“Falling is easy, but staying in love is hard. Hard to be honest and keep our heart open, to be who we truly are. Without the excuses. Without the facade. There’s no pretending here in your love.”
These words hit home right about now. After being on the Race for a month, the things I had once found joy and intimacy in became mundane and dormant. Spending time with the Lord felt more like routine than excitement. I felt like I had lost all authenticity in myself. I was longing for the feeling of real and honest worship, to feel it in my bones and know every single word to be true. Instead, I had traded true intimacy for performance without even realizing it.
I realized I had the option to either continue to put up a show for people, or actually fight for connection with the Lord again. That morning one of our leaders spoke about making our faith our own. I realized that I feel closest to the Lord when I’m put back into a position of leaning again. I needed something to put my need for him in perspective again. Sometimes the material things I call “blessings” can actually make me so comfortable that I forget that every single moment, every breath is an act of grace given by the Lord. I don’t deserve any of it, but He gives anyways. What a shame for me to rely on the gifts more than the Giver.
I knew from the start the things I cling to when I need comfort: sleep, social media, but mostly food. These are the worldly things that I’ve convinced myself will satisfy me when I’m tired or I miss home or I want to drown out what I’m feeling. Sometimes I convince myself that I’m just “winding down” or “taking a break,” when in reality I am attempting to satisfy my need for the Lord with worldly things.
In the moment the Holy Spirit convicted me of this tendency of mine, I knew what He was calling me to do: He was calling me to take something out of the picture so that He could take His rightful place in my life, to restore the genuineness of our relationship. Some people call it fasting.
A BIG OLE DISCLAIMER:: the purpose of this blog is not to boast about my experience with fasting. It’s not to make myself seem more holy or to make myself look better than I am. Nope. The vision I have for this blog is, simply put, 2 Corinthians 12:9.
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
This verse came to life when I decided to turn to Abba in the moments where I once turned to food or my phone. I learned that I truly do need Him to sustain me every second of every day. There is not a moment that goes by that He is not putting breath in my lungs and energy in my body. And when I feel drained or famished or exhausted, all I have to do is ask Him to fill me up, and that is exactly what He does. He does not call us into hard circumstances without promising He will walk with us through it all. No, He actually calls us out of the comforts of our material things to show us His power and pursuit of us.
In the midst of the most uncomfortable circumstances I’ve ever been in, He reintroduced me to the sweetness and the fullness of His love again. I came face to face with my weakness, but also face to face with His unmatchable power. “That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
2 Corinthians 12:10
