It is such a small word, yet has such large and debilitating effects on our lives. Doubt is something that I have allowed to rule and shape my life.
It eats your freedom, causes anxiety and masks your dreams. Yet it wasn’t in one area of my life. It was a disease that spread throughout all areas of my life. I believe it is one of Satan’s most powerful and deadly tools he uses to separate us from the beautiful freedom that is handed to us by our Savior, Jesus. Yet, I find that we tend to choose doubt above freedom. Disease above healing. Anxiety above peace. Unbelief above trust. It cost my freedom. It cost my dreams.
During the month of March, God was showing me the doubt in my life. He gently, but persistently pursued my heart. He wanted it all. He wanted my trust to be border-less. Yet, the doubt in my heart was covering it. I became so distraught because I was going home in 2 months and heaven forbid, I had no dreams! What was I going to do? I was lost. I was losing even more trust. The doubt was winning. The month before, God had given me so much freedom and I began to dream some more. But now the dreams were gone. After struggling with God on this, He told me that He took away my dreams because I was doubting the One who made them and gave them to me. It was humbling but I saw a side of God that was new to me. His gentle and loving discipline amazed me.
It was a new level of realization that my Father wants all of me. He wants the anxiety and doubt. They can’t stand a chance in the presence of God. I also can’t go two different directions at once. This last month in Swaziland, one of the girls did a short devotional and spoke about when Jesus and Peter walked on the water. She mentioned how there are different steps of faith in the story. First, when Peter asked Jesus if He could meet him on the water, second when he got out of the boat, and third when Peter was sinking and asked for help because doubt set in. I realized that I ask God to meet him on the water but most of the time I don’t have enough faith and trust to step outside of the boat.
I want to leave that behind me. I want “walking on water” to be a natural and everyday choice. I don’t want to automatically think about the most “logical” option or plan with the most security. I want to be willing to risk stepping out of the boat when the odds are that I will fail if God doesn’t come through. I want to live that type of life in trust. And as soon as I decided to walk that life and choose in daily, God started to show up in some cool ways. When you daily ask the Lord to remove all doubt from your life, He will definitely bring it up into your face and slowly give you opportunities to act upon that change.
So instead of having a freedom-less and anxiety filled life, I choose to walk in freedom, trust and daily step out of the boat and onto the water.
This is where I spent my time with Jesus in Swaziland last month!
————————————————————————————————————–
I am still in need of $700 by May 20th in order to get to visit the squad in July!
