I’m Dying.
On October 22nd, in Dobromirka, Bulgaria, everything in my life got wrecked, shook, and flipped upside down. I was standing with a wavering in my legs as a recently acquainted, mostly still stranger of a Bulgarian woman prayed for me with her hand on my shoulder. Her words were spirit-filled and I was overwhelming myself with thoughts.
“Are you Jewish? Anyone Jewish in your family?” She asked me.
“No, not that I know of.” I answered pretty confused.
“Okay. The Lord keeps giving me that word.” She continued to listen to the Lord with her hand on my shoulder. A couple minutes passed before she continued with her prophesy. “God has given you gifts for the Jewish people. He wants you to surrender your gifts totally to Him, and God will use them to reach the masses. If you surrender in trust and obedience, He will use you in a great way for the Jewish people. God wants His people to return to Him through Christ and His love and grace for them.”
My mind was going a thousand miles an hour. I raced through all the possible meanings of this prophecy for my future. A couple days later, I finally had time to really reflect and ask God about it. I sent an email to my mentors, leaders, and wise friends seeking prayer and advice. They all provided great wisdom, and I’m very thankful to have such amazing influences in my life.
As I sat and pondered the gravity of this possible future, I tried to just relax and talk to God. He showed me some amazing things. I can’t see in to the future. I don’t know what this prophecy will look like in fulfilment. But God gave it to me in that moment for a reason. He wanted to teach me about Him. He wanted to reveal things to me in a new way. He wanted to give me a big picture and see if I would focus on the tiny brush strokes. He wanted to see if I could be obedient. He is helping me to be.
I felt the need to make a promise to God. I stood on a little pavilion, shouting joyfully to my Lord in the cold Bulgarian rain.
“Lord, today I die to myself. Let no ounce or millimeter of me return to my worldly ways. Let me be so close to you that your light destroys any darkness near me. Every thought, word, action, decision, desire, gift, passion. It’s all yours. My life is yours. Let me not dwell in this world, but in you. Let me walk in obedience every moment, let me trust you and live out your will. Let me be a man after your own heart, and let no portion of me or this world infiltrate your purpose for me. I pray to hear you clearly so that I may be obedient. I pray that you make your armor strong around me and protect me from my enemies and all evil. Let me learn so much from you that I don’t need to learn as much from my struggles and failures. Let me walk with you on level ground and not stumble. Let me be upright and blameless, so that I will never stand in the way of your glory. Lord use my gifts to make yourself truly known. Let me not hinder your work, but be a humble servant whose life is evidence of your love, truth, and glory. Cast away pride, envy, lust, greed, idolatry, selfishness, and all evil spirits and distractions. Put your foot on the devil’s neck so he can’t trip me up. Help me be focused on you and your goodness every second of every day. I have no power to accomplish your will, but with you I can do all things that are of your will and for your glory. Use me, send, help me, guide me, gift me, bless me, talk to me, correct me, make me yours. Let these words be your will. Selah. Amen.”
I’ve spent a portion of my life believing everything happens for a reason in God’s will. This isn’t quite true in the way I had understood it. God works all things together for good, but not all things HAVE to happen for a reason. His will isn’t just the series of events that unfold in our life. His will isn’t just a movie of our life that we spectate and watch happen to us and hope to arrive at.
God’s will is something we have to actively choose to seek in every moment of every day. He is constantly showing us His will and we get to choose to pursue it.
God’s will is for us to surrender all to Him, love one another unconditionally, and share the truth of Christ’s sacrificial love with everyone.
God’s will is to renew our minds daily, allow us to ignore all the distractions of this world, and focus wholly on Him.
God’s will is to die to ourselves, take up our cross daily and follow Him.
I am no longer seeing the world as it is. I am no longer seeing the world as I am. I am choosing to see the world as God wants me to see it. Literally everything on this earth is meaningless except that which is of God and for God. He has asked me to draw so close to Him and know Him so much better. It’s changing each day. It’s changing my life. It’s destroying every worry, judgment, negative thought, doubt, and fear. It’s allowing me to walk in freedom, victory, joy, optimism, truth, and love. For the first time in my life.
I’ve been aiming to follow Christ for 15 years, and I feel like I am just now scratching the surface of knowing who God really is. He loves us so incredibly much. He is with us at all times, just desperately wanting to love us and be our best friend, our cornerstone, our guide, our joy, our love, our everything. If we could all just see that and grasp it, it would change everything.
Here is a great song that I think encompasses this idea: Praise the Lord by Crowder
One of my teammates shared with us a question that someone had posed in a sermon: “If literally everything in your life got stripped away, loved ones, possessions, comforts, every last thing stripped away, would God be enough to keep you going?”
God has been teaching me and growing me so much lately. He is showing me the answer to this question because there can only be one. The answer is yes, but we have to choose to make it yes. God can be our everything and He wants to be. We have to allow Him. We have to say yes.
Saying yes requires something so incredibly difficult. It takes a literal selflessness. It takes CHOOSING to strip away all things that aren’t of God and for God. It takes choosing to deny yourself everything to follow God in trusting obedience every moment of every day.
Fortunately, we have God to help us with this because we can’t do it on our own. We simply have to ask for it, and He will show us unimaginable love and blessings. So go ahead and ask. I pray that you ask, and I pray that you are obedient with what God asks you in return.
In the spirit of obedience, I’m choosing to take a small step in dying to myself. As soon as we land in Kuala Limpur, Malaysia, I will be going off the grid. My cellphone will be zipped away in my pack for the entire month. No distraction form social media, emails, photography, or music. God has asked me to do this to make more room for Him. I want to know Him more, to learn from Him more, and to make God my everything. I want to have the time and focus to be in constant communication with my Father. He doesn’t miss a thing, so why would I want to? I want more of God and less of this world.
“Then Jesus told his disciples, ‘If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?”’
-Matthew 16:24-26
This is everything. All of human existence boils down to only one purpose:
God will take care of the rest.
