Freedom Focus (written 7/29)
Wow. So, a teammate gave me some feedback that forced me to take a long look at and sit with the Lord. Feedback is a culture the World Race uses in order to cultivate honest community. Feedback can look like powerful encouragement and/or constructive criticism. All feedback is meant to help one another grow to become more like Christ, so I take every piece of it to the Lord.
I knew in that moment as I shared with my team my heart, my gratitude for the feedback and my desire to surrender all this before the Lord, that j needed to spend a decent amount of time sitting before God. So I decided to take two days to fast from speaking.
That’s right, Jessica Erin Aeppli, didn’t speak for 48 hours.
I so deeply thank the Holy Spirit for placing that on my heart. It was such a time of freedom and life and peace and renewal and focus. I fully expected God to give me and my stubborn heart a new, more strict set of boundaries, but God blew my expectations of what would come from this time completely out of the water.
As I spent time in silence with the Lord, watching sermons, reading the Bible, praying, resting- the Lord gave me more questions than answers.
1. What’s my glitch? In my areas of weakness and faults, God is seen standing strong and sovereign. Think about it, if Paul was as good of a preacher as Apollos, he may never have picked up a pen. We may not have much of a New Testament. So, God asked me to look at my “glitches” to see where He may want to show up in glory. Seek.
2. What does God love about me? God thinks more good thoughts about me every second than I could imagine. He wants me to ask Him what they are and invite me into His love for me. Ask.
3. What are my pieces? Just like a puzzle piece doesn’t look like the picture, so the pieces of my life don’t look like God’s whole plan for me. He asked me to take a step back and look at all the “pieces” of my life to perhaps get a glimpse of what He has laid out for me. Discover.
4. What do I need to stabilize in order to see strength? Just like in the human body, if joints aren’t stable, it wouldn’t matter how strong a person is, they will be weak. The Lord took me to the story of Sampson. At the end of Sampson’s life he braced himself on the pillars to be stable when he couldn’t see. The “pillars” God showed me were from a sermon: emotions, commitment, ambition, relationships and belief. Stabilize.
5. What are my whale, my worm and my wind? Just as the Lord provided these things for Jonah, it took Jonah some time to say that God “provided” these seemingly awful things for him. So, what things has God provided for me, to become more life Him, to be shaped, to be grateful? Gratitude.
So I took more time to sit with the Lord so that He could help me answer these questions and he has.
At the end of my time the biggest revelation came. As I was still expecting stricter boundaries, God told me this:
Instead of avoiding sin, get to know your Father.
ABIDE. Fix yours eyes.
But wait, there’s more. Stay tuned for the next episode of Jess’s journey.
(sermons were from Pastor Stven Furtick via the Elevation Church App)
