The theme of soul ties and how they affect you has been comng up alot in my life the past month.
I heard about it the first time when my squad leader Rachel shared her testimony and how she broke her soul ties. Then it came up again when my squad mate Caleb was talking with me one day in Ukraine and how he broke his soul ties with an ex girlfriend.
Then on the Friday before leaving Ukraine I went up to the 3rd floor of the home we were staying in with my teammates Lydia, Hannah and Ashley to have a time of soaking prayer. We all laid down and put on soft music and just listened for whatever God might have to say to us. During that time I felt stuck to the floor and just like God was saying to me that it was time to finally let go and cut ties with my ex once and for all. That whatever pieces of me I had handed over were to be taken back. Now if you know me from home you know the break up was a long time ago and that I have been ok for a while now. What you dont know is that I gave my heart away to him almost completely. I made him my rock. I put him in a place that wasn't suppost to be his. The Lover of my soul was wooing me back to Him and asking for my WHOLE heart to become His again. He asked me to cut the ties that night. However I wanted to do it on my terms. I wanted my team leader Lindsay and my friend Caleb and my squad leader Rachel to be with me to do it. The catch is that they had all gone into the city for the Ukrainain Independace day fireworks. So I chose to wait. I talked with Lindsay as soon as she got home, but we had an experince that needed to be talked about with our hosts, so again I waited. Lindsay didn't get back to our room until 1:30am and I'd gotten into bed. She asked if I'd like to still do it that night and I said no I'm to tired. I had talked about it with the girls I did the soaking prayer with and that I felt God was asking for it to happen that night. The next day Hannah came up to me and asked me if I did it or was going to soon. The timing was already screwed up though. We spent all day Saturday in the city to take care of last mintue things before leaving early Sunday morning for debrief in Moldova.
We arrived at debrief after a 14 hour bus ride on Sunday evening and had to hike up a hill with our packs because our bus couldn't make it up the way to skinny road. We started debrief and had bible teaching and worship. The week was starting off with just being filled up more and hearing God. Well what He had to say to me was "It's time to cut the ties" It hadn't changed and the timing wasn't as important as much as the OBEYING.
The one night Diane (a wonderful squadmate who is so alive in Christ) got up on a chair and claimed freedom over us and opened the chair up for whoever needed it. As the chair got more and more use I started to feel such an urgency to cut those soul ties. I found Lindsay on the side and just made the snip snip motion. She stood with me as I prayed and claimed back my heart and claimed wholeness in this realm and the spiritual realm. That my heart was now whole and for my Lover, Christ Jesus. Lindsay encouraged me to proclaim it in front of the squad. So I got in front of the whole squad and spoke it out. I was ambushed by my teammates and friends as they came around me and hugged me and encouraged me. My heart is His now, it is made whole in His love.
I spent the next morning spending time with God and He gave me these verses, Hosea 2:19 and 20 in the NLT it reads as "I will make you my wife forever, showing you righteousness and justice, unfailing love and compassion. I will be faithful to you and make you mine, and you will finally know me as the Lord." What a wonderful promise!
Then that night Deon had us close our eyes and ask God what he said about us, what He says our identity is. I got zip! I didn't hear anything, I didn't get any visions or anything. But He gave my friend Danielle who was sitting beside me a vision of me as a princess in a tower looking for my prince and that I was wearing a beautiful blue dress. But what God was saying was that my prince will come to me, he will pursue me. But right now he has his own battles to fight and can't come to me yet. I need to wait and let myself be pursued. Which was so funny to me. I had prayed that someone, anyone really, would pursue me earlier that day. I went to the swings and started to swing and two people came up to me and started talking to me. They had pursued me. Deon then called down some people to share about what God had said about them. After sharing the chair came out again. Danielle had gotten up and walked down near the chair. Deon called to her "do you have anything to share?" Danielle replied with "No, I had a vision for Mary" EVERYONE turned to look at me and I tried to duck down behind the man in front of me. I wasn't called down. I felt though that I was to share. So I shared about my prayer from earlier in the day and what the vision had been. I am being pursued by Someone who loves me with UNFAILING love and shows me compassion. I am falling more in love with Him!
My prayer now is that you will let Him pursue you too. His love is truly amazing and is just so good!
