Stop running & turn around!

As I mentioned in my previous post, I am doing Ann Voskamp's 2013 Joy Dare. Today's dare was 3 startling graces from God. As I was considering which three to select, God spoke directly to my heart and His words floored me!

First, God LOVES me! The God who created all of the earth and the heavens and everything in it, the God who is HOLY and can not tolerate sin, the God who is perfect... HE LOVES ME! Little ol' me who is broken and sinful and often resisting of His guidance. He loves me! It amazes me that no matter what I do, think, say or behave... He still loves me! He loves me so much He sent his son Jesus to be beaten, insulted, scorned, tortured and killed just for ME! Had I been the only person on earth, He would have done it just for me. WOW! That kind of love is so foreign and so unfathomable, yet it is true!

Second, God CHOSE me! It was Him who chose me! Not the other way around. He placed the yearning in my heart and soul for Him. He sent angels and the Holy Spirit to gently direct me to Him. And eventually (it took until I was 16) I followed His promptings and accepted His son into my heart. But He chose me first! He chose me before I chose Him. He chose me before my parents conceived me. He chose me BEFORE the earth was even formed! Being omnipresent, He saw the date of my conception at the beginning of time. He saw my birth before he formed the earth. And He knew that day in April of 1987, I would turn to Him and let His son into my heart! WOW! Just think about that for a second! Before God formed the earth and created man, HE KNEW each and every soul that would ever come to exist. He knew who we were, who we would become, whether we would accept His free gifts or reject them! He knew and KNOWS everything about us and STILL He loves us!

Third, God PURSUES me everyday! God chases after me and yearns for me to turn and accept His love and spend time with Him. He WANTS me and actively pursues me daily. Not just at the beginning of the day and when I race off too busy to acknowledge Him, he stops. NO! He actively pursues me throughout the day and night. Every minute of everyday He is there asking me to stop and listen and love Him. He doesn't care that I just lost my temper with my son over something trivial. He is there waiting for me to listen to His whispers. He is there with open arms ready to catch me when I stumble. Ready, oh ALWAYS ready, to lift me up and direct my feet. Ready to hug me and console me as I make mistake and mistake. Ready to guide me through whatever troubles me. Ready to discipline me when I need it.

I grew up going to church and learning about God and His son, Jesus. I just assumed that was what it was to believe until I was sixteen and went on a Spring Break retreat to Catalina with Campus Life. There, the speaker, Buster Soaries, changed my world! I realized you do not become a believer by osmosis. It takes action. I had to accept Jesus myself. Now it is nearly 26 years later and I am still amazed by God's love, grace and mercy. It still amazes me that there is nothing God doesn't know about me. NOTHING! Yet His love is never-ending, unfailing and unconditional. He knows my deepest, darkest secrets and because of His son, He loves me, despite and IN SPITE of my failings. And to think that He first CHOSE me?!?! WOW! What an unbelievable concept. But it is true!

This morning I was overwhelmed by what God was speaking to me and I still am. As I type this, tears of joy, tears of happiness, tears of guilt and shame stream down my cheeks. I am astounded that God still yearns for me after all I have done. I am shocked that even though I ignore Him, disobey Him, refuse to even acknowledge Him some days, He is still there, ready and waiting for ME! I had intended to reference Scripture verses in this as I shared today's experience but as I typed I realized God just wanted me to hear HIS voice today. Just the words He placed in my heart this morning. I know the Scripture is there for me to reference but the beauty of His words in my heart was what I really needed to focus on.

God is there. God is HERE. He is speaking to us constantly. Sometimes He shouts but usually it is a whisper. Soft and gentle, easy to ignore but persistant and loving. Usually I am so caught up in whatever mundane task I am hurriedly trying to complete that I don't and maybe can't hear the whispers. This morning I briefly allowed a window for God's whispers to pour through and I was floored!

I have a lot of friends who are doing the "Word of the Year" where you pick one word to focus on throughout the year. If I were to pick a word it would be LISTEN. God has been prompting me to LISTEN. First it was the realization that I have too many distractions in my life that are keeping me from God. Now it is becoming very clear to me that that is also about Listening. God wants me to just LISTEN. To stop and listen. Not just hear Him and let His voice drift from one ear out through the other. No, He wants me to LISTEN. Listening is active not passive.

Dictionary.com defines Listen as:

verb (used without object)

1. to give attention with the ear; attend closely for the purpose of hearing; give ear.

2. to pay attention; heed; obey (often followed by to  ): Children don't always listen to their parents.

3. to wait attentively for a sound (usually followed by for  ): to listen for sounds of their return.

4. Informal. to convey a particular impression to the hearer; sound: The new recording doesn't listen as well as the old one.

verb (used with object)

5. Archaic. to give ear to; hear.

 

Attend closely; pay attention; heed; obey; wait attentively... theseACTIVE not passive. God is telling me to eliminate the distractions that keep me from ACTIVELY LISTENING to Him. So that is my goal this year, to actively listen to God; to eliminate the distractions that keep me from listening to Him.

 

Thank you Lord for speaking so clearly to me and making it obvious what it is I need to do to actively walk in faith with You!

 

Blessings,

 

Erin

Ready...Set...Go...

I hate New Year's Resolutions. They only seem to set us up for failure. How many of us really ever manage to keep them? So usually my Resolution each year is to not make any resolutions. This year I decided to bypass the whole resolution thing and work on developing one good habit that I should be doing anyway but haven't been. I decided I needed to be more active in my faith walk with God. Wow! That's pretty vague and pretty hard to figure out how to accomplish. So what specifically am I trying to accomplish? What specific goal do I have in mind? These questions were what I was pondering in the weeks leading up to 2013. 

As Christmas drew to a close I eagerly anticipated a new study with my son leading us from Christmas to Epiphany on Jan. 6th. We discovered a book "The Twelve Days of Christmas" by Helen Haidle that goes over all the symbolism of the traditional Christmas carole of the same name. Now I grew up going to church and my family is a Christian family but I have never celebrated Epiphany before so this was exciting for me! Before Christmas I did some research and checked out a few books from the library so I could turn this into a lesson for my son and I to incorporate into our homeschool curriculum. I also discovered an amazing website with a daily devotion for each of the twelve days.

As we went through each day, my son LOVED learning what each day meant and very proudly would recite them each night. By the time Jan. 1st rolled around we were already in a good routine. We continued our twelve days of Christmas study and added a nightly devotion from Jesus Calling 365 devotions for Kids by Sarah Young along with our journals we started back in November. In addition I discovered Ann Voskamp's Joy Dare on Facebook a day or so before the 1st. So I had my answer. I would do the Joy Dare and Jesus Calling everyday and start letting both sink into my life. Basically I decided to allow my heart and mind to be OPEN to the promptings of God through two short, simple, daily activities. Guess what? To my immense surprise and pleasure just days into it I could already see a change in myself!

The Joy Dare is awesome! I highly recommend starting it. Go to Ann's website www.aholyexperience.com and download her Joy Dare calendar. Then follow her on Facebook and everyday she will prompt you to find three gifts in the everyday mundaneness (I think I just made that word up). Just a few days into it and I could feel my perspective shift. By challenging myself to find the three gifts of the day, I was focusing on the positive. I wasn't aware how much I focused on the negative until I started this! 

So the Joy Dare immediately opened my eyes and shifted my perspective to all the blessings that surround us.But this week was the kicker. In three days I was confronted with THREE different devotions from THREE different sources about Martha and Mary. It was like God was holding a bullhorn to my ear yelling "Are you listening?" WOW! Okay, Lord. I thought, I am listening. God was making it abundantly clear that He wanted my attention. He was loudly proclaiming, you want to become more active, then you need to LISTEN! Not just Hear, but actually listen. Get rid of the "stuff" that is distracting you and LISTEN to what I want you to get fromMe! 

That is why I started this today. I need something that will keep me honest and keep me accountable . Blogs are public so this is perfect. I commit to post updates regularly on this journey and I hope at the end of the year, I can look back on this and see the growth. I'm excited and eager to see what happens. Maybe, God willing, this will inspire someone else to further their own walk in faith.

Blessings,

E