“Now, just as you accepted Christ Jesus as your Lord, you must continue to follow him. Let your roots grow down into him, and let your lives be built on him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness.” Colossians 2:6&7
I came onto the world race expecting to grow and change, but once I realized that it actually happened everything was different. I am so ridiculously thankful for the last 9 months of my life because I truly will never be the same. The “world race” did not have much to do with it, it was all Jesus. An entire season devoted to pursuing and growing in intimacy with the Lord, with literally no other obligations or responsibilities but to love and serve.
The transforming starts in surrender. The real change happens in the choice to abandon all else: home, comfort, and the world and just cling to Christ. The race is the season God and I needed for intense preparation and thorough shaping to step into what the Lord has for me. Every circumstance contributed to making this possible: the force of abandonment, the living in constant community, the diligent work and service, amongst all the other trials or situations.
What have I grown in? Honestly, God has taught me an abundance of lessons that led to crazy amounts of understanding; I can’t list them all. The center of my maturing stems from the process of getting to know God, in order to understand myself. Knowing who we are in Christ is vital to everything in our lives. If we aren’t grounded in our identity from our Creator, how can we possibly love others? If we don’t fully grasp who we are, then how do we serve others? Our Heavenly Father is so good. He knows us. He tells us who we are. Then, amongst silence and solitude, we spend time with Him just absorbing His magnificent character until we look more like Him without even realizing it, that’s a part of faith. Faith comes from love and love is where we find our hope. Have faith in Him for all he has done for us and trust in the promises he will fulfill. Accept his amazing love from perfect grace to love others as Christ loves us. Pursue the Kingdom. It is our hope that is founded on Christ Jesus. This truth comes with a cost: ourselves… but if giving up this life to, not only to gain living on a Restored Earth with our Marvelous Creator, but to experience supernatural peace, pure joy, and true freedom, then is it even a question of if it’s worth it? When we “give our life to Christ,” we are called to actually give it to Him. Luke 9:23. If we follow Jesus, we must turn from ourselves and take up our cross. We can’t be a contradiction! Pursuit, Self Denial, and Radical Devotion for Jesus. I can walk in the HOLY SPIRIT to make my action and speech completely unpredictable. Someone who walks and talks like a true Christ follower, a Christian that isn’t a hypocrite, strives for the Kingdom of Heaven in all things by drawing everything from Him. (2 Corinthians 4:11)
I never would’ve said these things 9 months ago… but God has taught me and still guiding me in wisdom and understanding to process this ending season. I could honestly go on and on but if you want to know more or just meet for coffee to catch up I land in the U.S. on June 1st and I’ll be in Memphis June 6th. This will probably be my last blog… I love all of you, thank you for supporting me, and don’t be afraid to reach out to me for absolutely anything!
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