake up your world of comfort to make you feel a need to change up the scenery. Well God shook my world a bit and i needed to get away, and fast! So, in a hurried state i rushed with my application to Gateway and headed to Florissant Missouri to continue my education and learn from the greatest apostolic minds of the world!

Two years passed and many heart breaking things happened in my life. My parents divorced, I lived away from my sisters for the first time, I learned what it really meant to struggle financially and live on 16 cents for 4 months. I learned about relationships and depression. It was deep trials of self discovery and God discovery. In many ways those days were dark times.
Those were also times of deep undercurrents of spiritual reconstruction within my soul. It was the first time i gave God my full trust, it was the first time i allowed myself to put my whole being into his safe care. It was a time where i learned the value of believing and knowing that no matter the circumstance; if i cling to him He will ALWAYS provide. Ultimately; however, I learned about His unconditional and unwavering love.

After two years at Gateway God decided to throw me through another loop. He sent me home. I told myself that i would never be one of those kids that went home early without a degree in their hands. And yet, the day Gateway asked me to leave because of lack of funds, my heart broke. I felt torn between knowing where i was supposed to be and knowing that the money just wasn't there. And so in self defeat and self loathing, I packed my minivan up and headed home. I was spiritually broken, emotionally defeated and financially penniless. I  was quite literally homeless in my soul and a sense of self confidence within me had shattered to pieces.

It is in that moment in life where God has placed you down a certain path that you realize you have two choices to make:
1. You can either turn away from God because your pain is SO great. You dont understand why something is happening and nothing makes sense at all. And so you turn to the wisdom of your human mind to lead you and guide you.and ultimately self destruct. Or. . .
2. In that moment where nothing makes sense and you dont understand what is going on that you recognize and say, "He is the Lord; let him do what is good in His eyes."
And though you may be heartbroken, you may feel defeated and your dreams may feel so far lost and unreachable. But in it all, and through it all you commit your heart to follow after your Creator. Cling to Him and hope through Him, that He will guide you through and keep you no matter how hopeless it may seem.

I went home, and for two months i worked the hardest that i have ever worked in my entire life. I am SO proud of those days! It brings me great joy to remember those days of growth. Looking back i realize that i am so thankful God sent me home. If he hadn't i would never have learned the value of a deepness in Christ. An intimacy you can achieve in God through prayer and FASTING!!! But most of all i learned the value of trusting even when you don't understand something.

To be honest i dont know why I am at Gateway. What are God's plans for me? If you know, please fill me in ;) However, i am coming to a better understanding of what it is to blindly trust. Eli...Though his pain was great, and the judgement upon his family was final and severe. He looked at that judgement and faced it head on. He recognized that he was just a man, and God was his maker. He recognized who really was in control and he found solace in that.

We need to get to the point where we recognize who REALLY is in control of our lives. God our Lord and Saviour is in control of all. The sooner you release your will for His, the sooner you will find peace and comfort. True joy will enter your heart. Fear and uncertainty will no longer have a foothold in your soul. Because He is the Lord and He will do what He pleases. Its our job to love Him, stay true to Him and mold our lives to the will of His. Nothing short of that will suffice.

Go and read Samuel 3. It will encourage you and strengthen you. There is something so empowering about reading the word of God. Let it minister to your soul on a regular basis. :)

The Writing on the Wall

You know, I am a walking miracle. I am. Let me start from the beginning. . . April 2011, Gateway has asked me to leave because of finances. I didn't feel a peace about leaving. In fact I felt an immense sense of personal failure. But I prayed to God to give me strength to go back home and find peace in it. Instead God gave me strength and also gave me a purpose. Many do not know my story beyond Gateway. You know I went home but you do not know the journey.

I now cherish every step I made. I cherish the sunshine and the rain from those days but most of all I cherish the quiet moments before work when God revealed things to me and matured me.

Because of those early morning devotions, I learned what it really meant to pray, what it really meant to hunger for his word, what it really meant to fast, what it really meant to wait in silence to hear His voice. But most of all I learned what it meant to believe in something that God gave to me and cling to it even when all the world said it was impossible. You see I really believed that I was supposed to come back to Gateway. I don't know why and I still don't but I know I was supposed to.

So as a result of that conviction, I woke up one warm day in may and decided that if I was going back I couldn't wait for my miracle to fall in my lap. I realized that I had to get up and start moving in the direction of my miracle. And so I got my mopie self together. I collected all my self loathing and self pity and decided that it was not helping and got rid of it. I was in battle and it was a battle against time.

To shorten a very long journey. I worked the hardest that I have ever worked in my life. For a purpose and a goal that I could not and still do not fully understand. I worked full time in a dry cleaners at a five star hotel named the Broadmoor. At this hotel I met the most amazing people I will ever have the privilege of knowing. They were asians, Jamaicans, Africans, hispanics and so many more cultures compacted into one building. Lunch was always fascinating to me.  I brought my own lunch but I always wanted to eat everyone else's food.

When I wasn't working fulltime I was baking to raise money for college. I saved all my change and raised over a hundred dollars. And when I wasn't working I was at the church. I was helping with extra things like gift wrap, Christmas musicals, praise singing, youth activities. To say the least I was a very busy person.

My beautiful sister Ams got me a gift while I was at work one day. It was a wall stensil that said, "go confidently in the direction of your dreams." It faced my bed so that every morning that I woke up I had a reason to keep going. A goal to attain.

Well it was coming to the end. In faith I have always been a tad drastic. I don't have back-up plans. I just go all out or not at all. And so two months before january I told my boss that I was quitting in the beginning of January and was going back to school. I told her this knowing that I was $2000 short. But I knew that I was going. When you know something is right you just do it. You don't question what is right you just wonder how you are going to get there. I did not find out if I was going back to Gateway until the very day I quit my job. So if I didn't get back in I was without a job and without a school. But in my mind and in my heart it was a risk I was willing to take.

Christmas came and went and two weeks from knowing whether I knew I would go or not I got into a wreck. This is one of the reasons I am a walking miracle.  Imagine with me a snow storm. The highway packed down with ice and covered in an ever growing layer of snow. Dangerous.  But missing work in my mind was not an option. I grabbed my coffee and my lunch and headed out onto the highway. I was almost to work when a white jeep in front of me decided to switch lanes and in doing so slammed on their breaks. To keep from hitting the Jeep I hit my breaks. While in a thirty car cluster I started to swerve. And with two semi trucks on my right I swerved out of control and with my van now sideways swerved right into the semi trucks lane. You know that moment where you are going to die? They say your life flashes before your eyes. . . Well there were no flashes. A peace just came over me. I don't know how and the drivers who were also apart of the wreck don't know how but the semi trucks somehow got out of the way. My van was completely 360ing out of control by this point. I was now against the flow of traffic and I remember seeing cars everywhere. I was headed straight for the median at full speed. The car refused to stop and in final desperation I screamed out "JESUS!" and my van just stopped. Completely just stopped. Two other cars ended up on the side of the median one actually hit me but we were all so blessed. I should have died that day but I didn't. What did happen was as the preverbial smoke cleared, my hands were shaking, I was crying and I was saying over and over, "thank you Jesus" I heard the Lord speak to me and say, "I am not finished with you yet."

I am a walking miracle. But most of all my van is a walking miracle ;) he only needs his headlight fixed.

Finances were not only tight they were EXTREMELY tight. Ends weren't meeting. I was stressing but I knew my miracle was coming. The money wasn't there but I called Gateway anyway. They said that I could come back and with a plan in motion I set out. I said goodbye to loved ones.

But here is the thing. I shouldn't be here. But I am. I am a walking miracle. I walked into my dorm room on Monday and on the wall it said, "everyday holds the possibility for a miracle." And it is true. God has given one miracle after the other.

But the past week I have lived under such a fog. I didn't feel joy, I wasnt excited or even anything positive. I was just existing. I was doing things differently. I tried out for chorale and went about doing things to get a job and take care of finances but I still wasn't happy or excited. 

Come to find out. . . I was still living in survival mode. I'm used to surviving.  So much so that when I don't have to anymore I don't know any other way to be. I couldn't find peace here because I was afraid that it was all going to fall apart again. I was preparing for something to go wrong. I was waiting for the surprise attack. I was waiting for my miracle to fall through. The truth was that I wasn't trusting God and I was worrying over something that didn't even exist.

Spiritual emphasis week was amazing. But if there was one thing I took from it, it was this. Tomorrow is tomorrow I'll step towards it tomorrow. Today is today I'll keep moving forward. But yesterday is dead and gone. The struggles, the pain, the tears and uncertainty of those times are no more. All I have is the future so why not grab it by the horns and milk it for all its got. No matter what happens. Even if my miracle did fall through and I had to go home again. I know that there would be a reason. I may not understand it, I don't now but God loves me and He has a purpose for me. He isn't done with me. I know because he has left me writings on the wall.

And so I have resolved to live my life with NO MORE FEAR, NO MORE UNCERTAINTY, NO MORE DOUBT. I WILL MOVE FORWARD, I WILL KEEP GOING. God reminded me that I am strong but that through Him I am stronger. I may not know what tomorrow brings but one thing i do know is that it is going to be an adventure.

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