This blog has taken a year to write.
July 3rd, 2011. Tears falling from my face. Snot stuffed up in my nose. I see her face, it mirrors mine. “God told me to break up with you.” How I describe it is only a shadow of the depths of the emotion that I felt: “Like someone pulled a rug out from under me as they punched me in the soul and stabbed me in the back repeatedly.”
Her words pierce my heart and we both cry more. We were very close to that “next step”… engagement.
God was moving. He was not satisfied with the direction of my life, yet He allowed me to walk in my plans so that I might feel the valley that this breakup would lead me to. Why would He let me go through the pain? So that I could feel the surpassing joy of being loved by Him. So I could feel the joy of being lovesick with Him!
I’m convinced that we must go through valleys. If your life hasn’t gone through “the suck” yet, get ready. It’s not depressing at all, I promise, there’s joy just under the soil that is ready to burst forth.
Ask for it! Philippians 3: I want to share in Christ’s suffering so that I can know the power of the resurrection! What? Paul, that sounds foolish! Oh but he is so right! We will walk with Jesus in unending glory right after these present (short) hardships, because we are co-heirs with Jesus who are sharing with Him in suffering.
And don’t you forget that as the Redeemed, God works ALL THINGS together for our good. Which means that everything, good and bad, comes from the hand of the Father. He allows the pain, He permits the enemy to roar at times, Dad works it all out, regardless.
Romans 8 says that we are co-heirs with Jesus and we will share in His suffering! Dad wants to shape you. He wants to chisel away the things that are not you. He wants to make you beautiful. It’s a process, and sometimes it sucks. Sometimes it hurts so bad that all you can do is cry out to Him from your knees, literally- on the floor with tears and snot and all of it. Real, raw…. This is worship. For the sacrifices of God are a broken and contrite heart. He wants it more than our songs and acts (Psalm 51:17)! For us to be real and not try to hide behind fig leaves like our first father and mother did.
Dad loves those moments more than the times we are singing like crazy if our hearts are not in it. He wants to be glorified, He will be lifted high. Choose to praise Him not only when life is beautiful, but also when the beauty is a bit hard to see at first.
God shattered my life in an array of awfully jagged pieces. I wanted to be married to that girl, I wanted to be in grad school to become what I’ve always wanted to be. I wanted my plans to come to fruition! But God had plans in store for my life that I was not seeing, that I didn’t even want. He was calling me to the Nations. To join Him in His plan and work of redeeming all peoples to Himself. And this awful situation was the beginning of that mission.
I fasted. I prayed. I wept bitterly. And I waited. I asked and asked and asked for Him to give her back. For my life to go back to the way it was. God always answers prayers, and more often than not those answers are not how we thought.
Some truth from the fantastic book The Circle Maker, “What seemed like the wrong answer turned out to be the best answer.” So true!
To keep this post from becoming redundant and crazy long, I’ll sum up what God has done since that dark last July. He rearranged all the pieces of my life abundantly better than it was before and has woven Himself into the fabric of it. He put His desires in my heart as He walked with me through the brokenness. God showed me how small my plans were and how much better, truly better, His are.
So thank You, Father. Thank You so much for not letting me settle for my self-serving and minuscule plans. Thank You for breaking idols and for taking Your rightful place. I am filled with gratitude and I joyfully agree with Psalm 119, “it is good for me that I was afflicted, that I could learn your decrees” (v. 71). Augustine takes words from my spirit, “In my deepest wound, I saw Your glory, and it dazzled me.” And I cry out thank You, Papa, for calling me by new names: Holy, Beloved, Sought Out, Redeemed of the Lord, Son.
This July 3rd I will reunite with my family, F-Squad. All the tears will be back again in Dulles airport like they were a year ago in my car. But these will be tears of lavish joy! Joy in the amazing providential blueprint of Papa-God bursting forth, joy in the crazy love that I have for my entire squad, joy in the love that we have from Dad and joy in the amazing plan of revolution that He is walking us in!
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