Sitting in a cafe in Varna, Bulgaria trying to think of what God wants me to share with you and how exactly to word it is a little bit overwhelming. There has been so much that has happened over the last almost three months. It is hard to believe that there are words that are sufficient to describe it. I’m going to say this now, this blog is not going to be a standard update blog about our ministry and where we are headed next. This one is going to be personal and I hope that what I write will help you to come to know me a little better, and who knows maybe you will learn something too. 🙂
Over the last few month having a personal relationship with God has taken on a whole new meaning in my life. Sure I have been a Christian all my life and I can pinpoint times in my life when I could see God working in my life, but looking back now I can see that there was a piece that I hadn’t yet comprehended. What is that? The short answer is that it never crossed my mind that having a relationship with Jesus is two directional. I had always known that we would pray and He would listen, then maybe if you prayed enough and it was His will then your prayers may be answered. This was the way I viewed it most of my life. It was one way communication, me to God. Over the course of the last couple years I have slowly learned more and more about God and what it really looks like to have a relationship with Him. The push and the calling to go on this World Race was the first time that I felt like God was telling me something. This was the first time I had ever felt that maybe this relationship actually had two way communication. I had heard stories about visions, words, and other things that people said they had gotten from the Lord, but I never really understood what that meant. Coming into the World Race I started to see more and more of this. At training camp we talked about listening prayer and what it meant to sit and listen to what the Lord has to say to you. While we had done some listening prayer during Training Camp, Launch and through out month one I never really felt like He had said anything. I thought maybe I just wasn’t listening hard enough.
The first time I heard the Lord was at our first debrief in Belgrade, Serbia. All of the girls of our squad were sitting together in a room for girl time. Erika our squad mentor asked us to ask God for an image of what we would look like when we finish the Race. Sitting in that crowded room with my eyes closed and wondering what exactly everyone else was thinking I heard it. It wasn’t an image like we were told to ask for, but just one word. That word? The word was Radiant. The only thought that ran through my head after that was, Woah! Later, I sat sitting and contemplating first off was that really God who gave me that or did I just somehow come up with that word on my own. I decided to look up and see if their were any verses that used the word Radiant, maybe that would help. There were several starting with a couple in Exodus, then some in Psalms, Jeremiah, and Luke. Skipping over Exodus I was drawn to one of the Psalms. It just felt right. The verse says, “Those who look to Him for help will be radiant with joy; no shadow of shame will darken their faces.” Psalm 34:5 jumped of the page at me. We had been talking over the course of the month about things that we have struggled with over the years. For those of you who don’t know my story I invite you to look back at some of my earlier blogs that will tell you that prior to my move back to Colorado to be with my family I struggled with feelings of shame in regard to failure, as well as self-worth, and body-image. To see these words was so moving and this was just the beginning! Over the course of the next month I continued to go to the Lord in prayer. I have learned that the Lord presents us with different ways of communicating. Sometimes it may be an image, sometimes a word, other times it will be in the form of another person. While I am not going to share them all now I will share a couple more things that He has given me. One in the middle and the final one which triggered a revelation in my heart.
We were sitting on the floor in New Hope Church in Draganesti-Olt, Romania. Each morning, this being all squad month, the whole squad would meet for worship and then prayer intersession. I was in the corner up against a wall and we were doing listening prayer for some of our squadmates who felt that God may be calling them to Romania sometime after the Race. I have learned that while it is good to have a direction during listening prayer that it is important to stay open and give God space to communicate anything. This time he gave me an image. Do you remember playing the online games where you would build things and when you selected the building and where to put the blocks they would fall from the sky only to land brick by brick into place. Okay hold that image and then picture that God has torn down the previous structure and is now rebuilding brick by brick a new house and this new house is strong and can withstand any storm. This was the image God showed me. He gave me words to go with it. He said, “I am your house built on solid rock.” I again looked for a passage that might talk about this. I came upon Psalm 18:1-3 which says, “I love you, O Lord, my strength. The Lord is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. I call to the Lord who is worthy of praise, and I am saved from my enemies.” This was a beautiful image to me and it gave me confidence and courage. I had felt that the past several years, continued in training camp and into the Race that God had taken my life apart until there was nothing except a clean slate. He then was working slowly to restore each piece in Him.
The final revelation that I am going to share is very personal and quite literally moved me to tears when I realized just what it meant to me. Our last week in Romania I had the chance to be in a prayer group led by an American woman, Christiana, who returned to serve in Romania after her own World Race. She sat down and asked the circle a question. One that I strongly encourage you all to ask yourselves. She asked us what Jesus represented for us. She went on to explain that each of us has a void in our hearts that can only be filled by Jesus. It looks different for each of us. The example she used was that for someone who grew up without a father, Jesus may fill that place their heart, or someone who has struggled with relationships He may fill the place of love. She asked if anyone would share what they thought the answer was for them. When it came to me my first thought was worth, but that was very quickly replaced by the word Stability. At the same moment I said it, Christiana looked right at me and said it as well.
~ Bear with me! I know that it has taken me a lot of words to get back to the title of this blog entry, but I felt you needed the background first! 🙂
Two nights before we were scheduled to leave Romania to go to Bulgaria I was sitting in the hallway in the mission house where our squad was staying. (Yes, that is right, all 41 of us plus 3 members of our leadership team! All in one house.) It was about 11:30 at night and I was writing my journal. I have come to find that one of the best ways for me to talk to God is to write a journal that is essential a conversation with God as well as a way to write down my prayer requests and our day to day activities. In addition to all of that being the external processor that I am it comes in handy when you need to talk over things and the best person to take them to is the Lord! I am going to share with you a slightly edited version of what I wrote that night.
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Tonight, I got a glimpse of that place in my heart that is Yours. It was so bright and it was shining outward through me. The void that had been there was filled with Your glorious light. Abba, I pray that that shining light will only get more brilliant as I grow in my relationship with you. I spent part of the afternoon reflecting on some of what you have been showing me over the last week, week and a half. It is incredible how it all ties together. You are my stability. My issues with self-worth and self-doubt were where you started. You abolished the ideas and misconceptions that I have lived under for so many years. You sat me down and reminded me that I am beautiful, You love me unconditionally, and that I am worthy of all types love. From there you worked towards the root of it all. Now that I am thinking about it more it started even before all of this. You pulled me out of a depression and a situation where I had no roots and nothing to hold me down. You literally took me from the hard place and set my feet on solid ground. You slowly rebuilt your house. A house where you were the cornerstone, the anchor, and the mortar that holds all the pieces together. You are my house on solid rock. That was the phrase you gave me along with the image of brick houses being rebuilt in you piece by piece restored. Writing those words just now absolutely floored me. That is literally the name of the song that Jeremi wrote not even two weeks before I left on the Race. I knew it was special, but listening to it now, there are no coincidences with you Lord. I feel like this was written for me. I seriously just cried listening to it. The words he wrote speak directly into everything I just wrote and everything that You have been showing me. Piece by piece, breath by breath all my past you are restoring. You never abandon me. You are my stability. You are my house on solid rock, you are my anchor. You restored my past and my soul. You gave me the word Radiant and the verse “Those who look to Him for help will be Radiant with joy; no shadow of shame will darken their faces.” Jeremi’s song says you traded my shame for joy. I just saw yet another piece of the puzzle. The image and words You gave me earlier today. When we lay at the feet of the Lord, He pulls us into an embrace with the love of the Father. The image You gave me was of a person who was lying at your feet and you pulled them up into your arms and embraced them with so much love that it overflowed. Abba, Father, thank you for revealing this to me tonight. The image you gave me tonight of that void having been filled with that shining light that had overtaken all of the darkened corners and overflowed to shine through me. Abba, I pray that I never lose that image in my head. I pray that I will be able to go back there and remember where You are and all that you have restored in my life. There are no words sufficient to explain what I just experienced. It was so beautiful and phenomenal. I am set speechless and in tears.
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What I have come to realize now is that the word Stability hold so much more significance than I could have ever imagined. It is truly an umbrella word that every experience and trial I have ever had can fit under. Most importantly it has given me strength and courage to know that whenever I am having a hard time seeing Jesus in the places we go or in the experiences that we have that I never have to look far. He is ever with me and he dwelling in my heart in that void and he fills it so fully that His light Radiates and fills every darkened corner and shines through any barrier. As I was writing this God gave me yet another verse that fits this perfectly. Luke 11:36 says, “If you are filled with light, with no dark corners, then your whole life will be radiant, as though a floodlight were filling you with light.” I can only feel filled with excitement and joy to see where He will take me! I hope this has given you a glimpse into where my heart is and just how much my World Race experience has already changed my life. It is only month 3 and I can already see the changes that He has made in my heart and in my life. I am even more excited to know that this is only the beginning and that there is so much more to come.
God Bless!
Sara
~ Anyone curious about the song that I wrote about it is Piece by Piece by Jeremi Richardson.
~ Ps. Jeremi, if you have had the opportunity to read this, thank you so much for the song and for just being you. It has meant so much more to me than I can say! You have marked not just this turning point, but several others in my life as well.
