I am amazed daily by what God will do in someone’s life when you surrender to Him and decide to give Him control.
When I signed up for the World Race, I was surrendering my life plan. I was quitting a job that I loved, leaving a family and church that I loved in order to be jobless and homeless for a completely unplanned 11 months. All this in order to spread the love of God, grow in discipleship, and follow where He is calling me.
Now, after three months, I am still finding new areas of my life that God wants me to surrender to Him. Life plans, control, past hurts, the right to be right, my alone time, comfort, future, dreams, etc.
In Moldova, God was teaching me a lot about living in community with other people and persevering when it gets hard. Actually, He’s still teaching me about that because I’m not quite there. It’s been a humbling experience to realize that I’m not perfect. (Inside joke for my family 
) But God’s grace has been incredible so I’m still plugging away.
In the process of learning all these things about surrender and community, God is also calling me to surrender the identity I’ve formed of myself, to Him.
Last night during our evening session, my squad leaders were speaking about identity. (God works in cool ways like that.) At the end, I was asked to spend some time praying and ask God who He says I am. Well, God started speaking and I grabbed my phone and started typing as fast as possible. The things that He said were crazy and I couldn’t wrap my head around it. There I was, sitting against the wall, typing furiously on my phone, not even able to see what I was typing half the time because I was crying, overwhelmed by the Holy Spirit. Completely not how I normally act in public. (God’s working on that as well.)
After a while, we were asked if we wanted to share what God revealed to us. As my squadmates started to share, I knew I was supposed to share as well. So with a shaky voice, I read what I wrote down. The crazy, Holy Spirit inspired, revelation is still burning in my heart. I cannot seem to fully grasp the vastness of what I feel like God was telling me.
After I shared, person after person came up to me saying how moved they were by what God is teaching me and so I’m sharing it with all of you at the request of my squadmate, Emily Arzani.
Here’s what I wrote down. (My thoughts as I was writing this are in orange) I pray that it rocks your world as much as it is rocking mine right now.
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He loves me the same as He loves Jesus. (That can’t be right) If we are joint heirs with Christ and we are children of God then we receive the same inheritance. The same love. The same fatherly relationship. The same everything. I am not the forgotten step child. I am a daughter of God. God loves me the same as He loves Jesus. It’s only possible through grace. By being redeemed through Christ. (This is mind blowing! I can’t even…)
(God speaking) It’s mind blowing because you’ve believed satan for so long. He’s told you you’re not good enough. He’s reminded you of things I no longer choose to remember. Don’t take on his identity of fear, depression, loneliness, and hopelessness. Seek my identity of hope, peace, love, a sound mind, acceptance, truth, grace. I really do love you that much. I really did give my son as a ransom for you. The gospel is true. It’s not just a good story to keep you cozy at night. There really is a deceiver and he really does hate me and anything that reminds him of me. He really does want to destroy you in the most painful way possible. But I love you so much that I was willing to give everything so you could be free. And I set you free to be free. Not to be in bondage to anything, much less anything that satan throws your way. Not your past, your insecurities, or your own mixed up thoughts.
I am desperate for you to know me. I’m standing here screaming I LOVE YOU! Will you hear me? Will you accept my love?
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The thing is, I know that God is no respecter of persons (Acts 10:34). So if He is telling me that He loves me this much…that means He loves you that much as well. Wrap your brain around that! God loves you the same as He loves Jesus. Nope, it doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t seem right. You definitely don’t deserve it. But there it is. Perfect, unconditional love. And since God is love, that means that He is patient, kind, doesn’t envy, doesn’t boast, isn’t proud, doesn’t force himself on others, isn’t self-seeking, isn’t easily angered, keeps no records of wrongs, doesn’t delight in evil but rejoices in truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things, and never fails. (1 Cor. 13:4-8a)
So I’ll repeat what God was telling me.
I am desperate for you to know me.
I’m standing here screaming I LOVE YOU!
Will you hear me? Will you accept my love?
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