…and then He answered:
"Pursue her like I've pursued you…"
My mind went blank.
"Can you help me out a bit more? I don't even know how you pursued me. I just know you did."
"Well…you don't need to know any of the trivial details of her life right now so don't even prod. You know what I think of her and how I look at her. That's all you need to know about her. Trust me. Instead, I want you to pursue her by inviting her into deeper and deeper depths of your heart without any need for her to reciprocate vulnerability."
Wow! He's right. My relationship with God was never initialized by my vulnerability or depth. He always was deeper and more vulnerable with me…and He never once forced me to open up. He waited for it to be time. Still does!
***Even salvation…we often focus on asking Him into OUR hearts but the actual good news of it all is it's based on us accepting His invitation into HIS heart before there's ever any response from ours.***
Peace and confidence rolled over me like a 4.0 student who has finished and double checked all of their answers…or at least what I think someone who's like that and does that would feel 🙂 Regardless, I trusted God in this. What was even better was that I knew that I trusted HIm. All I had to do was wait another 5 or 6 days to talk with her…
God had different plans or at least He let me have them 🙂 Haha 10 days sounded like an ulcer so I took my pent up emotions and plans and headed for the Hylton's movie room where I could just pace and think loudly. My mind was pounding and I was starting to turn a little bit female because I had all sorts of emotions and feelings and wasn't sure which I was supposed to pick. In short, I was becoming a mess.
After about a half hour of this I figured I should either just give her a call or buy the Hylton's a new carpet from the tread I had just laid. So as calmly as I could with a sweaty brain, I picked up the phone and dialed her number. She answered and within a few minutes I started exploding the life inside of me and what God was doing all over her. Evidently the invitation into my heart needed the dramatic event of me ripping the door off of it's hinges.
She stepped in and listened to my heart. I told her about a few of the things God had been telling me from the previous blog. Then I stopped and said something like this:
"Listen. Ang, God is bringing me into a new season of my life where I'm learning to walk into my inheritance and to be bold. I took a pretty bold step when I talked to you 5 days ago. I'm thankful that I did and in all honesty I didn't take the step with as much boldness as I could have…but I took it. I invited you to Marquette because there was a hopeful anticipation that you might be crazy enough to consider it but under it all I was trying to be faithful to what He asked me to do."
"These past couple days, God has put an incredible tenderness inside of me for you and I'm thankful for it. I'm glad I invited you on behalf of God last time we talked. However, I want to invite you again. This time I want to invite you from me because I desire for you to be there. I believe it's a place that will make you thrive and has a community that will support and love you well. I'm personally going through some major transitions in my life and I know that I need someone like you in my life. I believe I need you in my life. In fact, there are two things that I know. One is that I need to go to Marquette for a little while. The second is that I need to have you in my life starting this season…"
I kept going, but this invitation held more boldness than the first time. The intriguing thing was that it was thinking about her that provoked some sort of boldness that was hiding somewhere latent in me…
The conversation continued and I assured her that I didn't need to hear a response or anything from her…and that's about what I got. She mentioned that she had praying about it a bit but didn't really know anything either way. God had given her some sort of "white page" and she was just waiting for Him to write on it either way. In the meantime she said it was ok for me to keep calling…
White page eh…Well, I thought, if she hasn't shut the door, isn't running and isn't creeped out by me yet, then God must be doing something in her…
