The universe. Earth. Asia. Cambodia. Pursat Province. Pouthisat. New Hope Orphanage. Courtney Grever.
He is in these places. He is with you as well, if you didn’t know that!
These past couple months, God has been begging for my attention, begging for my love. If I’m being honest, he’s been begging for these things for many many years, but up until recently, I had been ignoring Him.
No, He doesn’t need my love and attention, but He wants it. He loves me so much that He is willing to go to the greatest lengths to have me–He already has, but I just hadn’t chosen to invest in that truth… Until now.
Just a couple weeks ago, I sat thinking. My mind was racing, I felt forgotten and I felt that many of the promises that had been made to me had been broken. Never in my life had I ever felt so alone and I wallowed in that. All I could do was replay the little things that hurt me in my head. Seeing the images run by, hearing the words in my head as I sat there and blamed myself for it all. Trust me, it was a pathetic place to be. A vulnerable place to be. I was down to the raw bits of myself and I was seeing ugly truths that I had hidden from myself. Fears that I had finally reared there heads and looked me in the eye and I had to face them. What I didn’t realize, or rather what I refused to accept was that I did not have to battle these fears alone.
What I faced was not what I first thought it was. Yes, it was brought on by the fact that I had been let down (at least in my own mind at the time) but the real issues were not with other people, they were in myself.
For a long time I have struggled to understand why I didn’t feel like God had invested authority or trust in me. Why wasn’t He using me? All I could imagine was a stopped up pipe full of black, tarry gunk. Me.
My whole life, I had noticed something off-kilter. The atmosphere in certain rooms, certain houses, with certain people was heavy. It was uncomfortable and it manifested a terror in me, making me want to run the opposite direction. In other situations when I was alone, I would notice shadows moving when there was nothing to make them move and that same feeling of terror would come back. Dreams would plague me, causing me to wake up in a sweat. It was exhausting. I knew I was being oppressed, but by what? For what reason? Why couldn’t I make these demons stay away from me? Sure, I believed God gave me the power to cast them out and I tried, but they always came back. What was wrong?
Reality check: spiritual warfare is real and we are in the middle of it all but we are not alone.
After years and years of this, it became normal. Scary and confusing, but expected. I gave up trying to fight it and instead tried to just survive it. I didn’t talk to anyone about it, why would they believe anything so ridiculous?
**
“Courtney, how does you being all pathetic and mopey have to do with spiritual warfare?!”
Hang in there friends, I’m getting there.
**
And there I was a week ago, sitting in a little hotel room with five other girls (my beautiful new team!) in Cambodia when I brought it up during my testimony, waiting for them to laugh or ask me what in hades was wrong with me…
But that never happened.
Prayer and community and listening and loving happened.
They asked me questions and spoke truths into me and that’s when it became very clear to me: I was living my life in a pitch-black room without a single spark to illuminate the darkness inside of me.
God gave me a vision of what needed to happen.
I was standing right in the middle of this dark place. I had a match in my hand and all I had to do was strike it, but I was afraid. I knew there were dark, dark things in the dark room I was in, I could feel them sliding by my legs, breathing on my neck, I could hear them moving, lurking, laughing at me. I didn’t want to see them, all these things that I was afraid of, all these things that I knew were in me. But I grit my teeth, opened my eyes wide, and struck!
These things were everywhere, I kid you not. On the walls, the ceiling, flying around the room, all over the floor, covering and climbing me. Some were larger than others, attacking me while others fleed to the corners, trying to escape the light. Each was different and hideous in it’s own way, each representing something in my life. Great, I can see them now but how do I get rid of them?
So God says:
Burn. Them. Up.
Everything is on fire now, walls, ceiling, floor, demons, I’m even on fire… and yet,as everything in the room slowly begins to crumple to the floor in ashes, I do not burn. I walk out of that room, out of that house that is now caving in on itself, and on down the road, purified by the fire.
So what does all that mean? Let’s back up to when I was standing in the dark. Obviously, I’m me, but the darkness is my naivety and ignorance and the fire is God, but I had to invite Him into my mess, AKA strike the match. The creatures in the room are demons. (No, I was not possessed. Holy Spirit has me on lock down)! These demons are what followed me and oppress me. They latch on to my weaknesses, addictions, and all of the things I leave vulnerable to be twisted and misconstrued. They plague me and torment me with fear and they tempt me to turn to things instead of God for “peace.” It worked for a long time, but NOT TODAY.
By striking the match on all of the things that I held inside of my being, I claimed God’s authority in me. Before He can use me out in the world, He wants me to clean out all of these filthy things in me. He wants me to use His authority to cast out my own demons first.
I did just that, friends. Never in my life have I ever felt this sort of freedom and peace.
And in this, I had come to realize that one of the things in that dark room that held me for so long was my dependency and need for love from everyone except God. I turned to others for love, for support, for discernment, for relief, not once thinking about laying it at His feet. The demons kept whispering in my ear that I shouldn’t, and I listened to them. My wounds that came from trying to solve spiritual things through earthly people only deepened. So now, here I am, turning my love, my attention, my eyes to God. He hears me and He is the only one who I know I can trust with my heart.
As my pal Tess says, “don’t put all your happy (or sad, mad, excited, scared, nervous, etc.) eggs in one basket… unless it’s God’s.”
And with a little research, conversation with my girls, and prayer, I am learning what it looks like to be a good steward of His authority. I encourage you to read a little bit more into what I found in my research on Our Authority in Christ ( http://www.seekingtruth.co.uk/authority_in_Christ.htm ).
As you read, remember the five questions to ask yourself:
Is it scriptural?
Does it come to pass?
Do other Christians confirm it?
Does it bear fruit?
God bless, everyone! I miss every one of you.
