Coming home from training camp I was bombarded with the question, “How was it?!” And while I wish I could sit down and verbally process every detail of camp with each person, that’s just not a reality, and honestly not everyone wants to hear the long story! So long story short, training camp was good, of course, but most of all it taught me all of the things that God cannot do.
For all of those believers out there your immediate reaction might be, uh… what… there is nothing God cannot do… well sorry to say, but you’re wrong. Don’t worry this blew my mind too…
God cannot lie.
God cannot die.
God cannot remember. (our sins)
Thats just who he is. Which is wild, but also so simple!
God cannot do to me what other people in my life have done to hurt me, he is absolutely incapable of being anything but a good father, a best friend, and the greatest lover possible.
If you’re anything like me you’ve been hurt quite a bit in the past by relationships- with guys (or girls), family members, friends, peers, and people of authority in my life.
Through the relational disappointments in my life I have been fed the message that my needs don’t necessarily matter, my voice doesn’t need or deserve to be heard and respected, promises can be broken easily, and I will be disappointed by how things turn out because my hopes and dreams are “too big” and my expectations are too high.
That pretty much sounds like it sucks, right? Yup! Sadly, I have a feeling most of us can relate to at least one of those statements.
Well… this week God affirmed that he is nothing like these people in my life that have let me down in little and big, but all significant, ways.
I was viewing God through the lens of these human hurts in my life. I was shaping God into my image by thinking that because others have let me down, that he would too. I thought that these promises he had spoken clearly into my life, were just too good to be fulfilled. But God said “NO, THAT’S NOT WHO I AM. I am not capable of letting you down, I am not just a human, I am more than these things that have been done to you, and I will not let you down.”
For the first time I sang the lyrics of the song King of My Heart “You’re never going to let me down” with full confidence that GOD WILL NEVER LET ME DOWN.
Even when nothing seems to make sense. Even when I don’t see the end, even when these promises he has spoken seem unreachable. He can and He will, because he cannot lie, and his promises stand true. When God says he’s going to do something, he does it in a way much more miraculous way than we can ever imagine. When he says he loves us, he means it in word and action.
In relationships, or at least in my experience, saying I love you to someone is a big deal. Its like a marker in a relationship that makes light of a forever with a person. To me, saying I love you, is comparable to saying, “I’ll take care of your heart, I wont hurt you, I’ll keep my promises, I’ll take care of you no matter what.” I think maybe I have fanaticized too much about being in a romantic relationship where the weight of “I love you” is always honored but, NEWS FLASH humans are flawed! We mess up, because we aren’t God, and that’s okay! But thankfully we have this God, we have Jesus, and we have the Holy Spirit continually reminding us that when people in our lives break the expectations of “I love you” HE NEVER WILL!
God does not break his promises.
God does not make mistakes.
God does not forget about our needs, desires, and dreams.
God does not give up on us when things get hard.
God does not get bored with us.
God does not forget what it means to say I love you. Ever.
Something I did this week at training camp during my much needed introverted time was write down a list of everyone in my life that has hurt me relationally. Everyone that has made me feel like I don’t have a voice, that broke their promises, that didn’t listen to my needs or hurts, that showed me in their actions and words that I wasn’t enough.
Then, I forgave them. Yup… that was hard; there were many tears.
AND THEN I repented to God.
I said out loud as my leader Taylor was praying with me, “God, I am sorry I haven’t fully believed that you keep your promises, that I believed you didn’t fully listen to me, that I believed that you were these things that these people have been to me,” etc… I had a lot to say…. But as I voiced these things out loud through my snot filled nose and bawling eyes (it was all kinds of gross), I felt the presence of God fill my heart, body, and mind. As I voiced these things that God is not and God cannot do, it was so clear to me who He is and what he is capable of doing.
God listens.
He keeps his promises.
He cares about our needs, and dreams, and desires.
He will NEVER let us down, ever.
God loves us better than anyone in our lives, if we let him.
God can and will take care of us.
I sit here filled with confidence of who God is because of the confidence I have in who God is not. God cannot be compared to people we are in close relationship in our lives, even those people we have given permission to hurt us. God is incapable of hurting us no matter how close we let him in. He CANNOT.
So pick up your paper and pen, make a list of people that hurt you, and know that God is absolutely incapable of doing the same. He loves us, and says he loves us with the full intention of upholding what it means to love us, forever.
He will never let us down, ever. Even when things don’t make sense, which for me is a good majority of the time. But THAT’S OKAY because I know now, with confidence, that God will make sense of it all. He CANNOT forget about us, he just can’t, thats who he is!
Thanks for reading pals, I am thankful for you all!
More on training camp coming soon!
I’m still in the process of fundraising, our next deadline in December 21st, so please scroll up and click that donate button! 🙂
Peace & Blessings,
Mady 🙂
